Economic Opportunities for People Experiencing Homelessness

Improving Economic Opportunities for the Homeless

Building Changes believes that everyone deserves the opportunity for a home, a healthy life and a good job. Improving economic opportunities for people who are experiencing homelessness is a socially and financially responsible—and respectful—strategy for ending homelessness. We have a vision that all people deserve access to employment services, whether they are homeless or have housing, mentally ill or chemically dependent, youths or seniors, formerly incarcerated, or living with chronic health challenges. To achieve this vision, access to existing programs by the most challenging clients needs to be improved and new pathways to economic opportunity will need to be created.

Building Changes is dedicated to improving the economic stability of families experiencing homelessness. We address the growing needs of the services community in three distinct ways: providing training and one-on-one technical assistance, issuing grants, and advocating for systems change.

Our activities are designed to support nonprofit providers to help their clients: 

• Enter the employment market, earn higher wages and gain self sufficiency through improved access to training, referral, and job support and retention services.  
  
• Increase household resources through improved access to the state and federal benefits and tax credits for which they are eligible.

Building Changes’ staff provide nonprofit providers with information and strategies that they can immediately take to practice in their employment service programs. We consult, train, plan, research, and share best practices that deliver creative solutions to address the underlying causes of homelessness.

To learn more, contact our Economic Opportunities for People Experiencing Homelessness Staff:  

• Director: Mark Putnam, Consulting Services Manager
• Professional Staff: Sarah Cotton Rajski, Economic Opportunities Specialist