The Continuum of Care program, which is used to help with housing for those in need, is at risk of losing some of its funding across the country, including in Nevada.
However, after a couple of months of fighting, things are starting to trend in the right direction.
In Nevada, the Continuum of Care program has three separate sections that focus on northern, rural, and southern Nevada.
Washoe County Housing and Homeless Services leads the program for the north.
It uses the funding mainly in two sectors. The first is permanent supportive housing, and the second is rapid rehousing programs that help with things such as rental assistance.
"Any cut to housing is a huge hit," said Catrina Peters, Human Services Coordinator, Washoe County. "We desperately need to maintain these dollars to end homelessness in Washoe County."
According to Peters, on November 13, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development said it was going to make drastic cuts.
"These were unexpected cuts that would have cut that program by $1.8 million, because this program provides that rental assistance for folks who are housed," she said. "Many of those folks would have had no choice but to return to homelessness."
Washoe County gets about $3 million in grants for its program per year.
Peters says 80 households in Washoe County would be impacted by these cuts.
Across the state, the National Alliance to End Homelessness says 925 people could lose housing.
It was that organization that started the fight to get the funding back.
"HUD was sued by the National Alliance for Ending Homelessness," Peters said. "There was a court date on December 8, and at that point in time, right before the court date, HUD withdrew the notice of funding opportunity in the grant application materials."
After some back and forth in the courtroom, a U.S. District Court Judge ordered HUD to restore applications for renewals.
"The judge subsequently issued a written warning, kind of further clarifying, maintaining the status quo, and directing HUD to move forward with establishing one-year renewals for these grants, which for us was a huge victory," Peters said. "While we don't have a final judgment yet, and we're awaiting that final judgment to ensure that those grants are going to be awarded."
Peters adds that one of the hardest issues for getting folks off the street is getting them into stable housing.Â
This program is one of the best ways to address it.
"We were facing a devastating blow with the loss of these funds," Peters said. "Kind of the most critical funding for us to serve, the hardest to serve people who have limited or zero income. People who are facing things like severe mental illness. We have very limited options to be able to house those folks."
Peters added that this funding was already approved by Congress for a two-year cycle. Typically, it's an annual process.
The next step in the process is to try to secure that second year of funding that was already promised.
