Atlanta expands warming center hours, adds overflow site amid cold front
The colossal winter storm prompted the city of Atlanta to activate an additional emergency warming center for unhoused people sleeping at the airport, in addition to three centers for Atlantans at Central Park Recreation Center and Selena S. Butler Park in Old Fourth Ward, and the Westside’s Old Adamsville Recreation Center.
The three Atlanta warming typically operate from 8 p.m. to 10 a.m. But starting last Saturday night, Atlanta has opened them 24 hours a day through Wednesday at 11 a.m., since the frigid weather front will keep temperatures near or below freezing. Transport is available from the Gateway Center shelter.
When the temperature drops below 35 degrees, the city typically opens two warming centers with a total of 170 beds: the Central Park Recreation Center, located at 400 Merritts Ave. NE, with 125 beds, and the rec center at Selena S. Butler Park, located at 98 William Holmes Borders Dr. NE, with 45.
Due to the severity of this cold front, the city activated its backup warming center at Old Adamsville Recreation Center, located at 3404 Delmar Lane NW. That provides another 100 beds for Atlantans seeking refuge.
For unhoused people stranded at Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport, the city is coordinating shuttles to another overflow facility in an undisclosed location nearby, as I reported for The New York Times this weekend.
Fulton to fully fund services for 532 ex-homeless Atlantans
The Fulton County Board of Commissioners last week reversed course and voted to fully fund supportive services for 532 formerly unhoused Atlanta residents living in permanent housing delivered by the city.
That walks back Fulton’s roughly $2.1 million funding gap in its $1.4 billion draft budget for FY 2026, which started Jan. 1. Fulton officials initially said that the county only had enough money to fund services for 302 Atlantans living in existing units — not the additional people to be rehoused in 230 units the city says it will deliver by the end of this year.
But a last-minute activist campaign mounted days before Fulton approved its budget on Jan. 21 forced commissioners to reconsider. The county now plans to allocate the $4.8 million required to fund supportive services for 532 total households this year.
Read the full story here.
Could Trump order influence Georgia bills regulating Wall Street landlords?
President Donald Trump last week issued an executive order that aims to prevent Wall Street landlords from buying up single-family homes — an unexpectedly progressive response to institutional investors’ dominance in housing markets nationwide, particularly for entry-level homes.
It’s unclear how the presidential directive could affect Georgia legislation to rein in institutional investors buying up entry-level homes at a breakneck pace. State legislators last year proposed a battery of bills to loosen Wall Street’s grip on local housing markets — but most sputtered out. They’ll have another shot in the current legislative session, which ends April 2, since it’s the second half of the two-year session.
State lawmakers, lobbyists, and nonprofit leaders told Atlanta Civic Circle that the Trump edict could have one of two effects: It could signal to Georgia’s Republican-controlled legislature that it’s time to regulate institutional landlords — or it could do the opposite, and signal that the Georgia bills are unneeded, due to the federal executive order.
Read our full story on how Trump’s executive order could influence state legislation here.
Gov. Kemp announces $50 million grant for homeless programs, targeting Atlanta
When Gov. Brian Kemp earlier this month announced a $50 million Homelessness Response Grant “to tackle homelessness right here in our capital city” and elsewhere in Georgia, it stirred excitement and speculation among Atlanta’s advocates for unhoused people.
Atlanta Civic Circle asked local nonprofit leaders what they want to see the state’s homelessness services grant money used for. Read what they said here.
Kemp’s Jan. 14 announcement was light on specifics but brimming with promise — an unprecedented $50 million commitment to ameliorate street-level homelessness from a state that primarily relies on federal funding to address the problem.
Kemp said the state would pair the $50 million in grant funding with matching funds from local governments and nonprofits. It will subsidize emergency shelters, transitional housing, street outreach teams, and supportive services, including mental healthcare, substance use treatment, and other needs, he said.
ICYMI: HUD begrudgingly processing homelessness grant renewals
A federal judge has dealt a major setback to the US Department of Housing and Urban Development’s (HUD) controversial bid to retool how it grants nearly $3.9 billion in Continuum of Care funds for homelessness services. In Atlanta, HUD’s new grant rules jeopardized funding for 844 formerly homeless households.
HUD capitulated earlier this month to a late-December order from US District Judge Mary McElroy in Rhode Island that requires the agency to renew Continuum of Care grants for FY 2026 using the existing FY 2024-25 criteria. As ordered, HUD complied on Jan. 12, “including processing eligible renewals,” it said, for FY 2026, which started Oct. 1.
The judge also instructed HUD to hold off on its radical overhaul of the grant criteria until the court decides on a combined lawsuit from 21 Democratic-led states, the District of Columbia, and the National Alliance to End Homelessness challenging the proposed changes, which is still in its early stages.
Today’s newsletter was written by Sean Keenan and edited by Meredith Hobbs. Your support makes Housing Happenings and ACC’s housing reporting possible.