Overview

In response to the destruction wrought by the 2005 Gulf Coast hurricanes and their aftermath, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development's Office of HIV/AIDS Housing responded with coordinated technical assistance through the Housing Opportunities for Persons with AIDS (HOPWA) National Technical Assistance Program. The HOPWA Hurricane Response Project is a joint effort between Collaborative Solutions, Inc. (CSI) in Birmingham, Alabama, and AIDS Housing of Washington (AHW) in Seattle, Washington. The purpose of this project is to provide an intensive and coordinated response to help ensure the continuity of HIV/AIDS housing and support services for low-income persons living with HIV/AIDS and their families in the impacted areas of Alabama, Mississippi, and Louisiana. The project also focuses on areas that received large numbers of hurricane evacuees, including the states of Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, and Texas.

Vision & Strategy

Through the HOPWA Hurricane Response Project, CSI is working in partnership with HOPWA grantees and providers to reestablish and strengthen the continuum of HIV/AIDS housing and services throughout the impacted region by:

Providing ongoing assessment of the conditions and status of HOPWA providers and the environment in which they are operating, in order to develop strategies that will ensure the continued delivery of services to low-income persons living with HIV/AIDS and their families. CSI staff are examining current continuums of HIV/AIDS care and identifying existing HIV/AIDS-dedicated housing units and HIV/AIDS care providers, current numbers and locations of evacuees, policy barriers, and need in areas designated as areas of disaster by FEMA. Area assessments are critical if new and innovative strategies that adequately meet the needs within the hardest hit areas of the Gulf Coast are to be developed and implemented.

Developing strategies to provide ongoing housing and supportive services to those displaced and made homeless by the Gulf Coast hurricanes. CSI staff are working to ensure that displaced individuals living with HIV/AIDS stay connected to available housing, medical care, and supportive services. To this end, CSI is working on identifying Federal and state linkages and resources that may be accessed to aid evacuees. Such resources include the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA), the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), and Medicaid.

Visioning beyond the immediate emergency response and recognizing that the need for ongoing support to promote the development of permanent supportive housing throughout the impacted areas will be a multi-year effort. The already short supply of affordable, supportive housing was only made worse by the Gulf Coast hurricanes. The need to develop and provide additional affordable housing resources is paramount. It is important to rebuild and expand the continuum of care for persons living with HIV to ensure that a solid provider infrastructure exists, permanent housing units are developed, and other resources are identified to support such efforts. CSI staff are working in partnership with HOPWA providers and community leaders to devise strategies to meet this vision.