TRUE COLORS UNITED INC

True Colors United aims to prevent and end homelessness among LGBTQ youth and youth of color by achieving the following goals:

TRAINING & EDUCATION
We equip service providers across the country on how to create safe and inclusive spaces so that LGBTQ youth can get the care they need and move out of homelessness faster. We also train and educate communities on the causes and effects of LGBTQ youth homelessness and what can be done to prevent the issue from occurring in the first place.

ADVOCACY
We work within all levels and branches of government to prevent and end LGBTQ youth homelessness by ensuring necessary funding for services, meaningfully reforming the child welfare, juvenile legal and youth homelessness systems, and advancing the agency and legal rights of minors. We also educate the public about this issue and provide them with opportunities to be a part of the solution.

YOUTH COLLABORATION
We collaborate meaningfully and authenticaly with LGBTQ young people, youth of color, and other youth who have lived experiences of homelessness. We equip them with the tools needed to play a firsthand role in creating lasting solutions to youth homelessness that are inclusive of the most vulnerable.

TECHNICAL ASSISTANCE
We train adult partners on the issue of LGBTQ youth homelessness and the principles of authentic youth collaboration, culminating in the creation of self-sustaining Youth Action Boards and plans to prevent and end youth homelessness in communities. These trainings address the issue through a holistic lens that focuses on LGBTQ inclusion, racial and gender equity, and uplifting those who’ve experienced homelessness firsthand.

TRAINING & EDUCATION
We collaborate with communities and service providers to ensure LGBTQ youth experiencing homelessness have access to the inclusive and affirming services they need, while developing and implementing community-wide systems that help prevent youth homelessness. Strategies include our True Colors Inclusion Assessment, True Colors Inclusion Toolbox, True Colors Learning Community of online courses and toolkits, and Equity Hub. Through these programs, we train service providers and other stakeholders on the issue and ensure that baseline levels of inclusion are established at the individual site level, as well as throughout the entire community.

ADVOCACY
We advocate for federal funding, policies, and practices towards preventing and ending youth homelessness, most recently through the Youth Homelessness Demonstration Project (YHDP). We also build capacity among state-level stakeholders by leveraging relationships and building coalitions, and creating resources like the State Index on Youth Homelessness. This report, updated annually, tracks each state’s efforts to address the issue and guides much of our state-level policy priorities. Each year we host #TrueColorsDay to raise awareness about our issue and provide supporters with ways to make a difference. We leverage celebrities, activists, movement leaders, and youth with lived experience to spread the word and empower folks to get involved and make their voices heard.

YOUTH ACTION
We firmly believe that those who’ve experienced an issue firsthand hold the keys to the solution, which is why we’ve developed our youth action program area. Through our True Colors Fellowship, up to five LGBTQ youth with lived experience partner with staff for six months to help complete an existing project. We co-founded the National Youth Forum on Homelessness (NYFH) as the only youth homelessness advocacy body comprised entirely of youth with lived experience. NYFH has been heavily involved in the Youth Action Society and Youth Action Summit and recently released the first-ever Youth Homelessness Advocacy Agenda. Through the success of these programs, True Colors United is an internationally recognized leader on authentic and meaningful youth collaboration.

TECHNICAL ASSISTANCE
Through on-the-ground visits and remote trainings, our Technical Assistance work guides communities in making systemic changes in their approach to youth homelessness, while helping them develop plans focused on prevention and inclusion. This work is geared towards youth with lived experience, adult stakeholders, and communities and partner organizations nationwide. We partner with youth to develop and refine their leadership and professional abilities, train and educate adult partners on youth collaboration, and assist agencies and organizations in creating empowered Youth Action Boards (YABs). YABs are autonomous advisory groups that ensure all community solutions to the issue are inclusive of those most impacted.

