The Journey Home:
The Homeless Alliance Story
2004
Homeless Alliance is Founded and HMIS is Launched
An informal group of community volunteers is incorporated as the Homeless Alliance and receives 501c3 nonprofit status. Dan Straughan is hired as the first employee and leads the development of a new Homeless Management Information System (HMIS) for OKC. Last year, this shared database was used by 25 homeless service providers in OKC to coordinate care for 21,972 people.
2006
WestTown Resource Campus Opens
Property in the Metro Park neighborhood is acquired to build the WestTown Resource Campus. At this time, OKC was the only city of its size without a general use day shelter facility. It could take someone hours to travel on foot or by bus between various service providers. Our campus helps to eliminate barriers between our neighbors and the help they need.
2011
Day Shelter Opens
Our Day Shelter opens to anyone in need of a meal, a shower, or a safe place to rest. Installed just in front of the kitchen is the neon sign from the historic Johnny's Lunch Box, a downtown restaurant where our founding board members used to meet for lunch to discuss community issues.
The Shelter now serves an average of 300 people each day and, in collaboration with dozens of partner agencies, offers connections to employment, health care, housing, veterans services, and more.
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2012
Adoption of the Housing First Model
The Housing First model - a national, evidence-based approach that values flexibility, individualized supports, client choice, and autonomy - is introduced to OKC.
Once someone has the safety and stability of a home, then they have the ability to focus on physical and mental health, substance use disorder, employment, and other challenges.
2014
Meghan Joins the Team!
Meghan Mueller joins the Homeless Alliance team as a master’s degree intern from the OU Zarrow School of Social Work. She goes on to become a full-time employee and develop many of our key initiatives.
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2016
Healthy Housing Program Begins
We are awarded a U.S Dept of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) grant to provide housing stability services to people living with HIV. This is still the largest federal housing grant in Oklahoma City, serving 360 clients annually.
2019
Housing Navigation Model Launches
We develop a plan to place trained Homeless Alliance staff at partner agencies to share our unique expertise and be more accessible to those we wish to serve. This innovative "Housing Navigator" model is first tested at Palomar Family Justice Center.
With the help of the Day 1 Families Fund, we later add Housing Navigators at the YWCA, Diversion Hub, ReMerge, Restore OKC, the Metropolitan Library System, Oklahoma City Public Schools, Mid-Del Schools, and TEEM. These partnerships impact our community's ability to respond more quickly and effectively to housing needs. In July 2024, we were invited to share our experiences with this model at a national conference in Washington, D.C.
2019
Street Outreach Team Hits the Road
The Homeless Alliance launches a street outreach team. Our organization’s core values include meeting people where they are at and meeting basic needs as a pathway to healing and unlocking a person’s full potential. Our street outreach workers live out those values every day by building trust and relationships with our neighbors experiencing unsheltered homelessness.
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2020
Curbside Flowers Opens
Curbside Flowers opens as a full-service flower shop providing employment and training to people transitioning out of homelessness.
Today, our suite of social enterprises also includes Sasquatch Shaved Ice, a program that targets transition age youth, and Curbside Apparel, which is a full-service screen-printing business. Through each of its businesses, Curbside has helped more than 400 individuals and families end their homelessness.
2020
COVID Response Plan
The Homeless Alliance coordinates the development of the COVID response plan for local homeless service providers, which included massive food distribution efforts as well as a quarantine shelter and testing and vaccination pods. This same year, we operated a temporary winter night shelter at Willard School to provide additional beds and reduce shelter crowding.
2022
Community Court Begins
The Homeless Alliance, in partnership with the Oklahoma City Municipal Court and Crowe & Dunlevy, P.C., leads a program called Community Court that helps city residents experiencing homelessness clear outstanding municipal citations and fines.
2023
A New Record for Curbside
We celebrate selling 1 million copies of the Curbside Chronicle!
In 2023, Curbside supportive employment programs provided more than 72,000 hours of employment and created more than $1 million in earnings for program participants.
2023
HA Opens OKC’s First Winter Shelter
Our Winter Shelter opens at 1601 NW 4th Street as a low-barrier, emergency shelter to anyone seeking refuge from the cold weather overnight. There are 300 beds available to adults, and a kennel area for pets. The Winter Shelter is open annually from November 1 to March 31.
In the first winter season, it provided respite for 3,538 unique guests and their pets.
2024
Leadership Change,
Wayfinder Grant Awarded,
and Day Shelter Hits Record Demand
After 20 years at the helm, Dan Straughan retires, and Meghan Mueller is appointed President & CEO.
We receive the highly competitive Wayfinder Grant from the United Way of Central Oklahoma. The grant will allow us to pilot a Homeless System Diversion program which should reduce the strain on our shelters and provide early intervention for our neighbors who are newly homeless. Other communities have found this approach to be both effective and compassionate and we are excited to help bring the model to OKC.
On January 16, 2024, our Day Shelter served a single-day record of 576 people in our space that was originally designed to accommodate 150.
We have much to celebrate, but there is so much more to do!