The United States Interagency Council on Homelessness, the Department of Housing and Urban Development, and the Department of Veterans Affairs have adopted a vision of what it means to end all homelessness. One of those criteria is ending Veteran homelessness by the end of 2015. The aforementioned groups have adopted specific criteria and benchmarks for ending Veteran homelessness in order to help guide communities as they take action to achieve the goal (see the criteria and benchmarks here).

One of the first benchmarks that have been specified as evidence to ending veterans homelessness is that the community has identified all veterans experiencing homelessness. This includes Veterans who are sheltered, as well as Veterans who are unsheltered. We need your help in identifying all unsheltered veterans across our 71-county coverage area.

Do you know of any homeless encampments in or around your local area? We would like for to provide us with the whereabouts of all the encampments you or your agency peers are aware of. To submit this information to the BoS, fill out the following form: http://goo.gl/forms/h8IaxtUuzg.

We understand that sometimes describing where an encampment is can be complex, but please be as descriptive as possible (i.e. At the corner of 5th and Broadway…, in the woods behind McDonald’s, …5 miles outside of Cleveland on Hwy 61, off the highway by mile marker 95, etc.). If you know of more than the form allows, please submit another entry.

Deadline to submit information: FRIDAY, OCTOBER 16TH, 2015

Let’s work hard and do our part to end veteran homelessness! If you have any questions, please contact Reginald Glenn (rglenn@msbos.org) or Ledger Parker (lparker@muteh.org)