Housing Not Handcuffs Campaign/Communications Director

The National Homelessness Law Center (Law Center) seeks a strategic, mission-driven advocate to serve as our Housing Not Handcuffs Campaign/Communications Director. The Law Center is the legal arm of the national movement to end homelessness and is looking for a leader compelled by the national housing crisis and energized by our vision of housing as a human right and commitment to dismantling structural racism.

In recent months, we have seen communities from coast to coast introducing template legislation promoting criminalization of homelessness, creation of internment camps for persons experiencing homelessness, and defunding of housing-based solutions, and national political figures echoing this approach. Given our country’s historical racialization of criminalization and institutionalization, these policies will have deep, harmful disparate impacts on Black, Indigenous, and people of color, persons with disabilities and LBGTQ+ persons. The Law Center is excited to have the opportunity to expand its team and focus on an affirmative campaign to stop this concerning trend and promote evidence- and justice-based responses that affirm housing as a human right.

OVERVIEW OF POSITION:

The Housing Not Handcuffs (HNH) Campaign/Communications Director is responsible for spearheading campaign strategy for the national Housing Not Handcuffs Campaign, an over 3,000-member effort to decriminalize homelessness and promote housing and services as fundamental human rights. In collaboration with the Decriminalization Director and Senior Policy Director, the Campaign/Communications Director provides leadership in designing a long-term, national campaign strategy to combat recent efforts to criminalize homelessness through template bills being introduced to state legislatures across the country. The Campaign/Communications Director coordinates and supports members of the HNH Campaign, and assists in drafting Law Center reports, letters, testimony, and social media. The Director will work closely with Law Center staff, the Campaign’s partners organizations, and individuals with lived expertise in homelessness, to create a robust national movement around the Campaign’s goals and plan.

This is an ideal opportunity for a communications expert with campaign experience who thrives in a values-aligned organization. The Law Center’s budget is $2.2 million. The Law Center is financially sound and maintains a reserve.

ABOUT THE LAW CENTER:

Founded in 1989, the Law Center fearlessly advances federal, state and local policies to prevent and end homelessness while fiercely defending the legal rights of unhoused people. Our work has put unhoused children back in school, won new resources for affordable housing, prevented homelessness for renters, overturned laws that criminalize homelessness, and built support for the human right to housing, now a major component of federal domestic policy. We play a critical role in protecting, defending and promoting the rights of unhoused persons to ensure they can lead national, state and local efforts to end homelessness.

Our core conviction is that no one should have to go without safe, affordable housing in a country as wealthy as ours. The Law Center’s work, in partnership with national, state and local partners, is critical now more than ever as the eviction and affordable housing crises, exacerbated by the pandemic, push record numbers of persons into homelessness. People of color, women and members of the LGBTQ+ community are disproportionately and uniquely affected by homelessness, and our work consciously and affirmatively seeks to address these interrelated inequities.

We are proud of our high quality and committed team of 15 staff personsand 28 Board Members, as well as our large corps of volunteer attorneys. Although headquartered in Washington, DC, staff live and work across the country.

For more information, read our Annual Reports (https://homelesslaw.org/resources/annual-report/) and explore our website at www.homelesslaw.org.

KEY RESPONSIBILITIES:
To launch a major campaign-style communications strategy to: 1) defend against criminalization efforts while 2) advancing Human Right to Housing legislation, including:
• Collaborate and coordinate with the Law Center’s national, state, and local partners to develop campaign strategy and messaging;
• Ensure an effective partnership with Invisible People and the National Vehicle Residency Collective, supporting their communications and advocacy strategies while receiving direction on the Law Center approaches from them;
• Develop creative and effective communications and policy Campaign plans and take oversight responsibility for implementing those plans;
• Ensure the effective integration of a state-based Campaign infrastructure into national efforts;
• Help draft reports, testimony, advocacy letters, and social media templates for Campaign members;
• Assist in conveying Campaign messaging and resources through our Housing Not Handcuffs website, newsletters, social media, webinars and in-person trainings, as well as responding to reporters and traditional media;
• Assist in, and provide strategic guidance for, ongoing fundraising efforts (including the development of proposals) with the Law Center’s Development unit that enable the Campaign to grow;
• Supervise Law Center communications staff working on the HNH campaign; and
• Collaborate with other Law Center staff on cross-organizational priorities.

BENEFITS AND LOCATION:
Benefits: Health, dental, and vision insurance all fully employer paid and a 403(b)-retirement plan with supplemental salary contribution. The Law Center provides a leave package of vacation (4 weeks per year), sick leave (2 weeks per year), personal leave (1 week per year), and all Federal holidays. In addition, the Law Center closes two weeks per year. The Law Center has flexible work schedule options.

Location: The Law Center staff are primarily working remotely. Although headquartered in Washington, DC, proximity to DC is not required for this position.