Santa Clara County receives over $21 million for homeless housing

Santa Clara County will receive more than $21 million in federal grant funding for homeless housing programs, county officials announced Friday.

The funding is part of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development’s Continuum of Care (CoC) Competition. The award includes more than $1 million in new federal funding for housing assistance and supportive services for survivors of domestic violence.

About 7,400 individuals were homeless in Santa Clara County in 2017, according to census data.

“Lack of safe and affordable housing should not be a barrier to escaping violence in the home for families and individuals who live in our county,” said Protima Pandey, Director of the County of Santa Clara Office of Women’s Policy. “We are committed to working alongside our supportive housing colleagues to expand resources for survivors, children and families.”

The county will allocate the funding towards 19 permanent supportive housing projects, nine rapid rehousing and transitional housing projects, and county data management and planning.

In June 2018, HUD awarded over $2.1 billion in grant funding nationally for homeless aid programs.

Other agencies in the region will also be receiving grant funding, as HUD is allocating over $26 million in and around Santa Clara County.

Almost $2 million will go to San Jose’s Bill Wilson Center for aiding youth and young adults, about $807,000 to Gilroy’s St. Joseph’s Family Center, about $77,000 to Cupertino’s West Valley Community Services, about $423,000 to the YWCA of Silicon Valley and more than $813,000 to Fremont’s Abode Services.

Pilar Furlong, a spokeswoman for the Bill Wilson Center, said the money will help fund another year of work “to get kids off the street into safe and stable housing so we can provide them with the self sufficient skills to get them into permanent housing.”

“All great agencies listed here are doing great things in our county and we’re very grateful for the opportunity,” Furlong said.

“The County and our partnering organizations continue to receive this federal funding because our supportive housing system is so successful,” Supervisor Mike Wasserman, Chair of the Board’s Housing, Land Use, Environment and Transportation Committee, said in a news release Friday. “Since 2015, our collaboration has helped more than 6,000 people obtain permanent housing.”

Contact Kyle Martin at [email protected] or follow him @Kyle_Martin35 on Twitter.