True Colors United remains a key thought leader in both the youth homelessness and LGBTQ movements. Through our technical assistance, we partner with individuals, agencies, and communities so that they understand the issue and are equipped to meet the needs of LGBTQ youth and other highly impacted groups. We create resources that establish a baseline level of understanding about our issue for a variety of stakeholders and distribute information in a variety of formats, such as in-person trainings, online courses, and toolkits available digitally and as hard copies. This reduces barriers to our work by ensuring that our materials meet various learning styles and are available to folks around the country, including rural areas where staff may not have the capacity to physically travel. In addition to LGBTQ equity, we are also leading the youth homelessness movement as it pertains to racial equity, recognizing that this issue disproportionately impacts certain groups. We have completed all-day full-staff trainings on the topic, created an internal racial equity task force, and continue to push partner organizations and the wider movement to address the issue through an equity lens. We have developed and are in the process of launching our newest initiative, the Equity Hub, to set and track standards for LGBTQ inclusion in direct service providers.

Through our Advocacy programming, we ensure vital funding, policies, systems, and protections are in place that meet the needs of all youth experiencing homelessness. We have built strong partnerships with federal agencies such as the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and the Interagency Council on Homelessness, allowing us to consistently advocate for programs such as the Youth Homelessness Demonstration Project (YHDP). Each year, we strive to maintain YHDP funding at previous year-enacted levels or greater; in large part due to our advocacy, the number of Round 3 YHDP communities more than doubled. Our State Index on Youth Homelessness, which bridges the gap between our local and national policy agendas, enables us to develop a coordinated, strategic response to the issue.

Since our creation, we have been at the forefront of developing and advocating for authentic youth collaboration, and every aspect of our work centers those with lived experience and expertise. Through programs like the six-month True Colors Fellowship, now in its sixth year, and the ongoing National Youth Forum on Homelessness, which increased in membership from 14 to 25, we equip youth with the tools needed to advocate for themselves and their communities. By creating Youth Action Boards (YABs) nationwide and launching a Youth Action Society, we are bringing this youth collaboration philosophy to a wider audience and ensuring that youth are centered in local, state, and national solutions. We will also host a Youth Action Summit, the first-ever convening on youth homelessness for and by youth with lived experience.

TRAINING & EDUCATION
As part of our Inclusion Technical Assistance, we’ve partnered with a dozen communities to train leaders on LGBTQ inclusion, project management, and youth collaboration over six to nine months. We support sites through the True Colors Inclusion Assessment, surveying 1,037 staff and 964 youth clients in 33 organizations. We then provide sites with custom recommendations and support in making improvements. We have distributed nearly one thousand free True Colors Inclusion Toolboxes filled with resources like all-gender restroom signs and guidance on inclusive paperwork and policies. Our True Colors Learning Community now includes Inclusion 201 and Youth Collaboration 202 courses and we have trained over 5,000 people with our full slate of courses. Our four toolkits have been downloaded 943 times, and we’ve distributed thousands of copies at conferences and in our Inclusion Toolboxes. 2019’s Impact Summit and Hill Day convened over 200 people, including our largest turnout of youth with lived experience. Our latest initiative, the Equity Hub, will track an agency’s efforts to meet various Inclusion Criteria. Finally, we revamped our annual two-day Impact Summit to focus solely on youth with lived experience.

ADVOCACY
In great part because of our continued leadership on the Hill, Congress passed a bipartisan FY20 budget deal that allocated $80 million (for a total of $327.5M in new annual funding) for the federal government’s Youth Homelessness Demonstration Project. To date, 44 communities have participated and we have taken a leadership role since Round 1 to deliver technical assistance on youth collaboration and LGBTQ inclusion. In June 2018, we released the State Index on Youth Homelessness and have since released an updated version to reflect 2019 data. Beginning in 2015, we’ve hosted #TrueColorsDay on the last Wednesday of April to raise awareness about our issue, reaching millions online.

YOUTH COLLABORATION
We have completed five True Colors Fellowships and our sixth class will launch later this year. In 2019, we expanded the National Youth Forum on Homelessness from 14 to 25 members and increased their hours, compensation, and annual convenings. We have helped create just under 50 Youth Action Boards and launched the Youth Action Society for members to collaborate on the issue. We are also planning our first-ever Youth Action Summit for members to convene and caucus.

TECHNICAL ASSISTANCE
We launched the Technical Assistance program area in 2019 to address the growing demand for our on-the-ground expertise, which had previously been folded into the Youth Collaboration and Training & Education program areas through the Youth Homelessness Demonstration Project and 100-Day Challenges. By breaking out TA into its own division, we can more effectively dedicate time and resources into this work while ensuring all three program areas can thrive.