Request For Application

The Coos County Homeless Response Office is seeking applications from eligible entities to help support Case Management, Rental Assistance, Street Outreach, and Data Collection services. These services will play a critical role in Coos County’s House Bill (HB) 5019 Rapid Rehousing (HB 5019-RRH) Initiative that will coordinate a system of care to address and prevent homelessness. The goal of the HB 5019 Rapid Rehousing initiative is to achieve long-term housing stability for 32 households by June 30, 2025. All provided services will be culturally responsive, low barrier, and ensure equitable access and outcomes through Housing First principles and evidence-based practices. Services will be provided with a trauma-informed and harm-reduction approach. Culturally responsive programs and services will be prioritized.

HB5019 Background: 

On January 10, 2023, Governor Kotek declared a homelessness state of emergency in response to the 80% rise in un-sheltered homelessness in areas throughout Oregon. Oregon Housing Community Services Department (OHCS) was awarded funding through HB 5019 during the 2023 Session of the Oregon Legislature to increase shelter capacity and connections to shelter, support rapid rehousing initiatives, provide capacity support for culturally responsive organizations, and provide sanitation services for communities within the OR-505 - Oregon Balance of State Continuum of Care (referred to as Balance of State, or BoS) and for the administration of support relating to these objectives. As a community within the BoS, OHCS awarded Coos County $1,927,818.00 (HB 5019-RRH), to support activities with the objective of rapidly rehousing 32 un-sheltered households by June 30, 2025.

Prior to eligibility for funding, Coos County submitted an Un-sheltered Homelessness Emergency Response Plan (“HB 5019 Homeless Response Plan”) that specifies current local, state, federal, and other resources allocated to emergency shelter services, rehousing services, and housing stabilization services, and current service levels and gaps in services and resources in emergency response areas specifically impacting people experiencing un-sheltered homelessness.

Funding for HB5019 dollars is allocated through subcontracts with community partners. The agency responsible for signing the contract and ensuring the contracting requirements are met is called the "Sub-Recipient".  Costs and expenses are paid through a reimbursement process through The City of North Bend who serves as the fiscal agent for these funds. To receive reimbursement, the Sub-Recipient must complete a program progress report and a reimbursement request with supporting documentation on a monthly and/or quarterly basis.

Funding Plan:

As the community lead and direct recipient of the HB 5019-RRH Funds, the Coos County Homeless Response Office has established a preliminary budget plan, in alignment with the HB 5019 Homeless Response Plan and local policy priorities to support HB 5019-RRH eligible activities with the goal to:

Rapidly Rehouse 32 households by June 30, 2025. These eligible activities include:

• Housing navigation
• Tenancy supports (including but not limited to utility assistance, application fees, sanitation     etc.)
• Intensive case management
• Street outreach
• Rental subsidies
• Landlord engagement and incentives

The Coos County Homeless Response Office has identified for this grant cycle an estimated $1,000,000.00 for Rapid Rehousing/Case Management services and $27,818.00 for Street Outreach and Data Collection services. Recipients of this funding are expected to build and maintain effective partnerships with partners, which may include but are not limited to law enforcement, behavioral health, City and County staff, Oregon Coast Community Action (ORCCA), Coos Curry Housing Authority, Rural Continuum of Care, Coos Heath and Wellness, Oregon Housing and Community Services (OHCS), community-based organizations (CBO) serving un-sheltered populations within Coos County, and private market landlords.

Populations Served:

The work is guided by a commitment to advance equity for communities disproportionately affected by housing instability and homelessness and to reduce barriers to housing for these communities.

Local data gathered during the development of the HB 5019 Homeless Response Plan shows an underrepresentation of certain Subpopulations in Coos County’s sheltered and un-sheltered populations experiencing homelessness. These populations include:

• Black, Native American, and Hispanic/Latinx communities
• Families with children
• People with high and complex needs, where the level of need may not meet eligibility for existing housing programs (mental health, substance use, physical needs, aging, developmental and neuro diversity, etc.)

The goal is to coordinate a system of care that fully addresses the unique and complex needs and barriers of people experiencing unsheltered homelessness and reduce the barriers to accessing housing for underrepresented populations. Barriers identified during the development of the HB 5019 Homeless Response Plan include discrimination, lack of available units for large families, and histories of convictions, evictions, and bankruptcy that cause landlords to reject rental applications.

Service Geography:

Eligible funded projects must be located within the geographical boundary of Coos County. Our office aims to achieve an equitable distribution of services throughout Coos County. Investments will be prioritized in geographic areas that address existing service gaps and meet the needs of communities that are disproportionately underserved.

