Mayor Michelle Wu announced the City of Boston joined 11 jurisdictions and nonprofit organizations in filing a lawsuit to stop the Trump administration from creating unlawful and unreasonable restrictions on funding for proven solutions to homelessness, threatening to push hundreds of thousands of families and individuals onto the street as cold winter months arrive.

For many years and through multiple administrations, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD)'s Continuum of Care (CoC) Program has helped provide the necessary resources for local governments and organizations to fund permanent housing projects to support veterans, older residents, individuals with disabilities, and individuals and families experiencing homelessness. The City of Boston has applied for and received funds from this program since the early 1990s. On November 13, 2025, HUD rescinded its prior funding requirements, issuing new criteria which threaten existing services. This move could push hundreds of thousands of Americans back into homelessness.

In 2025, Boston was awarded approximately $48 million from Continuum of Care (CoC) program grants, supporting 19 nonprofit organizations and over 2,000 formerly homeless households. The federal government is proposing drastic changes that would have a harmful impact on how the City of Boston supports formerly homeless individuals and families with permanent housing and supportive services. The drastic changes this year would require Boston to eliminate $29 million in permanent supportive housing projects and replace them with new services-only and temporary housing projects –promoting strict mandatory service, forced treatment, and employment requirements over proven anti-homelessness strategies.

"Permanent supportive housing has been a key to tackling homelessness and keeping Bostonians stable and safe in our community. The Trump Administration's harmful changes to this longstanding program could leave more than 1,100 Bostonians homeless. It's thanks to the funding from the Continuum of Care program and our nearly 20 partner organizations that we have been able to support so many adults and children, individuals with substance use and mental health disorders, individuals with disabilities, veterans, and survivors of domestic violence to be on pathways to stability through this specialized housing with direct connections to health care, counseling, and other supportive services," said Mayor Michelle Wu. "I'm grateful to all the jurisdictions joining us in this lawsuit to challenge these detrimental new requirements."

"Boston's Continuum of Care funds the backbone of our work to house our homeless population," said Chief of Housing, Sheila A. Dillon. "The proposed federal changes in this year's notice puts our residents at serious risk. Without these federal grants, people who rely on permanent supportive housing, designated to help those who live with disabling conditions, could lose the homes that have helped them rebuild their lives. The Wu administration is doing everything that it can to protect Boston's formerly homeless residents, support our dedicated nonprofit partners, and stand up for a system that has kept vulnerable people in our City safe for decades."

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"We cannot allow the federal government to punch down on our most vulnerable residents by abandoning its responsibility to fund housing and essential services for people experiencing homelessness, including veterans and those facing mental health challenges. Nineteen nonprofits in Boston rely on this funding every year, yet the Trump administration continues investing millions in programs that harm vulnerable communities while eliminating the lifelines so many depend on. Boston will keep fighting for these critical resources and protecting our residents' basic rights," said City Council President Ruthzee Louijeune.

The Continuum of Care program supports individuals experiencing homelessness and formerly homeless Boston residents with finding stable housing connected to health care, counseling, and other supportive services. Each year, the City of Boston works with local nonprofit organizations to assist more than 2,000 households experiencing homelessness through the CoC. These services are part of Boston's broader "housing first" strategy, which focuses on helping people move into stable housing as quickly as possible with supports to help them stay housed. The actions by the Trump Administration threaten these resources and the housing that the City and its partners are able to provide. After more than a decade of prioritizing evidence-based approaches that reduce homelessness, the new funding notice upends the stability of the program. This new funding notice makes drastic changes at every step of the process, including changing the types of projects eligible for funding, the criteria for selecting awardees, and the conditions grantees will be required to accept.

Each year, the Continuum of Care program funds services in Boston such as permanent supportive housing for people with disabilities, rapid re-housing for those exiting homelessness, and transitional housing for survivors of domestic violence and others in crisis. Nineteen local nonprofit organizations receive this funding annually to do their work, including Metro Housing | Boston, Pine Street Inn, HomeStart, Massachusetts Housing and Shelter Alliance, FamilyAid, Bridge Over Troubled Waters and Casa Myrna. These groups also employ more than 125 people with these grants.

"With 98% of our tenants remaining housed after a year, and a street homelessness rate of under 2.5%, we are doing something right in Boston," said Lyndia Downie, President and Executive Director of Pine Street Inn. "With data proving the efficacy of permanent supportive housing, it would be disastrous to abandon this approach, and would set back our progress by decades," she added. "We cannot go back to systems that were proven ineffective and often harmful to people who are struggling, most through no fault of their own."

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"At FamilyAid, we provide critical housing and support to more than 100 children and parents through CoC programming—families who depend on this stability to stay together, keep their jobs, and keep their kids in school and out of foster care. These cuts don't just eliminate housing—they will push vulnerable children back onto the streets and into a child welfare system already strained beyond capacity," said Larry Seamans, President & CEO, FamilyAid.

"The Massachusetts Housing & Shelter Alliance (MHSA) is grateful for the City of Boston's leadership in joining nonprofits and municipalities across the nation in this important lawsuit. The federal government is rolling out a massive policy change that will dramatically cut housing for people with disabilities nationwide," said Joyce Tavon, Chief Executive Officer, Massachusetts Housing & Shelter Alliance (MHSA). "Nearly 4,000 households statewide are in danger of returning to homelessness. Thank you to Mayor Wu for standing up for what we know works: housing solutions to homelessness."

The coalition behind the new legal challenge includes the National Alliance to End Homelessness (NAEH), the National Low Income Housing Coalition (NLIHC), Crossroads Rhode Island, Youth Pride, Inc., as well as the County of Santa Clara, Calif., San Francisco, Calif., King County, Wash., Boston, Mass., Cambridge, Mass., Nashville, Tenn., and Tucson, Ariz. Democracy Forward represents the coalition of nonprofit organizations in the matter; the National Homelessness Law Center represents NAEH and NLIHC; Public Rights Project represents the cities of Boston, Cambridge, Nashville and Tucson; and Santa Clara County and San Francisco represent themselves. The Lawyers' Committee for Rhode Island, and the ACLU Foundation of RI represents all plaintiffs.

In May, the City of Boston joined a different lawsuit with cities and counties from across the United States to challenge the Trump Administration's unlawful move to cancel $3.6 billion in Continuum of Care grants for housing and homelessness prevention unless Boston and other communities agree to the President's unconstitutional Executive Orders. Boston joined seven other jurisdictions in filing this lawsuit in the federal Western District of Washington, including King County, WA; the City of New York, NY; the City of Columbus, OH; the City and County of San Francisco, CA and Pierce County and Snohomish County, WA. In June 2025, a federal judge in the Western District of Washington issued a preliminary injunction barring the Trump Administration from imposing these grant conditions as to Boston and the other plaintiffs. The Trump Administration's appeal of that decision is currently pending before the Ninth Circuit.

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