The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services will launch a $100 million pilot program designed to address addiction and homelessness in eight unspecified communities, HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. announced Monday.
The Safety Through Recovery, Engagement, and Evidence-based Treatment and Supports (STREETS) initiative aligns with previously articulated Trump administration priorities, including a shift away from harm-reduction and housing-first policies in favor of treatment programs. The program will fund targeted outreach, psychiatric care, medical stabilization and crisis intervention, according to HHS.
It will also connect people experiencing homelessness and addiction to housing “with a clear focus on long-term recovery and independence,” HHS stated.
Speaking at a Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration event on Monday, Kennedy said the STREETS program, which builds on a $45 million initiative last year to provide sober housing for young adults, will focus on early intervention.
“That’s one of the aspirations of the STREETS program, to find people as early as possible,” said Kennedy. “But also we’re taking a number of other steps to identify kids in foster care who need help and provide them with help before they have encounters with … the criminal justice system, with hospitals, with medical care, etc.”
The program will be outcome-based, said Kennedy.
“We’ve developed ways of following the addict for several years and having somebody take ownership of that addict,” Kennedy said. The program intends to disincentivize payments to rehab facilities that result in repeated cycles of addiction and treatment in favor of longer-term care, he said. “When you align the economic incentives with the healthcare outcomes that we’re looking for, behavior will change.”
Homelessness levels reached record highs in 2024 in the U.S. as the cost of housing surged. Advocacy groups such as the National Alliance to End Homelessness say initiatives such as permanent supportive housing are the best way to reverse the trend.
The National Coalition for the Homeless has said the Trump administration’s approach to homelessness as a “problem of personal behavior … reinforces harmful stereotypes” without addressing root causes such as the lack of affordable housing, wage stagnation and racial inequities.
“Most people experiencing homelessness are not dealing with severe mental illness or addiction,” NCH Executive Director Donald Whitehead said in a December blog post. “They are people who can’t afford rent; workers, parents, seniors, youth, and people priced out by an economy that no longer matches wages to housing costs.”
Kennedy on Monday also unveiled a $10 million Assisted Outpatient Treatment grant program, a civil court-ordered outpatient mental health treatment program for adults experiencing serious mental illness and unable to participate in conventional outpatient treatment.
The federal programs will also be open to faith-based organizations, according to HHS.
“We are in a spiritual malaise in this country, and we need to give people access to all different ways of reconnecting with something that is higher than themselves,” Kennedy said.
The announcements follow a chaotic month at HHS: The department on Jan. 13 abruptly cut an estimated $2 billion in federal grant funding for mental health and addiction programs before reinstating the funding 24 hours later “with little explanation,” according to the National Health Care for the Homeless Council.
