Automate the housing process
As soon as a person or family is identified as being imminently at-risk or has just become homeless, they should be entered automatically into a centralized housing waitlist database. If they do not have the income to pay market rate rent, they will need subsidized or "below market rate" housing, so why wait for them to find out how to get on this or that waiting list and make them fill out a separate application for each one?
At-risk people might avoid homelessness if an affordable unit were available at or before they are in crisis, but they don't know to get on the lists BEFORE they are in crisis. Most newly homeless spend weeks or months learning how to navigate they homeless system so they don't get on housing waiting lists right away and when they do it is in a haphazard way as they learn about openings; this delays their exit from homelessness. Many chronically homeless are not on housing lists at all, which keeps them homeless.
If we KNOW they need housing (or are soon to need it), it is cruel and inefficient to wait until they ask for it. Just register them for it and get them ON THE PATH TO HOUSING automatically with as little extra effort and cost as possible.
If they are seeking help at a food bank or energy assistance program, they do not have enough income for ALL their basic needs, including rent. They are therefore "at-risk". They should be immediately referred for a standardized, wholistic, universal "Social & Economic Assistance" screening to determine current and projected income, housing needs (bedrooms, accessibility, etc.), supportive service needs if any, and eligibility for mainstream supports and govt benefits. ALL needs should be assessed (not just what they need at that moment) and "wraparound" services referrals made ASAP.
Their data should be entered ONCE and shared with HMIS (if/when they go homeless) and a housing waitlist database. (Not over and over for every program or housing application!)
Common housing "Qualifications" (criminal history, income, etc) would be entered so that they could automatically be matched with ALL housing they qualify for; housing "Preferences" (pets, closeness to bus lines, clean & sober, etc) would be entered so that they would see ALL housing options that would best suit them. Putting people into inappropriate housing increases the chance that they will return to homelessness. Housing needs to be APPROPRIATE for each person and situation.
When a unit opens up at a place they are properly matched with, they would be notified and a housing facilitator would help them make the transition from wherever they are staying at that time: get the paperwork done, move them in, etc.
This problem needs a SIMPLIFIED, INTEGRATED, CENTRALIZED solution. Right now, it is complicated, siloed, and uncoordinated.