Supporting Unhoused Transgender Victims of Crime with Safe Housing

Written by Debbie Fox, MSW of Fox Den Consulting

Stable and safe housing for transgender victims of crime increases positive health outcomes and overall well-being. Transgender and gender‑expansive crime victims face disproportionately high rates of homelessness in comparison to cisgender people. Nationally, LGBTQ+ youth are 120% more likely to experience homelessness than their cis/straight peers[i]. Young trans people, particularly those who are Black, Indigenous, or other people of color (BIPOC), are especially vulnerable. Systemic barriers that further exacerbate higher rates of homelessness include discrimination in housing and employment, and family and societal rejection. When transgender people face housing instability, they encounter unique risks that stem from both transphobia and further vulnerabilities including increased rates of violence, trauma, criminal justice system involvement, and lack of support from social service providers. Once unhoused, transgender people often face compounded discrimination in shelters, healthcare settings, and job training programs.

When victim service and housing providers offer transgender inclusive services and housing to unstably housed or homeless transgender individuals, those individuals are able to heal, grow, and thrive.

Challenges to providing open and affirming services that center safety, dignity, and autonomy

The transgender community is currently experiencing rollbacks in protections impacting their interpersonal, familial, and community relationships, and ability to access nonprofit and governmental services without fear of further harm. Since 2012, the Equal Access Rule has prohibited discrimination in HUD-funded emergency shelter and housing programs based on “marriage status, sexual orientation or gender identity (SOGI).” The Violence Against Women Act (VAWA) has prohibited discrimination based on SOGI status as well since 2013.  Despite VAWA and EAR federal protections, the federal government is attempting to remove legal SOGI protections in HUD housing programs and homeless emergency shelter access, VAWA funded programming, and fair housing protections[ii]. In 2025 and 2026, the federal government proposed rules to block federally funded access to gender affirming health care for youth. Federal executive orders are attempting to require program services and data collection to only acknowledge two biological sexes and two genders. Anti-transgender rhetoric is gaining traction despite transgender people existing throughout documented history. This section will explore how safe, affirming spaces to heal and grow allow transgender individuals to thrive. If federal, state, and local governments, service providers, and philanthropic funders invest in transgender inclusive services, transgender victims of crime can thrive, heal and create protective factors to potentially decrease further trauma.

Barriers to accessing services

While many communities have shelters and programs for people experiencing homelessness, these services are not always safe or accessible for transgender people. Common barriers include:

• Gender Exclusive Facilities: Many shelters separate residents by gender but do not have policies that respect trans identities. Trans people are often denied access to the facility that aligns with their gender identity, forcing them into unsafe or traumatizing situations. If a participant is requesting more private or safer accommodation, consider alternative options to congregate shelter if available in your community. In gender-segregated projects, you need only know what gender the participant identifies as and, if they identify as nonbinary, you should ask which gender they prefer to be in a program with. Do not ask for additional “proof” of their gender identity.
• Identification Requirements: Lack of legal ID matching one’s name or gender can prevent trans people from accessing services or benefits.
• Discrimination and Harassment: Staff or residents may subject trans individuals to verbal abuse, misgendering, or physical violence. Fear of mistreatment often leads people to avoid shelters altogether.
• Medical and Mental Health Gaps: Trans people may have unique health needs—such as access to gender‑affirming care or hormone therapy—that are rarely accommodated in general service settings and difficult to access in rural areas.
• Lack of Privacy and Safety: Group living environments often lack adequate privacy, and trans residents may have their belongings, medication, or documents stolen or destroyed.
• Legal and Systemic Obstacles: Transgender people without stable housing are disproportionately arrested, fined, or penalized due to survival behaviors—such as sex work or sleeping outdoors—and they face discrimination when trying to re‑enter employment or housing markets.

Experiences of violence

Unhoused transgender people face extraordinarily high rates of violence. Centering safety means recognizing that many trans people are not just unhoused—they are actively surviving environments of constant threat. This includes:

• Physical Assault: Both on the streets and inside shelters, trans people—especially trans women of color—are frequent targets of assault.
• Sexual Violence: Sexual coercion and assault are common, and perpetrators may include strangers, partners, shelter residents, or staff.
• Police and State Violence: Law enforcement often profiles and harasses trans people, particularly those engaged in street economies or survival sex work.
• Institutional Violence: Denial of services, lack of access to healthcare and hormones, forced gender segregation in shelters and jails/prisons, misgendering, deadnaming, and erasure of identity all constitute forms of systemic violence.
• Mental and Emotional Harm: Chronic exposure to discrimination, being banned from parts of public life (such as playing sports with peers), housing instability, and trauma contributes to high rates of depression, anxiety, and suicidal ideation.

