All the Way Home

In 2015, Destination: Home convened a broad coalition to launch All the Way Home – a campaign to end veteran homelessness in Santa Clara County. The campaign brought together a wide array of public agencies, private funders, non-profits and housing providers to house our community’s homeless veterans, and in the process, the campaign has provided a model for how we can connect more vulnerable residents to stable housing.

From 2015-2021, the All the Way Home campaign helped connect 2,201 homeless veterans to stable housing

Bringing the Community Together to Assist Homeless Veterans

Many U.S. veterans experience conditions that place them at increased risk for homelessness, including higher rates of mental health issues, addiction disorder and lost jobs. Veterans experiencing homelessness are more likely to live on the street than in shelters and often remain on the street for extended periods of time.

So, several years ago, Destination: Home brought together the County of Santa Clara, City of San Jose and Santa Clara County Housing Authority to begin developing a community-wide campaign to end veteran homelessness in our community. And on Veterans Day 2015, San Jose Mayor Sam Liccardo and Santa Clara County Supervisor Dave Cortese officially launched “All the Way Home.”

As the convenor of this new campaign, Destination: Home helped coalesce the efforts of the lead public agencies, as well as several other community partners, into a coordinated strategy for housing Santa Clara County’s homeless veterans. Through this collective effort, the All the Way Home partners successfully:

• Secured significant new funding to house local veterans, including roughly 400 additional federal housing vouchers to help homeless veterans pay for housing.
• Created financial incentives to encourage more landlords to rent to a homeless veteran.
• Formed new partnerships with housing providers, faith groups and veteran serving organizations to expand the pool of housing available for veterans in need of housing.
• Increased coordination and collaboration between the public agencies, service providers and landlords to more quickly match homeless veterans with available housing.

Our Community’s Progress Ending Veteran Homelessness

Thanks to the collective efforts of the All the Way Home campaign, our community has made great strides in housing our community’s homeless veterans.

All the Way Home Campaign: 2015-2021

2,201

Veterans
Housed

912

New
landlords

A particularly noteworthy success has been the campaign’s progress in responding to the growing “inflow” of new homeless veterans seeking assistance for the first time (a trend that has fueled the overall growth in homelessness in Santa Clara County). In fact, thanks to the momentum built through the All the Way Home campaign, veteran housing placements now consistently exceed the “inflow” of new veterans becoming homeless, month-after-month.

Destination: Home stepped back its involvement in the campaign in 2020 to focus on other critical homelessness initiatives. However, the effort continues under the leadership of the County of Santa Clara, City of San Jose, Santa Clara County Housing County Housing Authority and their coalition of partners – who continue to house dozens of homeless veterans every month.

While there is still much work to do to truly end veteran homelessness in our community, the results of the All the Way Home campaign has shown what is possible when a community comes together and focuses on addressing a common problem.