The
Denton County Homelessness Leadership Team, a Collective Impact initiative managed by United Way of Denton County, has adopted the goal to end Veteran Homelessness by 2020 into its strategic plan, and City of Denton Mayor Chris Watts signed on to the national mayor's challenge in fall of 2018.
The
Mayors Challenge to End Veteran Homelessness is an interagency initiative launched in June 2014 led by the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs and the U.S. Interagency Council on Homelessness (
USICH). The goal of the initiative is to coordinate efforts among local, state, and federal agencies to develop partnerships with cities to end homelessness in their communities.
An end to Veteran homelessness means that ourcommunity will have a systematic response in place that ensures homelessness among Veterans is prevented whenever possible or is otherwise a rare, brief, and non-recurring experience. Specifically, the community will have the capacity to:
•Quickly identify and engage Veterans at-risk of and experiencing homelessness.
•Intervene to prevent the loss of housing and divert Veterans from entering the homeless service system.
•Provide immediate access to shelter and crisis services, without barriers to entry, while permanent stable housing and appropriate supports are being secured.
•When homelessness does occur, quickly connect Veterans to housing assistance and services—tailored to their unique needs and strengths—to help
The commitment to end Veteran Homelessness is a call to action for the entire community, a coordinated effort between leaders from across the public, private, and nonprofit sector. Individuals and businesses can make donations to the
Denton County Homelessness Barriers Fund, a fund which reduces barriers to housing by increasing resources for nonprofits working with families to promote housing stability and self-sufficiency. Landlords and property managers can join the effort by making units accessible to move the needle toward ending Veteran homelessness.
The collaborative county-wide efforts to address Veteran Homelessness includes the launch of the Denton County Veterans Center in 2017, securing HUD-Veterans Affairs Supportive Housing vouchers, and implementing a Coordinated Entry system so every person experiencing homelessness in Denton County can be identified and matched to appropriate services.
Denton County service providers continue to work tirelessly to collaborate and implement Coordinated Entry to better identify people experiencing homelessness, This data reflects a manageable number of Veteran households experiencing homelessness in Denton County, A number the community can work together to bring to zero by 2020.
Veteran Homelessness Data
The Denton County Homelessness Dashboard obtains data from a county-wide Homelessness Management Information System (HMIS) that assists emergency shelters, housing and supportive service providers to collect and store client data.
The United States Interagency Council on Homelessness (USICH), the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), and the Department of Veteran Affairs (VA) devleoped specific criteria and benchmarks to guide communities that are wanting to end Veteran homelessness. Through their criteria and benchmarks the community will be able to prove they have ended Veteran homelessness.
The United States Interagency Council on Homelessness (USICH) has identified the below Criteria & Benchmarks to measure community progress towards reaching our goal to End Veteran Homelessness. The image below represents our progress towards meeting those Criteria and Benchmarks. (Last updated 7/6/2020).
Past Benchmark Updates
DENTON COUNTY HOMELESSNESS DASHBOARD
