Action Alerts

by Jessica Douglas

Working to End Homelessness with the PIT Count

Piece written by Rachel Handler, Housing Policy Manager

What is the Point-in-Time (PIT) Count?

The Point-in-Time, or PIT, Count is a HUD-mandated survey of unhoused people that is conducted across the country on a single night in late January. Each area’s Count is run by the local Continuum of Care, or CoC, which is a coalition of organizations that works together to end homelessness in their community.

The PIT Count is one critical piece of data in the bigger picture of a community’s housing landscape. By getting a ballpark sense of just how many people are unhoused, advocates and providers can design targeted solutions and apply for funding to implement them.

Because the PIT Count is such a huge undertaking, it also means that volunteers are almost always needed to help out. Learn more about the PIT Count and how to get involved to help better advocate to end homelessness in your community: 
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by Jessica Douglas

Action Alert: Urge Congress to OPPOSE HR 734

This week, Congress will hear HR 734– a bill to ban transgender youth from participating in sports. This bill is a clear attempt to put politics over the well-being of transgender youth. It must be stopped– Send a message to your Congressperson, RIGHT NOW, and urge them to oppose HR 734!

SEND YOUR MESSAGE NOW

HR 734 would force an already vulnerable group of young people in Georgia Continue reading →

by Wes Sanders

HIV Modernization

How has Georgia’s HIV criminalization law changed in 2022?

 

As of July 1st, Georgia’s recently modernized HIV criminalization law implicates a drastically different proof for criminal charges that can be brought against a person with HIV in Georgia.

In the earlier days of the AIDS epidemic, states were encouraged to enact laws criminalizing people with HIV who “knowingly exposed” another person to HIV in exchange for federal funding to AIDS care. Since then, many states have repealed or modernized their HIV criminalization laws to reflect accurate science and stray away from the phobic sentiment with which these laws were written.

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by Wes Sanders

ACTION ALERT: Urge support for increased funding for ADAP NOW!!

Members of the State Senate are beginning conversations TODAY on the potential for increased funding for the AIDS Drug Assistance Program, and they need to hear from us RIGHT NOW! Click here to send your message.

A $15.4 million increase for the Georgia AIDS Drug Assistance Program has been proposed by House Public Health Subcommittee of Appropriations Chair Butch Parrish– this is our chance to make sure that the more than 12,000 Georgians living with HIV who cannot otherwise afford it, will not go without access to life saving medication.

In addition to saving the lives of the individuals enrolled in ADAP, access to treatment for HIV works to prevent the spread of the virus as well– treatment is prevention. Georgia is poised to make dramatic inroads to contain the spread of HIV in our communities and reverse a mortality rate from AIDS that remains one of the worst in the country, but only if the Department of Public Health and county health departments throughout Georgia have the funding they need to provide these services. Send your message now!