Our Focus: Housing and Health

Homelessness is solvable when we work together as a connected community.

In support of this idea, Piedmont Health Foundation has partnered with the Greenville Homeless Alliance to launch a Housing Navigator pilot to build a bridge between frontline service providers and housing providers.

Housing Navigator Pilot Initiative

The Housing Navigator pilot seeks to prove the concept that connecting people to housing will improve the overall health outcomes for people experiencing homelessness in Greenville County.

The Housing Navigator will work to build connections and relationships with housing providers such as property owners and property management companies to expand the database and increase the number and types of housing options for the most vulnerable in Greenville County.

The Housing Navigator will work closely with a coalition of frontline service providers to identify people who are experiencing chronic homelessness and are ready for housing. Chronic homelessness is defined as someone who has experienced homelessness for a year or more and is challenged with a disabling condition.

The Housing Navigator will build relationships with frontline service providers and work to eliminate any barriers between people ready for housing and housing providers. Together, the goal is to connect a minimum of 24 people to stable housing.

In 2024 the initiative’s work will also include:

• The Housing Navigator will network with housing providers to understand what perceived and real challenges providers have faced in the past with individuals who have experienced chronic homelessness.
• The housing navigator will ensure that housing providers know how working through the initiative can eliminate some of the perceived risks and develop and connect them to incentives that could mitigate some of these risks.
• In addition to the online resource guide that GHA’s Collaborate Working Group created, the Housing Navigator will develop and oversee a centralized housing list to increase options for people in need of housing. The goal is to keep the housing list updated monthly.
• The Housing Navigator will also work to identify the supportive services needed to keep a person from experiencing homelessness again once a person is housed.
• The Housing Navigator will create a universal database that reports on exits from homelessness and quantifies the success of the initiative.

To learn more about the Greenville Homeless Alliance and other initiatives in this area, please visit gvlhomes4all.org.

Beginning in 2025, Piedmont Health Foundation is a mission partner in Greenville Together, a community-driven coalition formed to confront homelessness in Greenville County with a unified, strategic response. The initiative brings together nonprofits, local leaders, landlords, service providers, people with lived experience of homelessness, faith groups, government partners, and residents to collaboratively work toward making homelessness rare, brief, and non-recurring in the community.

Vision & Goal:

Greenville Together’s core vision is to functionally end unsheltered homelessness in Greenville by coordinating cross-sector resources and actions that address both immediate needs and longer-term systemic challenges. The initiative’s action plan focuses on rapid rehousing, homelessness prevention, public awareness, improved service delivery, and accountability.

Action Plan Highlights:

• Housing Surge: A central strategy designed to quickly rehouse individuals experiencing unsheltered homelessness. This includes:

  • Street to Home efforts that place chronically homeless and medically fragile individuals into permanent supportive housing with support services.

  • Rapid Exit support such as one-time financial help (e.g., move-in costs) to quickly transition people from the streets into stable housing.

  • Leveraging existing programs to connect individuals with temporary housing while preserving their priority for permanent options.

• Public Education & Engagement: Building broader community understanding of homelessness and mobilizing support for solutions.

• Training & Technical Assistance: Strengthening service delivery among partners to center equity and best practices.

• Accountability: Establishing transparent data collection and progress reporting to guide improvements.

• Long-Term Planning: Greenville Together is also planning for a permanent supportive housing pipeline and a comprehensive day services and needs assessment to inform future solutions.

Why It Matters:

Homelessness in Greenville is linked to structural issues like housing affordability and income insecurity, with a significant share of extremely low-income renters spending more than half their income on housing. Racial disparities in unsheltered homelessness have also been documented locally.

For more information please visit greenvilletogether.org.