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Living independently for the first time can be challenging for many young adults, but those involved in the foster care or justice system are especially vulnerable to homelessness, according to a new report.

Young adults aging out of foster care often have no credit or rental history and limited finances, like many 18-year-olds looking for their first apartment, said Andrea Graham, a transitional living services worker with Missoula nonprofit Youth Homes. But the youth Graham works with are sometimes dealing with past trauma and limited adult support as they look for a job and housing, she said.

“It’s a lot all at one time, and it can be really hard emotionally for kids to face this,” Graham said. “I had a girl yesterday who just broke down and was like, ‘I just don’t want to be homeless.’”

The University of Montana Rural Institute for Inclusive Communities conducted research for the report, “Understanding Cycles of Housing Instability and Justice Involvement in Missoula County,” as part of the Just Home Project. Last fall, Missoula County and housing nonprofit Homeword received a grant from the MacArthur Foundation and Urban Institute to participate in the national program and plan local strategies to disrupt the cycle of homelessness and encounters with the criminal justice system.

For the next phase of the project, the county and Homeword will focus on improving housing access for transition-age youth. Once their final report is approved by the MacArthur Foundation, Homeword will receive a loan to invest in a housing project, said Karissa Trujillo, the organization’s executive director.

“We’re able to really hyper-focus on that population, trying to get upstream when it comes to justice involvement and really try to stop that housing insecurity piece early to see if we can make a difference,” she said.

Trujillo said she hopes Homeword, the county and other organizations will use the report to devise other solutions to bridge the gap in services for these populations.

“The whole issue of the unhoused Missoulians and shelters and all that has become this really hot-button issue, but it’s a community issue,” said Chelsea Wittmann, the justice initiatives coordinator for Missoula County. “We look at it as this is a piece of that puzzle, to really understand who our unhoused community is in order to develop any kind of intervention to serve those folks.”

DISPROPORTIONATE IMPACTS

As part of the study, researchers analyzed data from 2018 to 2024 from Missoula County Detention Center booking records and the Homeless Management Information System, a database the city and service providers use to track unhoused people in Missoula County. Researchers also interviewed service providers, industry professionals, youth and unhoused adults.

People experiencing homelessness were disproportionately involved in the justice system, accounting for 18% of jail bookings in 2023, according to the report. Many were booked for low-level charges, including 25% for failing to appear in court.

Native Americans made up 2% of Missoula’s population but 15% of unhoused people, according to the report. About 25% of unhoused people booked into jail were Native American. Black residents make up 1% of Missoula’s population, 3% of the unhoused population and 7% of unhoused people booked into jail.

Youth 17 to 24 years old accounted for 10% of the homeless population, but that is likely an undercount as many are couch-surfing, staying with family or friends or not revealing their housing status, according to the report.

“There’s a lot of great support in our community for under 18, but the support is a lot harder to get ahold of when they’re over 18,” Trujillo said. “And so we heard from the providers that just having roofs over their clients’ heads would make a huge difference in their success. And we heard that in the research, too.”

About a quarter of unhoused youth were Native American. The racial disparity among unhoused youth booked in jail was even greater, with Native Americans making up 43% of 18- to 25-year-olds booked in jail.

The researchers’ interviews with more than two dozen service providers and housing, criminal justice and health care professionals focused on the common factors among people experiencing homelessness and criminal justice system involvement, housing barriers and resource gaps.

Substance use and mental health were identified as underlying causes of behaviors that may result in losing housing or being arrested, which can then lead to housing insecurity, according to the report.

Several participants noted that colonization and displacement of Native people from their ancestral homelands, families and culture resulted in disproportionate poverty, homelessness and involvement in the criminal justice system.

Criminal records, especially including violent or sex offenses, were identified as a barrier for low-income housing, vouchers or market rentals. A lack of good credit, rental history and references is also a barrier, as well as lack of income, transportation, phone and internet access needed to obtain housing, according to the report.

Missoula has emergency shelters, some transitional housing, and support services; however, the community lacks adequate mental health and substance use treatment options, housing programs specifically for those with a criminal record, comprehensive reentry support and culturally informed housing and support services for Native Americans, interviewees said.

Researchers also surveyed 24 unhoused people at the Johnson Street homeless shelter, all of whom had been incarcerated at some point in their lives. Most listed the cost of housing as a barrier, as well as long waiting lists for housing vouchers and losing their place in line without a phone or mailing address or due to incarceration. More than half named medical or mental health needs as a barrier to being stably housed.

Participants’ suggestions for improvements included increased mental health and substance use treatment resources at shelters, lowering rent costs and not requiring credit checks for rentals. Many highlighted the need for more community acceptance of unhoused people.

‘GIVE THEM A CHANCE’

Youth age out of foster care or group homes without housing lined up, and many don’t have adults to support them or know about available resources, according to the report. Young adults face age-related barriers to housing, such as a lack of credit, rental history or co-signers. Homelessness often leads to involvement with the justice system, which can create another barrier to housing, according to the report.

Graham, with Youth Homes, said she has worked with some young adults with nowhere to go who have resorted to stealing food or trading their bodies for a place to stay. Bill Neaves, the transitional living services program director, said youth involved in the criminal justice system often lack resources and are desperate.

“It does not mean these are bad people. It does not mean that they are a danger to others,” he said. “It means it is really difficult to live, cope and survive. I think the systems are coming together to try to help human beings that deserve to live in this community.”

Some youth-specific resources are available, including vouchers for youth coming out of foster care and a statewide program providing case management and temporary housing support, but the community lacks safe emergency shelter for youth, interviewees said.

