Bay Area Homeless Vets To Get Helping Hand With Housing
SAN JOSE (KCBS) – Almost 300 homeless veterans in the Bay Area will be getting permanent roofs over their heads, thanks to more than $3 million in federal funding.
The federal assistance program, with the funding coming from a partnership between U.S. Housing and Urban Development and the Department of Veteran Affairs, is aimed at helping the chronically homeless.
Bay Area Homeless Vets To Get Helping Hand With Housing
"The whole region received about 280 vouchers, which are the housing assistance vouchers that we use to house people that are chronically homeless," said Alex Sanchez, Executive Director of the Santa Clara County Housing Authority. "These are specifically designed to assist veterans that are clients of the Veteran's Administration."
Sanchez said this is the most effective way to return veterans to traditional living conditions.
"Permanent housing allows people to actually have a stable home, where people can be visited by case workers, where their mail can be received, where they can begin to look for work, they can make their medical appointments," Sanchez said. "One of the things that's key to this is connecting to the Veteran's Administration in Palo Alto for the various services they provide this population."
Santa Clara County is receiving the most vouchers, 100 in total. The 180 other new vouchers will be going to aid homeless veterans in San Mateo, Alameda and Santa Cruz counties and those in the city of Santa Rosa.
The voucher program, known as HUD – Veterans Affairs Supporting Housing, is part of the Obama Administration's goal of ending veteran homelessness by 2015.
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