ANCHORAGE, Alaska (KTUU) – Leadership from Houston, Texas, was in Anchorage Monday night for the revealing of the Next Step initiative.
Anchorage Assembly members, Mayor Dave Bronson, and much of his staff were at the Anchorage Coalition to End Homelessness headquarters talking about the plan, which is a $4.6 million initiative to transition 150 people out of cold weather shelters into more permanent housing.
Houston’s model, often touted as the “gold standard” by many local governments across the nation, is focused on permanent housing for the homeless in the Lone Star State’s largest city. Alaska’s News Source extensively investigated Houston’s model earlier this year, in a multi-part series, detailing what that city is doing compared with Anchorage.
In that coverage, Houston’s mayor said that government, nonprofit and community leaders need to work together and not be competitive when trying to solve homelessness. Cooperation was very much the tone of Monday’s meeting …