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Alameda Countywide Homeless and Special Needs Housing Plan 77 Housing Goals and Cost Estimates This chapter establishes the goal of creating 15,061 units of supportive housing for people in Alameda County who are homeless or extremely low-income and living with serious and persistent mental illness and/or living with HIV/AIDS. It presents preliminary cost estimates broken out by subpopulations, individuals, and families. The housing goal assumes that roughly 10,000 units will be secured through renting or "master leasing" existing units in the rental market and another 5,000 units will be developed through new construction or acquisition and rehabilitation of existing housing stock. The projections include estimates for the costs of developing and operating the housing, as well as providing support services on-site where needed. The chapter of this plan entitled Housing Assistance Needs of People Who Are Homeless and/or Have Special Needs estimated that 30,846 households in Alameda County need some type of housing assistance. These households need not just housing that is low in cost, but also housing that offers on-site services tailored specifically to the needs of residents. Housing accompanied by services is typically referred to as "supportive housing." Because this plan is oriented toward permanent housing solutions, the estimates for units of needed housing refer to "permanent supportive housing" (with services on-site) and "permanent independent housing" (with no services on-site). No one model meets everyone's needs; rather, a variety of housing and service models are required, including both single-site developments and scattered sites. Currently, Alameda County has about 2,300 units of permanent supportive housing dedicated to people who have been homeless, people living with HIV/AIDS, and/or people with mental illnesses.99 While this represents a significant historical investment in addressing the housing needs of this population, there are many fewer units than people in need. Some members of these target populations are undoubtedly accessing a portion of the 21,000 Section 8 rental assistance vouchers that are being utilized to subsidize rents in apartments and buildings all across Alameda County. As a result of the federal subsidy, they pay just 30 percent of their income toward their housing costs. Others occupy some of Alameda County's nearly 20,000 affordable housing units,100 but the level of subsidy in the vast majority of these units is not enough to make the units affordable to a person with only disability income. Thus, even though these units exist, they may not be affordable to, or offer the services need by, this plan's target populations. Components of Supportive Housing Supportive housing offers tenants both long-term tenancy in safe, decent, and affordable housing and an appropriate level of on-site services tailored specifically to the needs ofresidents. Three interrelated components must be in place and financed or funded adequately to create and sustain permanent supportive housing: housing development, housing operations, and the availability of support services. 99 AHW calculation based on inventory information from each system. 100 See chapter entitled Housing in Alameda County for more information about subsidized housing in Alameda County.