To local homeless advocates, there is a glaring omission in Fulton County’s proposed fiscal year 2026 budget: Over $2 million to provide supportive services to 230 formerly unhoused Atlantans is nowhere in sight.
That $2 million commitment stems from the Fulton County Commission’s unanimous vote in 2019 to support the city of Atlanta’s $50 million Home First initiative. Fulton agreed then to fund the wraparound services, such as mental health and substance use treatment, for 550 permanent supportive housing units for unhoused people delivered by the city through Invest Atlanta and local development partners.
That funding would last for 30 years, according to an agreement between the county and Partners for Home, the city’s primary homeless services nonprofit. Fulton has estimated supportive services cost $8,750 per unit annually, making the full deal worth $4.8 million per year once all 550 units are inhabited, according to Partners for Home CEO Cathryn Vassell.
Fulton is currently funding $2.4 million in case management services for residents of 302 existing Home First units — but the county now claims it can’t cover the full cost of services for those units and the future units that the city will deliver, Vassell said.
“On Dec. 10, at what we thought was a planning meeting for 2026, the county dropped a bomb on us,” she said.
Fulton officials announced they didn’t have the money to fund services in 2026 for residents of the 230 supportive housing units that the city will deliver this year, according to Vassell. What’s more, in 2027, Fulton will cut its current $2.4 million of Home First funding by just over half, saying it will fund supportive services for residents of just 146 of the 302 units it currently funds.
Fulton County told Atlanta Civic Circle in a statement Monday that it will fund case management services for Atlanta’s existing 302 permanent supportive housing units until the end of the 2026 fiscal year on Dec. 31. “This commitment totals $2.4 million, [including] $1.9 million from Fulton County and $500,000 that we successfully sought from the state of Georgia’s Department of Behavioral Health and Developmental Disabilities,” the statement said.
Fulton also spends over $20 million annually for “community-based mental health services for children and adults,” the statement said.
During a Jan. 7 county commission meeting, Fulton Chief Operating Officer Pamela Roshell acknowledged the funding shortfall for the 230 new Home First units that will open this year. “As additional supportive housing units come online [in 2026], we do not have a funding strategy,” she said, adding that Partners for Home should seek the money from the city and the state.
For some Fulton commissioners, that won’t cut it.
“We have to deal with this problem,” Commissioner Mo Ivory, whose district includes Atlanta, said of supportive service funding during the Jan. 7 meeting. Providing housing to people who have long been without it, she said, “is not Atlanta’s problem alone. It is also Fulton County’s problem.”
Commissioner Marvin Arrington Jr. is also advocating for restoring the funding. He pointed out at the meeting that Fulton’s latest budget draft allocates $156 million to the sheriff’s department, and millions more for police and the criminal justice system.
Putting more money toward combating housing insecurity, he said, could offset the need to spend so much on public safety. “If we invest more in people — in health and human services — I guarantee you the amount of money we’re spending on justice and public safety will go down on the back end,” he said.
Vassell has launched a lobbying campaign in response to the anticipated shortfall, urging Partners for Home’s private development partners to pressure the Fulton commissioners to reconsider its FY26 allocations. Fulton is expected to finalize its budget this month for FY26, which started Jan. 1.
As for Fulton’s 2019 funding promise: “They are now rescinding that promise, leaving the 230 new units coming online [this year] without services for 2026 and jeopardizing $100 million worth of affordable housing developments across our city,” Vassell said in a Jan. 9 email to private developers and landlords involved in the Home First initiative.
Vassell is encouraging Fulton residents to pack the county commission’s Jan. 21 meeting to demand full funding for the supportive services. It is scheduled for 9:30 a.m. at the Fulton County Government Center, located at 141 Pryor St.