Ten-Year Plan highlights
The Ten-Year Plan lays out a series of five key strategies and actions, with clear goals and measurable outcomes. Below is a brief review of our accomplishments under each of the key strategies to date - impressive not only for their magnitude, but also for their effectiveness.
Preventing homelessness
Local prevention programs helped over 5,000 people to avoid homelessness through emergency assistance. King County, Bellevue, Kent, Kirkland and Seattle have increased homeless prevention funding, as did the Seattle Foundation, Medina Foundation and United Way of King County.
Outreach services to homeless people and access to treatment services have improved, thanks, in part of funding from the voter-approved Veterans and Human Services Levy. Discharge planning for people exiting hospitals and jails was enhanced. These improvements helped to provide the stability so crucial to preventing homelessness.
Help people move rapidly from homelessness to housing
More than 4,000 individuals were able to leave homelessness according to the 2011 Annual Report. These successes included people in our nationally recognized programs that help people “graduate” from service-intensive housing to community housing.
A total of 5.046 new units of homeless housing has been created by the partners of the Committee to End Homelessness (2011 Annual Report, total at end of 2011). This cumulative total exceeds the entire ten-year plan goals of most major cities and counties around the nation. Our goal is 9,500 units.
Increased the efficiency of existing systems
The Funders Group, comprised of all the major funders committed to ending homelessness within King County, formed in 2008 to align resource and planning efforts focused on housing production and system efficiencies. The Funders Group was recognized by Harvard University’s Kennedy School of Government as one of the Top 25 Innovations in Government.
Build public and political will
The Committee to End Homelessness together with United Way of King County, the City of Seattle and many partners are working to keep the issues of homelessness and the creation of housing on the forefront of public awareness.
Measure and Report Progress
The Safe Harbors information management system (external) provides information and detailed reports on our point-in-time count of homeless persons and services provided across King County.
