Fund for Housing and Opportunity

Screenshot 2025-04-14 at 9.40_edited.png

Helen Cruz and Jesse Rabinowitz, National Homelessness Law Center, speak at the Johnson v. Grants Pass Supreme Court Rally on April 22, 2024. Despite having no safe shelter alternatives, Grants Pass charged Helen over $6,000 in fines and tickets for sleeping outside when she could no longer afford her apartment. Photo by Alexandra Charitan.

Housing Justice Narrative Change

To repair racial injustice embedded in our housing system and achieve structural change, it is crucial to shift the narrative so that more people recognize housing as a basic need, not a commodity, and understand its connection to all areas of opportunity—health, education, the environment, and beyond. Narrative power is the ability to create meaning at scale.*

The Fund for Housing and Opportunity supports strategists, organizers, storytellers, and coalitions working to build the durable narrative infrastructure to transform our housing landscape and sustain progress.

*ReFrame

FHO Narrative Change grantee partners have reached over 100 million people, moving them to see housing as a basic need and understand the root causes of homelessness.

Screenshot 2025-04-16 at 11.14.00 AM.png

FHO Narrative Change grantee partners are working to:

Analyze the dominant housing narrative

Housing instability and homelessness stem from intentional policy choices rooted in racism, rather than individual failings.
Solutions must be informed by root cause analysis, with narratives that reflect the true origins of housing injustice.

Design and test new messages

Through research, message testing, and iterative learning, FHO grantee partners develop strategies, tools, and resources to shift public mindsets around housing and homelessness
Harnessing messages that resonate with people builds support and collective power for housing justice.

Tell authentic stories

Strategies center and create platforms for people with lived experience to tell their own stories and reframe who the true experts are.
FHO grantee partners work with organizers, journalists, content creators, and artists to showcase visions for a just housing future and emphasize systemic issues and solutions, rather than individual blame.

Build capacity for the movement

Utilizing learnings from the field, organizers and advocates are adopting narrative tools to bolster their organizing and advocacy efforts.
Turning theory into practice, the movement for housing justice leverages narrative power to win not only campaigns but a world in which everyone has a safe place to call home.