MHSA submitted a declaration as part of a lawsuit filed on December 1st, 2025 by a coalition of nonprofit organizations and local governments against the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD).
Update: At the December 19th hearing for both lawsuits filed against HUD in response to the FY2025 CoC NOFO, the Court granted the plaintiff’s motions for a preliminary injunction.
Following the hearing, HUD released a new FY2025 HUD CoC NOFO after rescinding the previously issued NOFO that prompted this litigation. Plaintiffs and defendants will confer to determine if this NOFO is lawful and if its release ends both cases.
With the FY25 CoC NOFO, HUD seeks to roll out a massive policy change to Continuum of Care (CoC) funding that will dramatically cut housing for people with disabilities nationwide. Nearly 4,000 households across Massachusetts are in danger of returning to homelessness. This is not a budget cut by Congress; it is a reckless policy change by HUD to largely eliminate funding that currently keeps people housed and replace it with short-term services.
The lawsuit challenges HUD’s unlawful and unreasonable restrictions that seek to shift funding away from proven solutions to homelessness, threatening to push hundreds of thousands of people onto the street as cold winter months arrive.
The coalition behind the new legal challenge includes the National Alliance to End Homelessness (NAEH), the National Low Income Housing Coalition (NLIHC), Crossroads Rhode Island, Youth Pride, Inc., as well as the County of Santa Clara, Calif., San Francisco, Calif., King County, Wash., Boston, Mass., Cambridge, Mass., Nashville, Tenn., and Tucson, Ariz. Democracy Forward represents the coalition of nonprofit organizations in the matter; the National Homelessness Law Center represents NAEH and NLIHC; Public Rights Project represents the cities of Boston, Cambridge, Nashville and Tucson; and Santa Clara County and San Francisco represent themselves. The Lawyers’ Committee for Rhode Island, and the ACLU Foundation of RI represent all plaintiffs.
MHSA’s declaration focuses on the severe and irreparable harm that HUD’s policy change will have on Massachusetts communities. As a statewide organization, we believe it is critical for MHSA to contribute to this lawsuit to highlight the impact HUD’s changes will have on our communities, nonprofit organizations, and most of all on the individuals and families whose housing is now at risk.
This lawsuit follows the announcement that Massachusetts Attorney General Andrea Joy Campbell and a coalition of 20 other states also filed a lawsuit to challenge HUD’s unlawful restrictions on the CoC program.