Can we end homelessness in America once and for all?

Idea exchange
May 2003

Can we end homelessness in America once and for all?

Bringing America Home: the Campaign: This national, broad-based initiative is dedicated to the goal of ending homelessness. The Campaign is founded on the principles and action of public education, grassroots organizing and support for progressive policies and legislation. It is founded on the principles that people need affordable housing, livable incomes, health care, education, and protection of their civil rights. The Bringing America Home Campaign is composed of a variety of efforts that address these causes of homelessness, including the following key elements of the Campaign:

The Bringing America Home Act
This comprehensive bill to be introduced in the 108th Congress includes resolutions putting Congress on record as supporting housing as a basic human right, Universal Health Care and a Living Wage; a dramatic expansion of federal resources for affordable housing and homelessness programs; a dramatic expansion of health care and services for people experiencing homelessness; greater income and work supports for people experiencing homelessness; temporary worker protections; and civil rights protections for people experiencing homelessness. The proposed legislation represents the most far-reaching initiative to date to address modern homelessness and is based on research, data, and the experience of front line providers and advocates.

The National Housing Trust Fund
A National Housing Trust Fund (H.R. 1102) should be established to serve as a source of revenue for the production of new housing, and the preservation or rehabilitation of existing housing that is affordable for low-income people. The initial goal of the National Housing Trust Fund is to produce, rehabilitate, and preserve 1,500,000 units of affordable housing by 2010.

Health Care Access Resolution
The Health Care Access Resolution directs Congress to enact legislation that guarantees every person in the United States, regardless of income, age, employment or health status, has access to affordable, quality, comprehensive health care. The resolution seeks to build the political will and the conceptual common ground for comprehensive reform.

Universal Living Wage Resolution
ULW is based on the premise that if a person works 40 hours a week, then he/she should be able to access basic housing. This resolution calls on Congress to enact legislation that Federal guidelines be established whereas no more than 30 percent of a person's gross monthly income should be spent on housing and that wages are based on the local cost of housing throughout the United States.

Temporary Worker Fairness & Protection Act
Temporary Workers work in an industry that is characterized by wage levels that keep workers in poverty as well as no job security, no health insurance, and inadequate worker protections. The Temporary Worker Fairness and Protection Act calls for federal legislation that offers day laborers the same rights and protections that are extended to permanent workers.

Civil Rights Protections for People Experiencing Homelessness
Legislation to prevent the criminalization of homelessness is included in the Bringing America Home Act. In addition, the National Coalition for the Homeless (NCH) calls on Congress to ensure that no voting qualification or prerequisite to voting, or standard, practice, or procedure shall be imposed or applied by any State or political subdivision to deny or abridge the right of any citizen of the United States to vote because that citizen resides at or in a nontraditional abode. NCH also calls on Congress for a GAO investigation and subsequent report into the nature and scope of violent acts and crimes that occur against people experiencing homelessness.

Reauthorization of the Head Start Act
Preschool-age children experiencing homelessness often face unique barriers to enrolling and succeeding in preschool. NCH recommends revisions to the Head Start program that will remove barriers to the full participation of children experiencing homelessness and increase their access to appropriate services.

Reauthorization of the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act
The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) provides students with disabilities with a wide array of substantive and procedural rights. In the upcoming reauthorization of IDEA, NCH recommends revisions that will ensure children in homeless situations are able to access the services and procedural rights that IDEA provides.

Click here to download this campaign form in .pdf form.

Please contact your Representative and ask him/her to become an original co-sponsor of the Bringing America Home Act, the National Housing Trust Fund, & the Health Care Access Resolution. To contact your member of Congress, please call the U.S. Capitol Switchboard at (202) 224-3121. For more information on the Bringing America Home Campaign, contact Brad Paul, (202) 737-6444 x13 or bpaul@nationalhomeless.org.

For more information:
Bringing America Home
National Coalition for the Homeless

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