Meeting needs: What gender-affirming service looks like

Trauma informed victim service providers can make a profound difference in the lives of those they serve. Key principles include:

• Center Lived Expertise of Trans Voices
  • Trans people with lived experience of homelessness should be involved in designing, evaluating, and leading programs and be compensated for their expertise. Their expertise is essential to creating effective systems of care.
• Respect Self‑Identified Gender
  • Always refer to people by the names and pronouns they choose. Intake forms and data systems should include open‑ended gender fields and avoid assumptions. Ask participants, staff, and volunteers what name and pronouns should be used when referring to them and use them. Apologize if you make a mistake. Never argue with someone about their name or pronouns. (note that this may be fluid and change over time depending on the individual’s perception of safety or how they identify at the time).
• Provide Safe and Flexible Housing Options
  • Promote and model transgender and LGBTQIA+ pride, inclusivity, support, and connection in all services offered and in physical locations. Where possible, ensure shelter placement based on self‑identified gender, with access to private or gender‑neutral spaces. Offering trans‑specific beds or rooms can be lifesaving. Provide flexible financial assistance to prevent homelessness in the first place. Place transgender individuals in permanent housing placement and bypass shelter entirely if it is not a safe or welcoming environment in that community.
• Ensure Access to Gender‑Affirming Care
  • Maintain connections with health clinics and medical providers/doctors that offer gender affirming health care including hormone therapy, mental health support, and primary care for trans patients.
  • Know which community agencies are gender-inclusive and gender-affirming. Do not refer participants to partners who are not. If these referrals cannot be avoided, provide this information to participants and support them in developing a safety plan.
• Build Staff Capacity
  • Anti‑discrimination policies must be paired with regular staff education on trans identities, trauma‑informed practices, and conflict resolution. Ongoing training helps create genuine cultural competence.
• Promote Safety and Accountability
  • Develop clear policies for responding to harassment or violence. Ensure that staff and residents know that transphobic behavior will not be tolerated and that reporting mechanisms are safe and confidential.
  • Respond to violence, harassment, and hate crimes.
  • Believe survivors of violence, harassment, and hate crimes.
  • Focus corrective action on the harm doer, not on the survivor.
  • Do not require survivors of hate crimes or interpersonal crimes to involve the criminal legal system. In some jurisdictions, this may increase their risk of harm.
  • If a program participant is in danger by a harm doer within the program and no longer feels safe housed there even after moving the harm doer, work with them to rebuild trust and safety while addressing the harmful behaviors. If the participant requests alternative housing or shelter arrangements, work with them to find a safer place to stay.
  • Facilitate conflict resolution where appropriate. Please note that mediation or conflict resolution is not always safe or appropriate for unsafe situations or if the person harmed does not want to participate. Participation must be voluntary.
• Protect Privacy
  • Safeguard information about a person’s gender history or medical status. Disclosure should always be the choice of the individual, not the staff or agency. Do not collect data without their consent and be transparent on where data will be stored and who it will be shared with if the individual consents to sharing information.
  • Do not ask invasive and unnecessary questions about anyone’s anatomy, genetics, medical treatment, medication, or documentation. If the participant’s identification or other paperwork has a different name, gender marker, or pronouns, this does not negate the name, gender, and pronouns the participant has shared with you.
  • Provide informed consent to participants about the risks and benefits of sharing demographic information or entering information into a shared database. In some jurisdictions, it may be unsafe for someone to have their gender recorded as trans or nonbinary in the Homeless Management Information System (HMIS), depending on who has or could gain access to it.
  • Participants may or may not want other staff, participants, or community members or partners to know they are trans. Unless you have explicit permission, do not share this information.

