The National Law Center on Homelessness & Poverty is pleased to serve as a conference partner for the 2011 National Conference on Ending Homelessness. The following guest post comes to us from Catherine An, communications and media relations specialist at the National Alliance to End Homelessness.
It’s just three weeks until the Alliance’s National Conference on Ending Homelessness and we hope to see you all there!
While homelessness is always a relevant and salient issue, we know that this is an especially important time. The persistent recession is leading to increased risk of homelessness, as we outlined in our State of Homelessness in America report earlier this year. Findings from other leading national voices – including Priced Out from the Technical Assistance Collaborative, Out of Reach from the National Low Income Housing Coalition, and information on state budget cuts from the Center for Budget and Policy Priorities – indicate that homelessness is on the rise. There is much work to be done in order to make real progress towards ending homelessness.
And the work starts with us!
This year at the conference, we’ll be offering our usual wealth of workshops covering topics from prevention to rapid re-housing to re-entry to domestic violence. There are a number of new and emerging conversations about ending homelessness and ways in which communities can be more innovative and resourceful while facing budget cuts.
For the first time, we’ll be hosting our Awards Ceremony in conjunction with the conference. At the Awards Ceremony, we honor the men, women, and organizations that work so hard to end homelessness. This year, we are excited to honor some luminaries in the field:
- The Los Angeles Business Leaders Task Force on Homelessness, who spearheaded the creation of Home for Good and LA’s plan to end chronic and veteran homelessness,
- Representatives Judy Biggert and Alcee Hastings, members of the Congressional Caucus on Homelessness,
- and The Road Home, a service organization in Salt Lake City, UT.
Find out more about the awards on the event website.
Every year, we look forward to the hundreds of people who converge in Washington, D.C. to discuss new innovations, strategies, practices, and policies to achieve our common goal: to end homelessness in the United States. See you there!