Housing and Homelessness Programme
Preventing homelessness through sustained solutions that improve the economic and social well-being of the most marginalised youth and adults. The programme has three focus areas:
Economic Self-Sufficiency
The programme supports projects which equip people who have experienced homelessness, or who are at risk of doing so, with the economic and social skills that will lead to greater long-term economic independence, or security. Of particular interest to Oak Foundation are programmes which have life-changing impact for individuals and families, and consequently for the lives of the next generation, as well as programmes that address wage growth and sustained employment.
Increasing the Supply of Affordable Housing and Housing Opportunity
Oak Foundation focuses on providing seed or catalyst funding which facilitates affordable housing development and the preservation of existing affordable housing. It favours projects that demonstrate a direct access route for homeless people into the housing produced.
Homeless Prevention
This programme aims to prevent homelessness among identified vulnerable groups and in certain regional “hot spots”. Oak Foundation favours projects that have a sophisticated understanding of specific needs and which have the intrinsic structure to effectively address them.
All three focus areas may include systems change objectives. These may take the form of securing mainstream statutory funding for a proven new solution, or change to remove structural and cultural barriers which hamper individual success, or change in the way that a service is delivered. Oak Foundation places value on system change initiatives that promote proven solutions, are proactive and are to be executed by organisations with a proven track record of securing change.
The programme currently focuses on three cities in the United States: Boston, New York and Philadelphia; and three areas in the United Kingdom: London, Belfast and South Wales.