After two years of caring for their son’s medical needs, Tiffany Solomon and her husband had exhausted their savings. Unable to renew their lease, Solomon’s family bounced between 15 hotels in one month and landed in a homeless shelter for four more, until a case manager helped them find a stable home.
Seven years later, Solomon has helped Durham create a plan to help people like her. By 2031, the city aims to place people experiencing homelessness into existing housing within 30 days. More than 1,400 people currently experience homelessness in Durham, with about 600 people living unsheltered and 284 on shelter waitlists, according to city data.
“This is the perfect time to look at the entire approach—the system, where the fragments are, and try and do something different,” said Solomon, who worked on the plan as a member of the city’s Homeless Services Advisory Committee.
In partnership with nonprofit Community Solutions’ national Built for Zero initiative, Durham’s Strategic Plan to End Homelessness aims to make homelessness “rare and brief” for all populations in the next five years, with the first milestone being a 30% reduction in unsheltered homelessness by June 2027.
The initiative is projected to cost $13 million for its first year, but not all of the funding has been accounted for. The city’s proposed budget offers $4.55 million, sourced from COVID-era grants. Durham County has proposed chipping in $500,000, much less than the city’s initial ask of $3 million, amid a budget deficit.
The city has requested an additional $5 million from private funders, including Duke University and the A.J. Fletcher Foundation, likely to be finalized in the next three months. The city also asked 4th Congressional District Rep. Valerie Foushee for help securing $2 million in federal funding.
Anise Vance, assistant director of community safety in Durham, said, if fully funded, this plan could “really move the needle” on homelessness in the city.
“Instead of hanging on a waitlist for months or even years, somebody who’s experiencing homelessness could be inside within 30 days,” Vance said. “That is a radical change.”
If the plan does not get fully funded, Vance said the city will need to modify its goals, likely moving fewer people into housing.
The city and county haven’t had a unified plan to address homelessness in nearly a decade, Vance said. Based on a count conducted on a single winter night each year, people experiencing unsheltered homelessness in Durham increased from 32 people in 2016 to 196 people in 2025. The city’s more expansive database, launched in January, now counts 600 people experiencing unsheltered homelessness.
Russell Pierce, executive director of the supportive housing nonprofit Housing for New Hope, helped create the plan. Pierce attributes the increase in homelessness to a lack of affordable housing, signaling a need for more help from the city and county.
Ryan Smith, director of the city’s Community Safety Department, made clear in a presentation to the Durham City Council that this plan relies on housing that already exists.
“We’re not going to be building ourselves out of this,” Smith said.
The city launched its strategic plan in August 2025, modeling the initiative after more than 150 communities across the country that have partnered with Built for Zero. Raleigh recently launched a similar approach.
By engaging with landlords, the city plans to make 500 units available each year—up from just 12—to ensure that housing and rent support are lined up before case managers engage with unhoused communities.
The city is incentivizing landlords to set aside housing units, building on a strategy Pierce said has ramped up since the pandemic. The plan will increase landlord engagement over the next five years, paying landlords to hold units while a person prepares to move in, covering the cost of potential property damage, and attaching case managers to each unit.
The goal of the initiative is for tenants to be self-sufficient in 13 months. A flexible housing assistance fund, projected to make up $9 million of the initiative’s budget if fully funded, will offer rent assistance for the first 12 months while tenants secure income and benefits.
“We do see a lot of people [for whom] the fundamental barrier is that initial capital, and if we can help bridge that barrier, then we really can move somebody out of homelessness,” Vance said.
After the first year, case managers will help tenants set up a long-term housing plan. Vance said the city has begun negotiating contracts for additional case managers and is prepared to roll out a new training in early June.
When Solomon was unhoused, she said the case manager she connected with at the shelter helped her secure a stable home, preventing her family from falling into a cycle of chronic homelessness.
“That case management support was just like the continued care for our family and support until we were, I won’t say truly on our feet, but until we were stable enough to carry the torch on our own,” Solomon said.
Durham’s plan will support case management services to help prevent vulnerable people from becoming unhoused, in addition to those already experiencing homelessness.
Over the next year, Vance said the city will also explore temporary housing options to offer people shelter while they wait for more stable housing. This includes leasing hotel rooms, a process the city also ramped up during the pandemic, and exploring new options such as building temporary cabins.
Durham County commissioners will vote on the budget June 8, and the City Council will vote June 15.
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