Juneau Homeless Coalition

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The Juneau Coalition on Housing and Homelessness (formly the Juneau Homeless Coalition, JHC) is a partnership of local agencies and non governmental organizations who serve Juneau's most vulnerable residents -- the homeless and those most affected by limited and high cost housing. These organizations participate in the Continuum of Care by providing emergency, transitional and supportive services to clients and are working together to develop housing solutions.

 

The JHC is managed by a steering committe consisting of five members: two co-chairs, Dan Austin of St. Vincent de Paul and Mandy O'Neal Cole of the Aiding Women in Abuse and Rape Emergencies, treasurer Joanne Wiitta of Tlingit & Haida Regional Housing Authority, and member-at-large, Kiel Renick of the Glory Hole. The Coalition is supported by Jessy Post, JEDC's Homelessness Coordinator, with funding from the CBJ.

History

In 2002, a number of local non-profit (501(c)(3)) organizations formed the Juneau Homeless Coalition in a unified effort to provide the vision and leadership required to develop and implement a plan to end homelessness in Juneau. Committee members and stakeholders in the planning process included homeless youth and adults, faith communities, philanthropy groups, businesses, local government, non-profit social service providers, non-profit housing developers, and advocates.

The Coalition formed out of the recognition that homelessness affects everybody, not just the poor. The strongest community for all is one where everybody has access to safe, decent housing, and can adequately address their basic needs. We believe anyone can

Since its inception, the Coalition has sponsored and received joint grant applications, worked with the City and Borough of Juneau to lend its expertise on affordable housing, hosted statewide conferences, developed community education and outreach tools, conducted research on homeless populations in Juneau, and engaged in municipal and legislative advocacy. The Coalition endeavors to keep its membership and scope broad, recognizing that homelessness is most often an end result of many interrelated causes, and that these causes act as social pressures that directly influence the prevalence of the homeless in our community.

Philosophy

The uniting purpose of the Juneau Homeless Coalition is to move beyond agency borders and work together to address and end homelessness. Individually, we each work on only one part of the puzzle: together, we work comprehensively to address the whole. When we come together, we take our agency hats off at the door, meaning we consider priorities for the community first. We share expertise from our own agency perspective, but we place our collective strength behind solutions and actions that we know are the most needed, regardless of the agency that benefits. We work to collaborate, consolidate, and communicate toward the goal of ending the hopelessness of homelessness in Juneau.

In practice, this philosophy allows us to demonstrate unparalleled collaboration to funders, maximizing dollars to the community; to consolidate resources and leverage scarce funding across multiple agencies; to communicate more between agencies,

allowing us to better serve our client base; to coordinate public education and outreach efforts far more than we co do on our own; and to coordinate our advocacy efforts to address homelessness in the sphere of public policy, accomplishing more than we would do as fragmented advocates without coalition support.

Three Branches of Effort

Research & Planning

• Gaps analysis – identify consensus priorities
• track shifting trends, short and long-term
• collect data on homeless population to use for grant applications
• share experiences
• the venue for discovering collaboration

Education & Outreach

• Media initiatives
• Education materials (calendars, brochures, etc)
• Public events – poetry reading and speak out in 2006, gallery exhibit in 2007
• Appearance at public forums – the Homeownership Fair, Housing Summit, etc
• Strengthening connections with businesses and others outside our network

Advocacy

• Local: affordable housing for low-income families, panhandling, etc
• State: funding for related programs, new laws and ordinances that affect our target populations, the Alaska Housing Trust Fund
• National: national programs that channel funds to Alaska, such as McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Act, or the National Housing Trust Fund

Juneau Homeless Coalition Members

Aiding Women in Abuse and Rape Emergencies (AWARE)  

Alaska AIDS Assistance Association (4As) Ÿ 

Alaska Coalition on Housing and Homelessness (ACH2) Ÿ

Alaska Housing Development Corporation 

Alaska Housing and Finance Corporation Ÿ 

Alaska Legal Services Corporation Ÿ 

Catholic Community Service Ÿ 

City and Borough of Juneau Ÿ 

The Front Street Clinic/SEARHC Ÿ 

Gastineau Human Services Corporation Ÿ 

The Glory Hole Ÿ 

Housing First Ÿ 

Cathy Johnson, Residential Mortgage Consultant Ÿ 

J. Ellen Moore

Juneau Alliance for Mental Health, Inc (JAMHI)

Juneau Economic Development Council Ÿ 

Juneau School District  Ÿ 

Juneau Youth Services, Inc. Ÿ 

Laura Lucas Design

Love, In the Name of Christ  Ÿ 

NAMI Juneau Ÿ 

Polaris House Ÿ 

Rainforest Recovery Center  Ÿ 

REACH, Inc. Ÿ 

SERRC - Alaska's Educational Resource Center

St. Vincent de Paul Ÿ 

Sims Foster Group Home Ÿ 

Southeast Alaska Food Bank Ÿ 

Southeast Alaska Guidance Association (SAGA) Ÿ 

Southeast Alaska Independent Living (SAIL) Ÿ 

Southeast Alaska Regional Health Consortium (SEARHC)

Tlingit and Haida Regional Housing Authority Ÿ 

United Way of Southeast Alaska Ÿ 

Zach Gordon Youth Center