Permanent Supportive Housing Is Often the Difference Between Safety and Survival—and It’s Now at Risk
Ashley never knew a home could mean so much to her.
She had plans to move closer to her grandmother before the COVID-19 pandemic hit. After that, her grandmother died from cancer, and those plans changed. Ashley married someone she knew from high school, and they began building a family together. That was until her husband started abusing her.
At first, Ashley said she was isolated from her friends and family. It was like her husband was using the loneliness she felt from her grandmother’s death to manipulate her, she said. Then, he started to physically and sexually abuse her. When she became pregnant with her abuser’s child, Ashley said she started to lose hope.
“I was really scared,” Ashley said. Invisible People decided not to publish Ashley’s real name because she is a survivor of domestic violence.
After she worked up the courage to call the cops on her abuser, Ashley felt even more isolated. She and her two kids were taken to a shelter, and ended up living in the shelter system for three years before moving out. Ashley said she always felt out of place in that environment, which she described as “overwhelming.”
“It was just temporary housing. It never really felt like home,” Ashley said.
From Shelter to Stability
All of that began to change when she met a group of women at the shelter, whom she referred to as “The Network.” They shared information with Ashley about getting a case manager and connecting with an organization in New York called New Destiny Housing Corporation.
New Destiny is a 30-year-old nonprofit that provides permanent supportive housing and services to about 900 domestic violence survivors and their children every night.
Ashley said living at New Destiny has been life-changing. Not only did the organization help her with move-in costs, but it has connected her with other benefits and services to help her get back on her feet. She’s also been able to enjoy some of the small pleasures in life again, like spending an evening watching television with her children.
“Moving into my new home felt like stability,” Ashley said.
Why Permanent Housing Saves Lives
Ashley is one of the more than 60,000 people who are homeless in America because they are fleeing domestic violence. This population can be difficult for many service providers to help because of their living conditions and the severe trauma they’ve experienced.
Experts worry that helping people like Ashley could become much more difficult in the future if President Donald Trump’s administration enacts its proposed reforms to the Department of Housing and Urban Development’s Continuum of Care grant program, the nation’s largest pot of funding for homeless services.
Last year, the Trump administration proposed making significant changes to the CoC program, including limiting how much money can be spent on permanent supportive housing and directing more resources toward substance abuse treatment and workforce services rather than housing.
A federal judge in Rhode Island temporarily blocked the proposed changes because HUD sought to apply them to funding that was already approved. The judge required HUD to release the fiscal year 2024 funding it already approved. However, reports indicate that HUD is working to implement the changes ahead of the next grant cycle.
Gabriela Sandoval Requena, the vice president of external affairs for New Destiny, told Invisible People that if Trump’s proposed cuts were enacted today, then the organization would immediately lose about one-third of its budget. That could result in hundreds of survivors being forced back onto the streets, she warned.
“If we were to lose the funding … we would have to change our approach dramatically and reduce the number of survivors that we can house,” Requena said. “That means that survivors will have to stay in dangerous situations, in situations that could be life and death for them and their kids. Some of them may not be able to escape on time, and some of them may die.”
Domestic Violence and Homelessness Are Deeply Linked
The ties between domestic violence and homelessness are deep. According to research from John’s Hopkins University, women who experience intimate partner violence are four times more likely to become homeless than women who do not. Many survivors also face financial abuse, which is when a partner exerts control over their finances, employment, or credit, thereby threatening their housing stability as well.
Advocates have warned that Trump’s proposed changes to the CoC program could result in as many as 170,000 people becoming homeless. Service providers and local nonprofits who work with people experiencing homelessness have described the proposal as “life-or-death.”
Requena said that New Destiny is one of the lucky nonprofits that has a small financial runway to carry them through October 1, 2026, which is when the federal fiscal year ends. However, that doesn’t make the matter any less urgent, Requena said.
“It’s a matter of life and death,” she said. “It’s funding that human beings, hundreds of people, rely on across the country, and without these programs, families, individuals, veterans, and domestic violence survivors are going to be pushed out of their homes, back and on the streets, and for survivors, back to their abusers in situations where they can perish.”
This Is a Policy Choice
Ashley’s story is not unusual. It is the story of countless survivors across the country who rely on housing programs most people have never heard of.
For them, permanent supportive housing is not a benefit. It is not assistance. It is not a stepping stone. It is the reason they are alive.
Proposed changes to the Continuum of Care program may sound like bureaucratic adjustments on paper. But in practice, they threaten to dismantle the very system that allows survivors of domestic violence to escape abuse, protect their children, and rebuild their lives in safety.
When housing is the only barrier between a survivor and their abuser, cutting that housing is not a budget decision. It is a life-and-death decision.