The Missoula Housing Authority administers the federal Foster Youth to Independence voucher program, and participants are referred by the state child welfare agency or Youth Homes, said Gwenyth Rafuse, director of HUD programs for the authority.

Rafuse said the authority holds 11 vouchers but could request more if needed. In the last five years, seven to eight vouchers have consistently been used.

The housing authority encourages voucher recipients to sign up for the agency’s Family Self Sufficiency program, which helps participants work toward educational, career and financial goals, and will house voucher holders in its affordable housing units, Rafuse said.

“We just need more property managers to buy into this program and give them a chance,” she said.

Graham said that while a few companies will work with first-time renters, some will decline applications for various reasons.

“Even though they have a voucher, some companies won’t accept them without employment,” she said. “So that’s another thing they have to tackle at the same time. They’re without housing, they need to find a job, and that can get so overwhelming for them.”

Researchers surveyed 37 youth, 16 to 25 years old, including 20 Willard Alternative High School students. Nearly 60% had experienced homelessness at some point, 57% had been in foster care, 30% had been justice-involved and 89% had at least one parent or close family member who was currently or formerly incarcerated.

Most youth cited high costs and years-long waitlists for housing vouchers as barriers to stable housing. About a dozen participants said they wanted to live on their own but were either too young to apply for housing or couldn’t find a place because of their lack of rental history or credit.

Of the 20 youth who responded to questions about temporary shelter, most did not know where to go for shelter or support. Many did not have family or friends to stay with and did not feel safe at the Poverello Center or the Johnson Street shelter even if they were old enough to stay there.

The young adults surveyed advocated for more support from trusted adults to navigate housing, more readily available information online, lower housing costs, more rental assistance, increased education about finance and job opportunities, more short-term housing options and access to showers and hygiene supplies.

Willard Principal Cameron Johnson told Montana Free Press the alternative high school has a significant number of resource-insecure students, meaning they have unstable housing and struggle to consistently access food and keep up with other costs.

The school, which offers small class sizes and a hands-on curriculum, serves about 150 students at a time who are school-credit deficient and have some other educational disruption. That can include unstable housing, involvement in the juvenile justice system or a medical or mental health hospitalization, Johnson said.

The high percentage of surveyed youth with a currently or formerly incarcerated parent or close relative speaks to the impact incarceration has on upward mobility, Johnson said. When these students graduate, they lack some of the traditional family structures or guidance to transition them to the next phase, he said. Other students are working to support their families, many of whom are being priced out of Missoula-area rentals, Johnson said.

“The cost of living in our communities is so high, for some kids, they can’t see beyond the ‘how do I help my family make rent, buy groceries, pay the power bill and make sure the internet and water stays on,’ let alone transitioning to their own housing,” he said.

Willard established a safe-housing fund with donations to help students and families who are unhoused or unstably housed, Johnson said. The school used that money to pay for one student to live on campus during the summer before starting college in the fall, he said. The student had a job but had spent much of his senior year living in a car and couch-surfing.

“For all intents and purposes, he was working harder than some adults to make ends meet and was running into barrier after barrier,” Johnson said. “One of those was trying to find an affordable place to live.”

Willard has several support staff, including a school counselor, clinical social workers and a community health care worker, to help students with college applications, mental health challenges, benefits paperwork and accessing other resources.

Johnson said the approximately 25% of Willard students who identify as tribal members face additional systemic and generational traumas and injustices. While Missoula County Public Schools has a Native American Student Services Department, it can be difficult to tackle such issues during an academic year or even over four years, he said.

Johnson said that “in a perfect world” the school district’s former administration building would be converted into a temporary youth shelter. The idea comes with a cost, but as a preventive measure, it would save money down the road by keeping youth out of the justice system, he said.

“In moments of crisis, having a place for young people to land where the web or network of community can support them is important,” Johnson said. “That starts with a physical space where they can feel safe, secure and access the space.”

FIGURING OUT WHAT’S NEXT

The study includes several overarching recommendations: expand housing services for unhoused people and those involved in the criminal justice system; create youth-focused housing and support services; advance culturally appropriate, Native-led programs; reduce criminalization and improve reentry support; and address stigma and promote inclusion.

The Missoula Just Home Project is on track for the MacArthur Foundation to underwrite Homeword for its project-related investment by late summer or early fall, said Trujillo, the nonprofit’s executive director.

Moving forward with the initial focus on youth, Homeword is looking into opening housing for 18- to 25-year-olds, Trujillo said.

“We’re trying to figure out, is there land that we can use?” she said. “Is there an already existing structure that would work for this? Do we do new construction? And then after we’re done trying to figure out an interim housing intervention for the transition-aged youth, then what’s next? … There’s a lot of potential out there for what’s next. You just have to figure out which one is going to land.”

The report outlines several recommendations that would be easier to accomplish in the short term, such as setting up a youth service night that would bring resources together in a “one-stop shop,” Trujillo said. The team also plans to seek feedback from Native people with lived experience and continue holding meetings for youth providers to connect and ideally streamline access to services, she said.

Despite support from local governments and organizations, limited resources mean the problem is not easy to solve, Trujillo said.

“Nonprofits are at capacity right now,” she said. “So trying to add on a new program or a new effort is tricky, but at least folks are there to have those conversations to see if we can get creative and figure out a path forward to support this population.”

Homeword and the county plan to continue efforts to address the overlap between housing insecurity and criminal justice involvement even after the MacArthur funding is used up, Trujillo said.

“Our communities are stronger when everyone has a place to live. That’s just a fact,” she said. “It’s not going to be perfect every time, but at least we’re moving towards stable housing for everyone.”