Housing for Homeless Veterans Campaign

About the Program

Category: Human Services (Best in Category)

Year: 2017

During the summer of 2016, Placer County’s Housing Authority coordinated with the Placer County Public Affairs team to launch a new campaign to find housing for homeless veterans. The Housing Authority program supports local and federal efforts to end homelessness among Placer County veterans. Part of that effort is a program known as Veterans Affairs Supportive Housing (VASH) that provides vouchers to qualifying veterans to help supplement whatever other income they receive to pay for housing. Even with these vouchers, veterans are often unable to find landlords to rent to them. The campaign was aimed at educating the community about this program through movie theater advertising during the summer season. First, the Public Affairs team developed a touching Public Service Announcement featuring a veteran and his landlord that described the program, how well it had worked for them and the need for help finding landlords for those who had served our country. Then the county contracted with a theater chain to have the video aired prior to every movie shown between Memorial Day and August 25th at four theaters across the county. For the low cost of $6,600, the campaign generated much interest in the community, most who were totally unaware of the program. The effort was complemented by speaking engagements at events like the Sun City Veteran’s group as well as interviews about the campaign on local news channels. The video was shared with the national program coordinators for veterans housing program, and it was played at their directors’ staff meeting as an example of the type of outreach they hoped other local offices could replicate. Most importantly, veterans were able to secure housing through landlords who learned of the program through the video campaign and other landlords committed to doing so as soon as they had available rentals.