New plans from the Trump administration signal a move away from long-term homelessness assistance toward short-term programs that impose work requirements, mandate treatment for mental illness or addiction and support law enforcement efforts to dismantle homeless encampments, according to media reports.
The policy shift appears in a 128-page funding notice for the Department of Housing and Urban Development’s Continuum of Care (CoC) program. The CoC network—made up of roughly 400 local organizations that distribute federal dollars to about 8,000 projects nationwide—oversees more than $3.9 billion in grants. These funds serve as the primary federal support system for people experiencing homelessness, including elderly and disabled individuals and historically have prioritized long-term, housing-based solutions.
Critics of the new approach say it would cut federal support for permanent housing programs by roughly two-thirds next year, potentially putting as many as 170,000 people at risk of returning to homelessness, according to the New York Times. They argue that the proposed shift undermines strategies such as Housing First, which provides permanent, subsidized apartments to people with disabilities or chronic homelessness without requiring sobriety, employment or treatment as prerequisites.
Supporters of the policy change contend the shift does not necessarily require widespread displacement. Devon Kurtz, an analyst with the conservative Cicero Institute, a Texas think tank advising the administration, said programs could retain funding by restructuring services to align with the new rules.
However, many providers say that adaptation is far more complicated than it sounds. Vivian Wan, chief executive of Abode Services in Fremont, Calif., which houses about 1,500 formerly homeless residents, argued that the new requirements ignore the structural drivers of homelessness, particularly severe housing shortages and high rents. The shift toward temporary aid, she said, effectively assumes people can achieve self-sufficiency within two years.
“There’s nothing I can do to tweak the program model to get people to afford rent when rent is so high,” she said.
The new notice also includes language allowing HUD to reject applications from organizations that “previously or currently” use policies that “facilitate racial preferences” or “use a definition of sex other than as binary in humans,” signaling potential changes in civil rights enforcement and eligibility standards for service providers.
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