Program Delivery:

All services are expected to be aligned with the following service delivery approaches:

• Racial and Ethnic Equity: To effectively address homelessness, we must acknowledge and address through our work the continuing role that structural and institutional racism have in causing disproportionate homelessness among Black, Indigenous, Latino/a/e, Asian, Pacific Islander, immigrant, and refugee communities, many of which are significantly underrepresented in Coos County’s homelessness data. Eliminating these disparities requires that resources be prioritized and services be delivered in a manner that acknowledges and addresses the barriers to housing caused by racism and discrimination.
• Collaboration and Cooperation: All providers are expected to work collaboratively and demonstrate cooperation with all partners who work with and within the support network to better serve and improve outcomes for people navigating unsheltered homelessness into housing stability. Partners include but are not limited to: law enforcement, behavioral health, City and County staff, Oregon Coast Community Action (ORCCA), Coos Curry Housing Authority, Rural Continuum of Care, Coos Heath and Wellness, Oregon Housing and Community Services (OHCS), community-based organizations (CBO) serving unsheltered populations within Coos County, and private market landlords.
• Culturally Specific and Responsive Services: All providers are expected to deliver services in a culturally responsive manner. Culturally responsive services are respectful of and relevant to, the beliefs, practices, neurodiversity, sexual orientation and gender identity, culture, and linguistic needs of diverse participating populations and communities. Many providers will also be expected to deliver culturally specific services. Culturally specific services are informed by specific communities, where the majority of participants are reflective of that community, and use language, structures, and settings familiar to the culture of the target population to create an environment of belonging and safety in which services are delivered.
• Housing First: Housing First is a widely accepted best practice for homeless service programs and is based on the belief that stable housing should serve as a platform from which people can pursue other health, economic, and personal needs and goals. A Housing First approach aims to quickly and successfully connect households experiencing homelessness to permanent housing without preconditions and barriers to entry. Key components include few to no programmatic prerequisites or housing readiness requirements, low-barrier admission policies, supportive services that are voluntary and participant-led, and an emphasis on participant choice and self-determination.
• Low-Barrier: Programs should be designed to ensure that all eligible households can easily access the services they need. All programs and services should have low or no barriers to entry with a particular emphasis on meeting the needs of underserved communities and populations that experience multiple barriers to accessing and succeeding in services. Any documentation required for determining program eligibility should be low-barrier and include self-reporting options.
• Evidence-Based Practices: Programs utilize approaches proven to quickly and equitably coordinate the access, assessment, prioritization, and referrals to housing for people who have experienced prolonged homelessness and marginalization by society. These practices include Coordinated Entry, trauma-informed care, motivational interviewing, and strengths-based practices.

Eligible Services and Activities

All services and activities funded through this grant must be aligned with the service delivery approaches listed above and be utilized for the following purposes.

1. Case Management and Wrap-Around Supports: Eligible projects will have participants navigating out of unsheltered homelessness to living in a variety of housing settings, including, but not limited to, scattered-site settings, project-based settings, and residential facility settings, using locally funded rent subsidies or a federal voucher. Flexible and person-centered case management that provides ongoing wraparound support before, during, and after housing placement is an essential component of this grant and will be delivered in close coordination and collaboration with the entire system of care. Case management supports in your project will help meet the housing stability needs of participants and are expected to align with other Service Components that can be provided by multiple organizations. Funded case management activities may include:
2. Health services: Community-based (on-site and off-site) mental health services, addiction and recovery supports, community health workers, peer support services, strategies that support harm reduction, health care navigation, wellness programs, assistance applying for medical benefits, non-clinical behavioral health supports, behavioral health outreach services, crisis intervention, pregnant and parenting support services, and support with navigating the behavioral health system and accessing clinical services as needed. (Clinical services that can be funded through Medicaid will not be funded through this NOFO, but support to assist clients to access those services will be funded.)
3. Peer support services: Support specialists that use the therapeutic value of lived experience to provide support for individuals with substance use or mental health issues. Peer support specialists are often from the communities with which they work, creating systems of support which are relevant to the community, trauma informed, culturally specific and culturally responsive.
4. Education, training, and employment services: Services aimed at increasing incomes by providing access to education, training, and public and private workforce resources, with a focus on meeting the needs of individuals who face barriers to employment and/or are experiencing barriers to employability.
5. Benefits navigation and legal services: Assistance with accessing benefits such as Supplemental Security Income, Social Security Disability Income, Medicaid/Medicare benefits, and Veterans benefits. Assistance with accessing or providing civil legal services that facilitate housing access and stability, including assistance to enforce tenants’ rights, expungement rights, and rights guaranteed under civil rights laws.
6. Rapid Rehousing: Eligible costs, including landlord incentives to secure available units, through block-leasing strategies or other means, for people exiting homelessness. Supportive housing services may be provided for block leased units and for households that are rehoused pursuant to the Region’s Grant Agreement to ensure participants are able to stay securely housed and landlords are supported with various needs. For all clients who are rehoused utilizing grant funds, the recipient is required to provide the landlord with documentation showing that the landlord participated in the program to ensure the agency can provide further guarantees of financial assistance through the Landlord Guarantee Program. The agency shall provide templates that the recipient may use for this purpose. 

