What is Partnership for Zero?
An extraordinary collaboration to dramatically reduce unsheltered homelessness in targeted areas of King County.
Starting with the premise that housing is a basic human need and every human should have a safe place to live, Partnership for Zero is an extraordinary collaboration to dramatically reduce unsheltered homelessness in targeted areas of King County. The initial demonstration project has launched in Downtown Seattle and the Chinatown/International District, made possible by a public-private partnership with King County’s business and philanthropic communities.
The Partnership for Zero model — a proven, evidence-based approach — is divided into five phases. In Downtown Seattle, we have already implemented phases one and two: the establishment of the Housing Command Center and the development of a By-Name List, both of which are essential for the work of swiftly getting people housed.
Led by the King County Regional Homelessness Authority (KCRHA), Partnership for Zero is funded with significant investment through We Are In’s business and philanthropic partners, including: Ballmer Group, Alaska Airlines, Amazon, Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, Boeing Commercial Airplanes, Campion Foundation, Costco, Expedia Group, Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center, JP Morgan Chase Pacific Northwest, Kaiser Permanente Washington, Madrona Venture Group, Microsoft Philanthropies, Nordstrom, PATH, Puget Sound Energy, Raikes Foundation, REI, Russell Investments, Schultz Family Foundation, Seattle Foundation, Starbucks, Ste. Michelle Wine Estates, Symetra, T-Mobile, Weyerhaeuser, and Zillow Group. For statements from We Are In’s partners about Partnership for Zero see HERE.
Partnership for Zero is also made possible through support from the City of Seattle and King County.
Our Goals
The goals of Partnership for Zero are to…
- Treat King County’s homelessness emergency like an emergency
- Live our values by helping people move from homeless to housed
- Develop a model that can be quickly and effectively scaled, with additional resources, to other communities across King County.
Our Approach
Partnership for Zero involves…
- Unifying and coordinating resources to address unsheltered homelessness in a specific geographic area
- Building a By-Name List with detailed information about what each individual needs to move to stability
- Identifying and building the necessary infrastructure to effectively respond to the needs of people living unsheltered
- Employing trained System Advocates to provide individualized, trusted support for people experiencing homelessness as they navigate social services and the path to permanent housing
- Facilitating the movement of people into shelter and housing that matches their needs
- Maintaining the infrastructure necessary to immediately respond to new individuals experiencing unsheltered homelessness in focused geographic areas
The Partnership for Zero model is being deployed in five phases:
Phase 1
Phase 1: Creating the Housing Command Center
Status: Open and Operational
The Housing Command Center (HCC) is a centralized emergency operations management system that coordinates and streamlines the actions required to house people. Currently, the HCC is focused on permanently housing people living unsheltered in Downtown Seattle.
A command center takes best practices learned from years of emergency response to disasters like floods, fires and other major displacements, and applies them to homelessness. To set up a command center utilizing these practices, KCRHA received technical assistance from the US Department of Housing and Urban Development.
The HCC leadership team includes representatives of the Lived Experience Coalition, the City of Seattle, King County, the KCRHA, and We Are In. The HCC also includes System Advocates, a Housing Acquisition Team, a Data Management Team, and more.
Phase 2
Phase 2: Development of By-Name List
Status: Initial Build Complete in Downtown Seattle, In Progress Countywide
A “By-Name List” is a tool that allows us to understand every person experiencing homelessness and what they need to move to stability — it includes real-time, action-oriented, person-centered information. This tool relies on relationships built by system advocates and enables effective case planning and service matching.
A By-Name List is similar to the “MyChart” that you might access through your healthcare provider; it securely centralizes the needs and conditions of individuals that can then be accessed when facilitating connections to shelter and housing.
We’ve seen By-Name Lists used successfully before. Encampment resolutions at Ballard Commons and Woodland Park in Seattle used a By-Name List to move individuals inside and match them with the resources they need; the federal government relied on a By-Name List to help end veterans homelessness; and many communities in Washington use By-Name Lists for sub-populations like youth experiencing homelessness.
As the agency leading our regional response to homelessness, the KCRHA is responsible for developing and maintaining the By-Name List. The KCRHA is starting with a By-Name List for Downtown Seattle and building toward a comprehensive, county-wide list. While the initial build of the list is complete for Downtown, it will be constantly evolving as new information is collected.
Phase 3
Phase 3: Matching People to Resources
Status: Ongoing
The Housing Command Center is matching people with housing and services in an ongoing process based on available resources. As individual needs are assessed and added to the By-Name List, we can review the services and resources needed to successfully support people on the path to stable, permanent housing. The gaps identified between available resources and population needs will inform our recommendations for an expansion of infrastructure and capacity.
With funding from We Are In, KCRHA is hiring and managing staff to do the hard work of caring for people. The KCRHA team of more than 20 System Advocates have lived experience of homelessness and use that expertise to help others. Trained System Advocates know how to access and navigate resources, social services, and pathways to housing, and provide that support to people experiencing homelessness.
Phase 4
Phase 4: Permanently Housing People
Status: Ongoing
Housing people is an ongoing process managed by the Housing Command Center, as outreach workers and system advocates facilitate the movement of people into housing that matches their needs.
Phase 5
Phase 5: Hold Steady
Status: Ongoing
Once Phase 4 is complete, KCRHA will maintain the infrastructure necessary to immediately identify and respond to new individuals experiencing unsheltered homelessness in focused geographic areas.
Staying Updated On Partnership For Zero
Joining We Are In is the best way to stay engaged and informed about Partnership for Zero. follow us on social media at @WeAreInKingCo.
