DCA Highlights Resources Available to Help Local Governments Address Homelessness in Their Communities

• Posted on: 01/29/2025

Department Calls Attention to These Resources as Local Agencies and Volunteers Begin 2025 New Jersey Point-in-Time Count of the Homeless

TRENTON, NJ – As the 2025 New Jersey Statewide Point-in-Time Count of the Homeless gets underway today, the New Jersey Department of Community Affairs (DCA) calls attention to the resources and programs available at the Department to help local governments assist people experiencing homelessness in their communities.

One major resource is the State Rental Assistance Program (SRAP) which is still accepting pre-applications from people to enter the lottery for placement on the program’s waiting list. The application period started on January 13 and will end at 5 p.m. on January 31, 2025. During the Point-in-Time Count, people experiencing homelessness will receive information about the SRAP program and help in filling out the pre-application posted at https://www.nj.gov/dca/dhcr/offices/srap.shtml on the DCA website. People accepted into the program receive housing subsidies for decent, safe, and sanitary housing.

“Municipalities are on the frontlines of responding to homelessness and housing insecurity in their communities,” said DCA Commissioner Jacquelyn A. Suárez. “For this reason, DCA has looked to form strong partnerships with local governments and create effective programs that they can use in their efforts to prevent homelessness.” 

During the Murphy Administration, DCA’s Division of Housing and Community Resources created the Office of Homelessness Prevention and the Office of Eviction Prevention. Both offices work to keep people stably housed so they don’t enter homelessness and to get people who are unsheltered into stable housing as quickly as possible. To accomplish these goals, the offices started several programs, including:

• Comprehensive Eviction Defense and Diversion (CEDD), which provides eligible households facing eviction with free access to attorneys and resource navigators who work to prevent households from getting evicted. Data shows that eviction is one of the top two causes of homelessness in New Jersey. Therefore, CEDD serves an important homelessness prevention role.
• Homeless Diversion Pilot, which employs problem-solving, flexible funding, and individual case management to quickly resolve housing crises for those at-risk of homelessness and those experiencing homelessness.
• Rural and Suburban Street Outreach, which helps strengthen the capacity of rural and suburban communities in New Jersey to respond to homelessness through grants that help with staffing, direct aid to clients, and equipment such as vehicles to transport people to safe places to sleep at night. The goal is to make it much easier for people in rural and suburban areas to quickly access homelessness prevention services in their county when they need it. This increased outreach has helped the Point-in-Time Count identify more unsheltered people than in the past, making the count more accurate.
• Data-Driven Decision-Making funding for the 16 Continuum-of-Care (CoC) programs in New Jersey that promote a communitywide commitment to ending homelessness. The funding allows the CoC programs to hire data analysts, purchase analytics and technology equipment, and support data strategic planning activities all aimed at homelessness prevention.
• Document Assistance and Support for Housing (DASH) program, which works with persons at-risk of homelessness and unhoused persons selected in the Section 8 Housing Choice Voucher (HCV) and Emergency Housing Voucher programs administered by DCA to overcome documentation barriers to tenancy and accelerate permanent housing outcomes in conjunction with municipal, county, and Continuum-of-Care partners.
• Bringing Veterans Home Initiative to fund services and interventions over a two-year period between 2025 and 2027 to help place more than 1,000 homeless veterans in New Jersey in stable housing. 

DCA is also working with local governments to help them ensure they are obtaining all available federal funding for homelessness prevention for which they are eligible.

“Ending homelessness requires bold action, compassionate leadership, and collaboration across all levels of governments and sectors,” said DCA Assistant Commissioner Janel Winter, who directs the Division of Housing and Community Resources. “With these programs, DCA is laying the groundwork for long-term stability and dignity for our most vulnerable neighbors.”

Through its collaboration with local governments, DCA was able to assist with the City of Newark’s expansion of street outreach services for unsheltered residents. Newark’s 24/7 outreach program, advanced medical services, and innovative tools like the new texting hotline, create a lifeline for individuals who have fallen through the cracks.

DCA also helped launch an initiative in Atlantic City last month that is aimed at ending chronic homelessness in the city over the next three years through collaboration with the City of Atlantic City, nonprofit organizations, and healthcare providers, enhanced services, and housing.

Additionally, the Department supported efforts by Toms River Township to provide people living in homelessness encampments with up to one year of rental assistance and case management to help them remain stably housed. These examples demonstrate that local governments can be innovative in how they address homelessness prevention in their communities.

“Our goal is to make homelessness rare, brief, and nonrecurring by creating long-term systems change,” said DCA Office of Homelessness Prevention Director Michael Callahan. “This requires partnerships at all levels and across all sectors. Working together, we can ensure every New Jersey resident has a safe, stable place to call home.”

DCA offers a wide range of programs and services, including local government management and finance, affordable housing production, fire safety, building safety, community planning and development, disaster recovery and mitigation, historic preservation, and information privacy.

For more information about DCA, visit https://nj.gov/dca/ or follow the Department on social media: