The city of Milwaukee has been selected by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) to receive more than $3 million in funding through the Youth Homelessness Demonstration Program (YHDP) to help develop systems to prevent youth homelessness here.
The YHDP application was a yearlong collaboration between Pathfinders, a Milwaukee nonprofit dedicated to helping homeless youth, the city, Milwaukee’s Continuum of Care, and a Youth Action Board comprised of 15 youth and young adult leaders from Pathfinders with lived homelessness expertise.
Pathfinders hosted HUD officials in Milwaukee for a roundtable discussion with the organization’s leadership and the Youth Action Board prior to the official announcement this week.
“This is a victory for the community – shared by the young people contributing to the application, the city of Milwaukee and the other members of the Continuum of Care, and so many committed community partners,” said HUD principal deputy assistant secretary Marion McFadden. “This funding will support local initiatives to ensure safe, stable housing for youth in Milwaukee.”
The YHDP supports communities in building and executing a cohesive strategy to prevent and end youth homelessness. Each community includes local young people with homelessness experience at the decision-making table for how the financial resources are allocated in the community. Milwaukee was one of 16 communities selected across the U.S. to receive YHDP funding in the program’s seventh annual round of grant awards.
“This investment represents a major milestone in the journey to bring youth and young adult homelessness front and center,” Pathfinders president and CEO Tim Baack said. “An estimated 15,000 young people experience homelessness in Milwaukee each year. Young people are the future of our community, yet unhoused youth are far too often overlooked by government, funders, and service providers. YHDP advances what we at Pathfinders have known and valued for decades: No effective solution to youth homelessness can happen without young people at the table as leaders and experts.”
The next step in this process will bring together the Youth Action Board, city officials and Continuum of Care partners to plan for how the YHDP funding will be allocated.
YHDP funding stipulates that young people with lived homelessness experience lead the effort to design, implement, and improve programs and policies around how communities address youth homelessness.
