Click on any of the questions below to be taken directly to the answer.
Back to Top ^
What was the goal of the Sound Families Initiative?
The goal of Sound Families was to make a significant impact on the lives of families in crisis in King, Pierce, and Snohomish counties by helping them move toward self-sufficiency. The initiative provided partial support for housing and housing-based supportive services for families in transition out of homelessness. Support services included on-site case management, job search and referral services, and parenting help. The program succeeded in achieving a new level of cooperation on ending family homelessness among the three counties.
Inspired by early results from the initiative, the Washington State Legislature created the Washington Families Fund in 2004 to dedicate long-term funding for support services for homeless families across Washington state. The fund is a collaboration of public and private partners and is administered by local housing and service provider Building Changes. The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation will make its next set of investments to address family homelessness by expanding the work of the Washington Families Fund. To learn more, please visit BuildingChanges.org. Back to Top ^
Why did the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation decide to fund the Sound Families Initiative?
Prompted in part by a question that Melinda Gates asked about what could be done to help vulnerable families in the Puget Sound region, the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation set out to address the needs of homeless families, and families at risk of homelessness, in our own backyard. The foundation launched the Sound Families Initiative in 2001 with a $40 million commitment.
Back to Top ^
How were Sound Families grantees chosen?
Sound Families grantees were chosen from our region’s many nonprofit affordable housing organizations, service providers, and housing authorities. Grantees responded to requests for proposals and were selected through a competitive process by staff of Sound Families and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, guided by members of the Sound Families steering and review committees. Our grantees demonstrated their experience and capacity for developing housing, managing properties, and providing and coordinating supportive services to families. Back to Top ^
Why did the Sound Families Initiative only fund three counties in a region with such great need?
The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation made its first set of investments to address family homelessness in its own backyard—the Puget Sound region—where an inadequate supply of affordable housing puts many families at risk of homelessness. The Gates Foundation will continue to partner with these three counties—King, Pierce, and Snohomish—as a first step in a next set of investments to end family homelessness. These counties will serve as pilot communities where the foundation and its partners can try new approaches that have worked well in other communities. After carefully monitoring outcomes, the foundation hopes that the lessons learned will be applied statewide.
Early evaluation results from Sound Families were one inspiration for the Washington Families Fund (WFF), a unique public-private partnership to dedicate funding for supportive services for homeless families across the state. The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation has been a partner in the fund since its inception in 2004. Along with partners from the public and private sector, the foundation will make its next set of investments to end family homelessness through pilot projects in King, Pierce, and Snohomish counties, which will expand WFF’s work. To learn more, please visit BuildingChanges.org.
Back to Top ^
Were there additional funders apart from the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation?
The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation launched the Sound Families Initiative with an initial $40 million commitment, but the work of Sound Families would not have been possible without the support of our partners. More than $200 million dollars in local, state and federal funding was leveraged by the Sound Families allocations. Of particular note was the contribution made by seven Puget Sound housing authorities—the Housing Authority of Snohomish County, Everett Housing Authority, King County Housing Authority, Seattle Housing Authority, Renton Housing Authority, Pierce County Housing Authority, and the Tacoma Housing Authority—all of whom dedicated federal Section 8 rental subsidy funds to provide a steady source of operating dollars for Sound Families. Back to Top ^
Who staffed Sound Families?
The Sound Families Initiative was staffed and administered by the City of Seattle Office of Housing (link) with guidance from the Sound Families steering and review committees. Back to Top ^
Who set the policies for funding and operation?
The Sound Families Steering Committee established policies for funding and operation based on an agreement among participating jurisdictions and other partners. To view the full Steering Committee roster, please click here. Back to Top ^
Was there an evaluation process for the program?
Evaluation was an integral part of the Sound Families Initiative. To measure the effectiveness of service-enriched housing in helping homeless families achieve stability, evaluators from the Northwest Institute for Children and Families at the University of Washington School of Social Work gathered data on families' experiences of being homeless, their progress toward self-sufficiency, and their quality of life after they left transitional housing. The evaluation also helped identify the challenges that housing and service providers faced when serving the needs of families. Our full set of evaluation data includes reflections on what we learned as well as our best insights for moving forward.
Promising outcomes from early Sound Families evaluation was one of the inspirations behind the Washington Families Fund, a statewide strategy to dedicate funding for supportive services for families. It is through the Washington Families Fund that the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation and many public and private sector partners will invest in a new approach to end family homelessness in our region. To learn more, please visit Building Changes.org.
Back to Top ^
What was included in "support services"?
Support services include a wide array of assistance to help families overcome their individual barriers to self-sufficiency. Services may include child care, financial help, skills training, counseling, budgeting assistance, assistance obtaining clothing appropriate for work, domestic violence counseling for adults and children, legal advocacy, life skills classes, mental health services, chemical dependency counseling, transportation, and food programs. While Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation funds were not sufficient to cover all of these needs, they were used to help social service providers target these services to the families living in supportive housing units.
One thing we learned from the Sound Families evaluation is that families benefit from supportive services that are flexible, coordinated, and highly tailored to their unique needs. These services are an integral part of the new approach to end family homelessness in the Puget Sound region, through the Washington Families Fund, which is led by Building Changes. To learn more, please visit BuildingChanges.org.
Back to Top ^
What role did the University of Washington School of Social Work play in the program?
The University of Washington School of Social Work was a key partner to Sound Families from the start. After studying the needs of families in our region, the school recognized the value of pairing housing with support services. The Seattle Office of Housing later developed the original proposal for the Sound Families Initiative based in part on that research. The School of Social Work served as both evaluator and guide to Sound Families; representatives of the school served on the Sound Families Steering Committee and evaluators published seven reports of Sound Families findings, available here. Back to Top ^
Did the funds provided by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation also support emergency housing?
The funds provided by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation for the Sound Families Initiative were directed to housing for families in transition out of homelessness. While the Gates Foundation understands the ongoing need for emergency shelter, this type of housing is not designed to be a permanent solution. Our community and statewide responses to homelessness are generally organized in a way that treats symptoms by focusing more on crisis interventions and short-term help. The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation’s next set of investments to address this problem are designed to target solutions to quickly and permanently end family homelessness and promote long-term family stability. To learn more about these investments, please visit BuildingChanges.org. Back to Top ^
|
