The Streets to Home Indy partnership announced Friday that 18 people from the Leonard Street homeless encampment have been connected to permanent housing and supportive services.
WRTV confirmed Thursday that the encampment area is now clear.
The success comes just two months after Fountain Square residents expressed growing frustration over the expanding encampment, which had grown from a single tent at the end of 2024 to approximately 30 tents by July.
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"We're proud to stand with our partners and announce that 18 formerly unsheltered individuals who had been staying outside are now safe in apartments with supportive services through the Streets to Home Indy initiative," said Chelsea Haring-Cozzi, CEO of the Coalition for Homelessness Intervention & Prevention (CHIP). "This is what Streets to Home Indy is all about – connecting our most vulnerable neighbors with a stable place to call home, not displacement."
Haring-Cozzi said 29 people have been housed and two camps have been closed through the partnership.
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Streets to Home Indy launched in Indianapolis in July 2025 as a 12-month, $8.1 million effort to end street homelessness for 300-350 individuals. CHIP leads the initiative alongside Horizon House, RDOOR/HomeNow Indy, Adult & Child, InteCare, the Damien Center, and the City of Indianapolis.
The program uses a 4-6 week process involving street outreach, housing navigation, unit acquisition and case management to move people directly from the streets into housing with services. Once individuals are housed from a site, the city cleans and restores the area to its original use.
Similar programs in other cities have been seeing results. Cleveland's initiative housed 177 individuals and resolved 53 encampments in eight months. New Orleans' program housed 300 individuals from encampments and closed eight sites.
The initiative receives funding from the City of Indianapolis, the Housing to Recovery Fund and contributions from philanthropic, corporate and faith-based communities.
