Strategies

What Works for Health includes evidence-informed strategies to create communities where everyone can thrive.

11 Strategies
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Community Development Block Grants (CDBGs)

Provide funding for local community development activities such as affordable housing, anti-poverty programs, and infrastructure development
Evidence Rating:
Some Evidence

Community Conditions

  • Housing and transportation
  • Civic and community resources

Societal Rules

  • Budgets

Community land trusts

Purchase the land a home is on to lease to homeowners with low and middle incomes and require homeowners to sell the home back to the trust or to another resident with low income upon moving
Evidence Rating:
Some Evidence

Community Conditions

  • Housing and transportation
  • Air, water and land
  • Civic and community resources

Societal Rules

  • Institutional practices

Debt advice for tenants with unpaid rent

Offer debt advice from trained providers to tenants with unpaid, overdue rent to help repay debt and increase financial literacy
Evidence Rating:
Some Evidence

Community Conditions

  • Income, employment and wealth
  • Housing and transportation

Housing Choice Voucher Program (Section 8)

Provide eligible families with low and very low incomes with vouchers to help cover the costs of rental housing; also called Section 8
Evidence Rating:
Some Evidence

Community Conditions

  • Housing and transportation

Societal Rules

  • Budgets

Housing First

Provide rapid access to permanent housing and support (e.g., crisis intervention, needs assessment, case management), usually for chronically homeless individuals with persistent mental illness or substance abuse issues
Evidence Rating:
Scientifically Supported

Community Conditions

  • Housing and transportation

Societal Rules

  • Institutional practices

Housing mediation services

Facilitate mediation between tenants and landlords to resolve conflict and prevent eviction
Evidence Rating:
Insufficient Evidence

Community Conditions

  • Housing and transportation

Housing reparations

Apologize for discriminatory housing policies; increase subsidies, financing, and paths to homeownership for people of color; and invest in systematically disadvantaged neighborhoods
Evidence Rating:
Expert Opinion

Community Conditions

  • Income, employment and wealth
  • Housing and transportation
  • Civic and community resources

Societal Rules

  • Laws and policies
  • Worldviews, culture and norms

Housing trust funds

Support funds that help create or maintain affordable housing, subsidize rental housing, and assist homebuyers with low incomes and non-profit housing developers
Evidence Rating:
Expert Opinion

Community Conditions

  • Housing and transportation
  • Civic and community resources

Societal Rules

  • Budgets

Legal support for tenants in eviction proceedings

Provide legal representation for tenants with low incomes in eviction proceedings or offer limited legal assistance to prepare tenants to represent themselves in court
Evidence Rating:
Scientifically Supported

Community Conditions

  • Housing and transportation

Societal Rules

  • Institutional practices

Rapid re-housing programs

Transition families and individuals experiencing homelessness into permanent housing quickly, often with supports such as short-term financial assistance, case management, landlord negotiations, etc.
Evidence Rating:
Some Evidence

Community Conditions

  • Housing and transportation

Societal Rules

  • Institutional practices