Ending Family Homelessness

There is no reason families should be sleeping outside at night. Every child deserves a chance at a happy, healthy life – that starts with a place to call home.

On October 4, 2021, Destination: Home joined with the County of Santa Clara, City of San Jose, Santa Clara County Housing Authority, Cisco and several other Continuum of Care partners to launch HEADING HOME – a community-wide campaign to end family homelessness by 2025.

Heading Home - No More Families Living on Our Streets

If you, or someone you know, is currently experiencing homelessness: Contact the Countywide Shelter Hotline at (408) 385-2400 to be connected with available shelter options and information on how to be assessed for housing assistance

If you, or someone you know, is at-risk of becoming homeless: Contact the Homelessness Prevention System at (408) 926-8885 to learn about financial assistance and other resources for families at-risk of losing their housing

HEADING HOME: No More Families Living On Our Streets

The HEADING HOME campaign leverages four key strategies:

  • Emergency Housing Vouchers – The Santa Clara County Housing Authority has been awarded approximately 1,000 emergency housing vouchers, which provide rental support to homeless households for up to ten years. The vast majority of these vouchers is allocated for homeless families.
  • Rapid Rehousing – The coalition is expanding its Rapid Rehousing programs – which provide a time-limited rental subsidy along with case management and supportive services – with a goal to serve another 200 homeless families annually.
  • Homelessness Prevention Strategies – The coalition is working to expand homelessness prevention services so that fewer families fall into homelessness. This includes increasing the Homelessness Prevention System capacity to serve 2,500 households by 2025 as well as increasing investments in Housing Problem-Solving programs, which quickly house families who recently became homeless and are sleeping on the street or in a place not fit for human habitation.
  • Affordable and Supportive Housing Development – New affordable housing developments in the Measure A pipeline are producing approximately 1,000 new family apartments in five years. There is also the potential to create more new homes for families by leveraging $1 billion in Project Homekey funding.

The HEADING HOME campaign also represents a key element of the 2020-2025 Community Plan to End Homelessness and plays an important role in achieving our community-wide goal of permanently housing 20,000 homeless individuals by 2025.

Join the HEADING HOME Campaign!

Ending family homelessness is within our reach – but we’ll need your help to house every homeless family in our community. We need the support of elected officials, landlords, private businesses, non-profit partners and other community members.

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