In early August 2023, the “Big Four” mayors of the four largest cities in the United States convened in Houston, Texas, to discuss their common problems, chief among them homelessness. This was just over a year after New York’s mayor Eric Adams had imposed a camping ban, using the police to bar homeless people’s access to public spaces, and seven months since Los Angeles’s Karen Bass declared a “state of emergency” to “prioritize bringing unhoused Angelenos inside.” Chicago’s Brandon Johnson, who had only recently taken office, told the Houston Chronicle at the time that he hoped visiting Houston would provide the tools necessary to build “a system that actually works.” They each had reason for optimism.

Throughout his time in office from 2016 to 2024, Houston’s then mayor Sylvester Turner was a tireless booster for the region’s Coalition for the Homeless (CFTH). Between 2011 and 2022, the umbrella nonprofit’s approach had overseen a 64 percent drop in people experiencing homelessness, from about 8,500 people down to just over 3,200. This is small potatoes compared to the sixty-five-thousand-plus homeless Angelenos in need, to say nothing of the ninety-three-thousand-plus homeless New Yorkers. Still, modeling a “Housing First” approach, Houston’s CFTH had centralized the region’s data and linked the local governing apparatus with partnering landlords and over one hundred nonprofits. To house people quickly and efficiently, the program used public-private dollars on vouchers subsidizing the cost of rent. It even offered a nonrefundable “Landlord Incentive Fee” to sweeten the pot.

The New York Times reported in 2022 that CFTH’s streamlined approach had reduced housing wait times to just thirty-two days. Compare that to New York, where the wait time for a similar program is closer to seven months. Contrary to New York and Los Angeles, which primarily use interim housing or shelters to shuffle people off the streets, CFTH grants voucher-holders tenancy in a variety of multifamily apartment complexes from the start, the idea being that people are better able to receive aid when they have a stable home. In a statement leading up to the Big Four meeting, Turner promised to “continue our groundbreaking, successful efforts until every Houstonian is off our streets.”