A thousand people in Utah could lose their housing under possible federal cuts, according to the National Alliance to End Homelessness. Advocates fear they’ll end up homeless, having lost trust in service providers.
The estimate reflects Utahns currently living in permanent supportive housing, which serves people with disabilities. They receive vouchers to pay rent and additional support services like case management or job training.
The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development was on track to change its guidelines for homeless services grants, capping how much providers can spend on permanent supportive housing and assigning more money to temporary transitional housing, which prepares people to live on their own without government support.
The new standards align with the Trump administration’s push away from the housing first model, outlined in a July executive order. Housing first programs get people into a permanent living situation without requiring them to be sober or get mental health treatment first. But they’ve been unpopular with conservatives like the Manhattan Institute and President Donald Trump, who argues it doesn’t promote treatment or accountability.
There is still a lot of uncertainty. The government withdrew the new guidelines an hour before court hearings were set to begin in two lawsuits against the changes, according to the Rhode Island Current.
Heather Hogue, a project coordinator with the Mountainland Continuum of Care, a coalition of homeless services organizations in Utah, Summit and Wasatch counties, expects the new guidelines, whenever they come, to be similar. She’s working on getting plans together, so she’s not tracking people down over Christmas.
“The nastiness of the thing is the abruptness and the uncertainty of the thing,” she said. “If we had a year to ramp up, two years to ramp up, we could figure this out. We could start shifting.”
Now, though, she sees the funding guidelines as a lose-lose situation. With a cap on money that can go to permanent supportive housing, programs won’t have the funds to keep providing vouchers, she said, forcing landlords to evict residents who can no longer pay.
“We're talking about millions of dollars of economic impact just to our private landlords,” she said. “It's a hell of a way to punish somebody for taking a chance on somebody that's a little higher risk.”
She fears voucher recipients will lose faith in advocates.
“We are now the system that has screwed them over again,” she said.
And people in permanent supportive housing can’t simply switch to transitional, Hogue said. They have limited independence and a high need for services, often for the rest of their lives.
“Transitional housing will buy them two years, but the disabling condition is still going to linger after that, and they're going to need those services. And then what?”
Hogue is looking to apply for federal funds for programs that align with the administration’s priorities, like additional case management and outreach workers. She and other advocates are also thinking about asking the Utah Legislature for support.
“We need some one-time funding here to keep people in housing through the end of their lease, at least, you know, so we don't have evictions and private landlords,” she said. “We're going to be going after asks like that pretty aggressively, because it's such an acute and immediate need.”
In Utah County, where she works, domestic violence survivors make up a large portion of people in permanent supportive housing, she said. Those with behavioral health issues and physical disabilities also stand to lose their housing.
Kristy Chambers, CEO of the Columbus Community Center, a disability service provider in Salt Lake City, called the move away from permanent supportive housing “tragic.”
Still, she sees her organization as well-positioned to try to address the need. It provides housing, training on independent living and job placement for adults with intellectual disabilities and autism. If more funding becomes available for those types of services, Columbus could eventually step in and serve others who currently rely on permanent housing, she said.
“We know how to do the necessary job supports. We have relationships with employers who are looking for people to be employed. So we come well prepared with all of that,” she said.
But it’s not a home run. She worries there won’t be enough affordable units for people to rent once they lose their permanent supportive housing vouchers or finish their time in transitional housing. She would love to see the administration’s new priorities succeed, but she’s skeptical.
“I applaud the aspiration of it all,” she said.
Read more: Homeless advocates worry about local funding as Utah aligns with Trump exec order
Macy Lipkin is a Report for America corps member who reports for KUER in northern Utah.