Action steps

1. Adopt explicit nondiscrimination policies including gender identity and expression.
2. Review housing screening assessments and coordinated entry procedures for continuum of care funds to ensure trans people can access programs.
3. For emergency shelter programming, make sure shelters are affirming and individuals can safely access bathrooms and sleeping areas.
4. Through a formal memorandum of understanding (MOU), partner with local trans‑led organizations to provide training, advocacy, case management, or outreach.
5. Create low‑barrier entry points for housing, medical, and job training programs.
6. Collect data respectfully to track outcomes for transgender clients without outing them or risking their safety or autonomy.
7. Advocate for systemic change—from inclusive housing policies to gender affirming health care, fair ID laws and equitable healthcare access.

Conclusion

When service providers commit to inclusion, safer spaces, dignity and respect, healing happens. Creating welcoming environments where transgender people are seen, believed, and given the space to truly be themselves, allows transgender individuals to feel valued and safe, which can be transformational. Transgender lives are deserving of dignity. Creating affirming and healing environments where transgender individuals are seen, heard, believed, and included begins with making sure no one has to choose between their identity and their safety.

References

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Ayeni, O. O., & Hampton, C. (2023). Evaluation of a flexible funding pilot program to prevent homelessness among BIPOC and LGBTQ+ survivors. National Resource Center on Domestic Violence. https://safehousingpartnerships.org/sites/default/files/2023-05/Process%20Evaluation%20of%20a%20Flexible%20Funding%20Pilot_Program_to_Prevent_Homelessness_among_BIPOC_and_LGBTQ%2B_Survivors_Report.pdf

Ayeni, O. O., & Scarpelli, S. (2024). Examining the needs and experiences of BIPOC LGBTQ survivors through a flexible funding pilot project. National Resource Center on Domestic Violence. https://safehousingpartnerships.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/10/FF-with-BIPOC-LGBTQ-Survivors-Report-FINAL.pdf

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Javaid, S. (2022). The persistent housing and food crisis, exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic, continues to create economic insecurity among women and LGBT people of color. National Women’s Law Center. https://nwlc.org/resource/the-persistent-housing-and-food-crisis-exacerbated-by-the-covid-19-pandemic-continues-to-create-economic-insecurity-among-women-and-lgbt-people-of-color/

Morton, M. H., Samuels, G. M., Dworsky, A., & Patel, S. (2018). Missed opportunities: LGBTQ youth homelessness in America. Chapin Hall at the University of Chicago.

National Coalition of Anti-Violence Programs. (2012). Lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, and HIV-affected intimate partner violence in 2011. http://www.avp.org/storage/documents/Reports/2012_NCAVP_2011_IPV_Report.pdf

National Network for Youth. (2023). Policy brief: LGBTQ+ youth homelessness. https://nn4youth.org/learn/lgbtq-homeless-youth/

Peitzmeier, S. M., Malik, M., Kattari, S. K., Marrow, E., Stephenson, R., Agénor, M., & Reisner, S. L. (2020). Intimate partner violence in transgender populations: Systematic review and meta-analysis of prevalence and correlates. American Journal of Public Health, 110(9), e1–e14.

Scheer, J. R., & Baams, L. (2021). Help-seeking patterns among LGBTQ young adults exposed to intimate partner violence victimization. Journal of Interpersonal Violence, 36(17–19), 8050–8069.

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U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. (2026, April 28). Equal access to housing in HUD programs revisions [Proposed rule]. Federal Register. https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2026/04/28/2026-08244/equal-access-to-housing-in-hud-programs-revisions

West, K. (2021). Queer even in safe spaces: Homeless shelter failures and the queer community. Augustana Digital Commons. https://digitalcommons.augustana.edu/wollstonecraftaward/45

Wilson, B. D. M., Choi, S. K., Harper, G. W., Lightfoot, M., Russell, S., & Meyer, I. H. (2020). Homelessness among LGBT adults in the US. Williams Institute. https://williamsinstitute.law.ucla.edu/publications/lgbt-homelessness-us/

 

[i] Morton, M. H., Samuels, G. M., Dworsky, A., & Patel, S. (2018). Missed opportunities: LGBTQ youth homelessness in America. Chapin Hall at the University of Chicago.

 

[ii] U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. (2026, April 28). Equal access to housing in HUD programs revisions [Proposed rule]. Federal Register. https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2026/04/28/2026-08244/equal-access-to-housing-in-hud-programs-revisions