People with histories of homelessness and criminal justice involvement face high barriers and a more constrained housing market than the average American. Beyond affordability concerns, people with jail and homelessness histories face overlapping barriers including tenant screenings, housing affordability, and the need for additional services. This often leads to a harmful and costly homelessness-jail cycle, in which people are unable to access or afford housing, and as a result, are more likely to experience homelessness and be reincarcerated because of quality-of-life offenses, such as loitering.
The Just Home project is working with 10 sites to develop housing for people with histories of jail incarceration. Many people in the target population have had difficult experiences with the criminal justice and homelessness response systems, forging distrust toward institutions and straining efforts to successfully house them, particularly because of the lack of participant-led solutions.
The Just Home project provides three examples of how local communities successfully engaged affected individuals and communities to better understand their barriers to housing and the solutions that resonate locally.
1. Identify and leverage existing community services and organizations to design engagement and support strategies.
Local partners bring unique insights on service needs, are already well connected to local communities, and are responsive to community need—an essential resource in the planning and design process (PDF) tailored to Just Home participants.
In Minnehaha County, the team focused on two housing approaches, one of which included a low-barrier housing model with comprehensive services and case management to support people transitioning out of jail. This group disproportionately included Native women. Yet team members noted that past attempts to enroll Native women often failed, in part because they lacked culturally appropriate therapies.
To address this, the county partnered with South Dakota Urban Indian Health, a health clinic and community organization that works with people with Native ties or roots. Relying on their expertise, the county included a broader spectrum of therapeutic options and advocated for space to engage in spiritual practices, hired program coordinators to facilitate Wellbriety holistic healing classes, and talking and beading circles. Partnering with culturally competent service providers has improved program engagement and participation as people return for additional sessions.
Similarly, the team in San Francisco is building housing for young people exiting custody with a history or at risk of high utilization, who need access to public services but distrust government and the criminal justice system. To ensure success in housing design, the city’s Department of Homelessness and Supportive Housing partnered with a local nonprofit: 3rd Street Youth Center and Clinic. Backed by a history of trusted service delivery and youth engagement in the Bayview neighborhood, 3rd Street has been a key partner in project design and helping young people provide input on services and the structure of rooms and common spaces.
2. Formalize community member leadership and recognize their expertise throughout program design.
Honoring livedexpertise can happen in multiple ways but should recognize expertise, prioritize compensating people for their time, and reduce barriers to participation. Several Just Home sites developed advisory or leadership boards of people with lived experience to inform or guide the work while recognizing expertise.
The City of Philadelphia partnered with Impact Services Corporation, which focuses on the Kensington neighborhood. They developed a paid community advisory board (CAB) with 11 committed community members with lived experience and other representatives from local organizations. Through recurring meetings, CAB members debated local needs and highlighted undersupported areas in the community. CAB members were able to connect directly with service providers and investors through formal structures, improving relationships and keeping community members educated and informed. Using their feedback, the team identified a need for 24 months of transitional housing, sober housing options, on-site services, and employment supports with a goal of economic mobility for tenants. Paid, formal structures for input and engagement helped foster relationships between project leadership and community.
Similar to a community advisory board, Tulsa created the Lived Experience Advisory Board (LEAB). The city team identified members of this board through town halls, focus groups, and service providers. The board offers structure for providing feedback, and all members are compensated for their expertise. The LEAB is responsible for sharing their own insights and gathering more from others to inform Tulsa’s housing plans. By providing several opportunities for engagement, Tulsa community members could participate to the extent that was convenient and adequately compensatory. Tulsa’s variety of approaches to community engagement early in the planning process helped build data for decisionmaking throughout planning and into implementation. For example, the Tulsa team considered many properties for acquisition and rehabilitation before finalizing their plan. Input from the LEAB was used to better understand why some properties considered earlier in planning would not help residents meet housing stability goals.
Developing advisory or leadership boards helps craft programs that meet local need, but their structure should depend on community interest. Some sites opted for shorter-term commitments from their community members and compensated each participant for each engagement attended.
3. Pair research insights with local community voices to identify gaps in programs and housing needs.
Quantitative data often misses gaps or concerns that require community-engaged research methods to highlight and address.
In Missoula, the lead organization, Homeword, gathered a range of qualitative and quantitative data to ensure their housing was focused on areas of greatest need. Working with Rural Institute for Inclusive Communities at the University of Montana, they analyzed data from the Homeless Management Information System and Missoula County Detention Facility and conducted interviews with 60 people who had experienced homelessness and jail incarceration. They highlighted key local gaps in the housing and service provision landscape. Specifically, they learned that young people ages 18 to 24 face unique barriers to housing because of a lack of rental history and restrictions on shelter entry, and they often receive services that are not linked to housing.
Similarly, Milwaukee County was able to draw on an existing resource—the county jail’s “familiar faces” dashboard (PDF)— to estimate the size of the population encountering homelessness and jail recidivism. Milwaukee County Housing Services then conducted feedback interviews and listening sessions through established advisory groups composed of people with lived experience. Findings from direct engagement corroborated the link between homelessness and recidivism and informed and helped refine the ultimate goals of the project: to provide low-barrier permanent housing (an option often limited by stigma), private spaces in emergency housing, person-centered supportive case management, and housing access points on the streets. Milwaukee’s “data interactive” was a structured forum to test the validity of quantitative findings by sharing and discussing the results alongside members of the target population.
Community engagement reaps multiple benefits
When designed thoughtfully and strategically, community engagement can play a pivotal role in crafting programming that aligns with local need. By acknowledging and positioning community members as valuable contributors, community engagement not only empowers them as cocreators in program design but also reshapes power dynamics and cultivates trust between residents and governments. Governments that are responsive and well-connected to their community are better equipped to address residents’ needs.
For more on Urban resources related to community engagement:
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