Rental Assistance

Rental assistance commitments, when utilized under rapid rehousing services, may be issued for a maximum of 24 months per household. However, when issued in an upfront payment to the landlord, payments may not exceed a 12-month period of time. Rental assistance commitments may include pre-paid costs to encourage landlord participation. Eligible costs may also include paying for damages or past-due housing debt to secure new units or resources.

1. Street Outreach: Outreach to people experiencing homelessness in locations where structured connections to services do not currently exist, with a focus on building relationships and service engagement through person-centered, trauma-informed and strengths-based practices. Services include completing coordinated entry assessments, linking people with services to promote connections to stable housing. Funded services may also include:
   • Providing services and supplies to meet basic needs such as food support, hygiene services, restrooms, survival gear, storage, etc.
   • Providing connections to safety-off-the-street services, such as emergency shelter, motel vouchers, day centers, safety planning, peer support, and crisis resources.
   • Behavioral health and addiction recovery outreach, and culturally specific outreach services.
   • Emergency on-call services in the event of severe weather, natural disasters, public health, or other emergencies. May include outreach, information sharing, distribution of basic needs supplies, transportation, and service connections.

Data Collection: Eligible costs may include:

1. Hardware and IT-related equipment
2. Software and IT services
3. Training
4. Staffing and overhead costs as related to data collection and HMIS.

Service Integration Strategies

The Service Components described in this NOFO document will operate in close alignment with one another as part of the system of care. In many cases, individual programs will incorporate more than one Service Component into an integrated approach. For example, street outreach and case management programs will connect participants with housing navigation and placement services, supportive housing services will need to connect participants with housing retention and resident services, and all of the Service Components will need to connect participants with tailored ongoing wraparound supports. This alignment and integration can be achieved through a variety of different strategies:

• Some organizations will provide multiple integrated Service Components. These organizations should respond to this NOFO by proposing an integrated approach that includes multiple Service Components
• Some organizations have existing partnerships that they can leverage to create an integrated approach. These organizations should respond to the NOFO by identifying the set of partner organizations that will work together to provide each Service Component.
• Some organizations have capacity, interest, and/or expertise within one Service Component or its individual subcomponents. These organizations should focus their NOFO response on the particular Service Component their organization is interested in providing.

When grants are awarded, the Coos County Homeless Response Office will work in collaboration with awardees of this NOFO to explore potential strategies to achieve the necessary alignment and integration between the different Service Components. Potential service integration strategies include partnerships, collaborations, contract alignment, designated services, and subcontractor relationships. In some cases, the Coos County Homeless Response Office may serve as a matchmaker to connect providers of complementary services to one another to create a coordinated program. In other cases, the Coos County Homeless Response Office may work with one or more providers to create mobile service teams that can provide support services to multiple housing settings. The Coos County Homeless Response Office may also develop aligned contracts that will enable providers of one Service Component to access other necessary services for their participants. For example, the Coos County Homeless Response Office may contract with behavioral health providers to ensure their services are available for other contracted organizations to draw from as needed to meet the needs of individual participants.

Eligibility Requirements

To be eligible to apply for funding all applicants must meet the following requirements:

• Applicants must either be a governmental, community-based, or non-profit organization whose mission and services align with the guidelines outlined in this document.
• Applicants must have the organizational capacity to carry out their proposed activities.
• Contractor recipients will be required to obtain adequate insurance covering worker's compensation, bodily injury, property damage, or automobile liability, depending on the nature of the project. Contractors will be responsible for obtaining any necessary licenses, permits, and/or jurisdictional approvals, and for complying with applicable federal, state, and municipal laws, codes, and regulations.
• All recipients of funds will be required to enter into a grant agreement with Coos County Office of Homeless Response that outlines the details of the proposed program, project, or services with anticipated timelines and outcomes.

Submission of a proposal does not guarantee funding.

Application Scoring

Please download the supporting documents below to fill out an application for funding opportunity.