For all questions, please email info@wearein.org
Frequently Asked Questions About Partnership for Zero
Partnership for Zero is a united effort to focus and coordinate resources in a targeted geographic area to dramatically reduce unsheltered homelessness. The goal of Partnership for Zero is to build a future where homelessness is rare overall and brief when it occurs, by combining resources and investing in targeted infrastructure and capacity to put every person who is experiencing unsheltered homelessness on the path toward permanent housing.
Starting with the premise that housing is a basic human need that everyone should have access to, Partnership for Zero is an extraordinary collaboration across the City of Seattle, King County, and a broad group of businesses, philanthropies, service providers, and people with lived experience. Partnership for Zero will launch its initial demonstration project in Downtown Seattle and in a set of regional communities to be named soon, allowing partners to iterate and adjust the model before expanding across King County.
The Partnership for Zero approach was developed by KCRHA leadership in collaboration with the Lived Experience Coalition, the City, the County, and We Are In — a coalition of philanthropies, businesses, service providers, advocates, and both housed and unhoused King County residents — and other community partners.
Ending homelessness is not an easy task; the problems we are trying to solve reached this level because of years of inattention and underfunding. It requires time and focus to do it right — people’s lives depend on it — and this partnership is designed to work in a different way than what has been done before.
Partnership for Zero strategically focuses resources on a defined geographic area, treating this emergency like an emergency in order to make visible progress. By focusing resources, Partnership for Zero avoids the trap of spreading resources so thinly that everybody gets something but nobody gets enough to make a difference. Partnership for Zero ensures coordinated resource deployment and adaptive adjustment using real time information.
There are several core tenets of the Partnership for Zero model that differentiate this approach from previous efforts to address homelessness in our region.
As the backbone of Partnership for Zero implementation, the Housing Command Center has been activated in Seattle/King County. The HCC is a centralized emergency operations management system that coordinates and streamlines the actions required to house people. Currently, the HCC is focused on permanently housing people living unsheltered in Downtown Seattle.
A command center takes best practices learned from years of emergency response to disasters like floods, fires and other major displacements, and applies them to homelessness response. To set up a command center utilizing these practices, KCRHA is receiving technical assistance from the US Department of Housing and Urban Development.
The HCC leadership team includes representatives of the Lived Experience Coalition, the City of Seattle, King County, the KCRHA, and We Are In. The HCC also includes System Advocates, a Housing Acquisition Team, a Data Management Team, and more.
The second phase of Partnership for Zero will focus on the development of a “By-Name List,” a comprehensive list of all the people experiencing homelessness in a designated area and their specific needs. A By-Name List is more than just a list of names — it includes granular, real time information about who is experiencing unsheltered homelessness and what they need to move to stability. This tool relies on relationships built by outreach workers and enables effective case planning and service matching.
KCRHA’s By-Name data capacity is being developed with in-kind support from Microsoft. The tool is meant to replace duplicative, burdensome, and traumatizing intake sheets with secure records of clear, relevant, up-to-date information, similar to a medical history like a primary care “My Chart.”
A majority of the shelter and housing placements will take place during the third phase of Partnership for Zero with the help of system advocates. Peer outreach or navigation has proven effective and essential in getting folks on the path to permanent housing. System advocates provide individualized, trusted support to people experiencing homelessness, acting as an advocate and an ally to help people move from homeless to housed. System advocates have lived experience of homelessness and an understanding of how the system works and how to access resources. Navigating multiple social service systems can be challenging. It is not enough to have resources available — we must actively work to ensure that folks are getting the resources they need.
With funding from We Are In’s business and private partners, KCRHA will hire and manage sufficient staff to do the hard work of caring for people. The workforce will include 15 trained incident responders and up to 30 system advocates who can provide longitudinal support to get people to stable outcomes.
Here is a hypothetical example of how system advocates works: A 52 year-old man is experiencing homelessness in Downtown Seattle. He’s diabetic, has a dog, is currently employed, and lives out of his car. Because he moves from location to location, he might be harder to find from week to week. Because he has a dog, he doesn’t want to go to a shelter that won’t allow him to keep his pet. Because he has diabetes, he should have access to regular medical care that can prevent more serious health problems. A peer navigator would get to know him by name, build a relationship to better understand his needs, and be able to reach him if he has to move his car. The peer navigator would understand that he has limited ability to meet or access services during the work day, and would also know that he needs a place that will let him keep his dog. When an appropriate housing opportunity arises, the peer navigator would be able to connect him with that opportunity immediately and would stay in touch after placement to act as a coach and ally who can support him in accessing services.
For each of Partnership for Zero’s geographic targets — the first being Downtown Seattle — the model will include five phases. In Downtown, we expect to reach phase five in what could be as fast as 12 months, though we expect some variance in timeline due to command center development and project staffing, client needs, and the availability of appropriate resources. We are not setting a strict timeline and instead committing to doing whatever is necessary to implement this program successfully — we want to do this once, do it well, and make sure it’s sustainable. Partners expect that there will be learning and adjustment over the course of the project and will operate with full transparency to keep the community updated.
The Partnership for Zero model enables us to break down silos, consolidate our approach, and work together to provide shelter and housing for everyone in need. The City and County retain responsibility for housing, zoning and development, so KCRHA will work with them to assess what resources are needed to successfully place people experiencing unsheltered homelessness on the path to stable, permanent housing. We will identify the gaps between available resources and population needs and expand our infrastructure and capacity accordingly. We will then be able to provide folks experiencing homelessness with available shelter or permanent housing that matches their needs and then maintain the infrastructure necessary to quickly respond to new incidences of homelessness.
Yes. There will be an additional community in King County, outside of Seattle, announced in the coming months. KCRHA and its partners will work with the initial Partnership for Zero communities to adjust and improve the model, learning lessons so that we can bring it to other communities in King County.
