Boston Council Probes LGBTQ+ Youth Homelessness as City Reports 16 Percent Drop

BOSTON -- October 10, 2024, Boston City Council hears urgent testimony on LGBTQ+ youth homelessness, with advocates calling for a flexible city funding pool to address service gaps. The Committee on Public Health, Homelessness, and Recovery, chaired by Councilor John FitzGerald and sponsored by Councilor Henry Santana, Council President Liz Breadon, and Councilor Gabriela Coletta Zapata, convened Thursday to hear from homeless youth, nonprofit leaders, and city officials. Connor Schoen, co-founder and executive director of Break Time, which operates on a $6 million annual budget with 40 full-time staff, told councilors that less than 2 percent of his organization's funding comes from the city of Boston, calling the gap a structural problem in how city dollars reach organizations spanning multiple departments. City officials from the Mayor's Office of Housing reported that Boston's youth homeless point-in-time count dropped from 157 to 132, a 16 percent decrease, since the 2019 launch of Rising to the Challenge, and that 621 young people have been housed through the plan, with a 6 percent return-to-homelessness rate. A new HUD-funded emergency housing program targeted at LGBTQ+ youth, sponsored by Victory Programs, is slated to begin operations before year's end and will serve approximately 12 young people.