DALLAS — Mayor Eric L. Johnson on Friday released the report produced by his Task Force on Homelessness, Organizations, Policies, and Encampments (HOPE).
The full report is available here.
“I am incredibly grateful for the time and thoughtful effort that each member of the Mayor’s Task Force on Homelessness Organizations, Policies, and Encampments contributed to generate this report,” Mayor Johnson said. “The Task Force’s work highlights the interwoven challenges associated with unsheltered homelessness and contains valuable recommendations, such as calls for enhanced behavioral health support for individuals experiencing homelessness, reductions in the redundancy of homelessness response efforts, and required data sharing among public and private funders of homeless services to improve collective problem solving.”
The HOPE Task Force — which included ten (10) members led by three co-chairs — was created by Mayor Johnson in February 2023. The Task Force was directed to leverage data-driven and evidence-based approaches to identify, develop, and recommend concrete solutions to reduce homelessness and encourage healthier and safer communities in Dallas.
Similar to the process employed after the release of the Mayor’s Task Force on Safe Communities’ report in January 2020, Mayor Johnson said the HOPE Task Force’s report will be referred to one of the city council’s standing committees for consideration and possible council action and that having completed its work, the HOPE Task Force is now disbanded.
“I strongly urge the Dallas City Council to carefully review this report, as I believe it can be a useful tool in helping us achieve our goal of improving Dallas’ worsening unsheltered homelessness problem.”
For four months, the Task Force met weekly with experts and, in between meetings, gathered and studied data.
Below are quotes from the Task Force’s three co-chairs:
“Homelessness is a complex, multi-faceted challenge with no single, magic bullet solution…Our task force has worked diligently over multiple hours of dialogue, often with wildly different views of solution. We have had respectful debate, listened to experts within our own system and outside of our system, and reviewed available data. Our hope was to offer suggestions on how to propel us forward as a community to remove barriers, to accelerate what is working, and to offer suggestions for how the city can improve in its special role to serve all who live in our community, whether housed or unhoused.” – Ellen Magnis, President & CEO of Family Gateway
“Mayor Johnson put together a group of people with diverse backgrounds and diverse perspectives and tasked us with finding common ground and executable solutions…In a city as great as Dallas, we cannot tolerate our fellow human beings living on the street. We need to find a way to help them, both for their benefit and for the benefit of our whole community. We hope that our Task Force’s recommendations will help guide the city to take actions that will allow us all to achieve our goal of ending homelessness in Dallas.” – Peter Brodsky, Chair of Housing Forward
“I have been involved with our community’s response to poverty, mental health, and homelessness for decades. We must balance the needs for those who are housed and unhoused. We must adhere to state laws and make camping an unacceptable response; we must provide alternatives to camping through increased shelter opportunities and atypical housing available for those who will accept it. And we must secure prior encampment sites that have been resolved so they do not get resettled.” – Betty Culbreath, Chair of the Dallas Housing Authority and the former director of Dallas County Health and Human Services
