Marin County's 'collaboration over competition' cuts homelessness by double digits

Overview

Facing one of California’s most complex housing crises, Marin County has achieved what few counties can claim: measurable, sustained reductions in homelessness. Through a decade-long shift from competition to collaboration the County has built a system where agencies learn from one another, align resources, and focus their energy where it matters most: helping people find stable homes.

By the Numbers

• Chronic homelessness: ↓ 24%
• Veteran homelessness: ↓ 32% (since 2022)
• Family homelessness: ↓ 12%¹

“Collaboration, Not Competition”

Nearly ten years ago, Marin County’s community leadership took a hard look in the mirror. Agencies realized that despite their best intentions, they were often competing for limited funding, time, and not aligned with the approach to address homelessness.

“In the words of our agencies, it was competition, not collaboration,” recalls Gary Naja-Riese, Director of Homelessness & Coordinated Care. “In a moment of true collaboration and humility, leaders got together, looked with clear eyes at what was happening, and committed to working differently.”

That commitment — to collaboration, shared data, and humility — transformed the county’s approach. The community prioritized evidence-based practices and streamlined communication across partners and centered every decision on outcomes.

A Fragmented State, a Unified County

California’s homelessness response is famously decentralized. Counties juggle dozens of overlapping funding streams, each with unique reporting and eligibility rules. “The fragmentation gets in the way of our work,” says Naja-Riese. “Leaders and front line staff are juggling dozens of grant requirements and approaches and that naturally leads to questions – about what needs to be done next and how best to do it. Multiply that across hundreds of staff, and it’s enormous.”

Before Marin’s shift, County staff fielded duplicative questions by email and phone, often resolving the same problems in isolation. Even regional meetings could not keep pace with the daily flow of operational issues.

Civic Roundtable: A Common Place for Collaboration

To tackle this complexity, Marin County implemented Civic Roundtable, a digital platform that allows government and nonprofit partners to share resources, ask questions, and collaborate in real time.

Marin HOPE is an online collaboration space hosted by Marin County’s Department of Homelessness & Coordinated Care. It connects local agencies, nonprofits, and community partners to share knowledge, coordinate services, and advance system-wide improvements in housing stability and homelessness prevention.

“Roundtable is an essential part of our new peer-to-peer community– Marin HOPE. It provides a space to make it easier for frontline workers to do their job,” says Naja-Riese. “By creating a space where everyone can communicate immediately and directly and find what they need, we’ve made the work easier — and more human.”

Roundtable gave practitioners a single place to connect, reducing administrative friction and freeing up time to focus on clients instead of red tape.

Early Results

• 12 posts per month on average, reflecting strong early engagement.
• High-value discussions on Coordinated Entry communication, case management, and policy updates.
• Around 20% of posts spark multi-agency, multi-person dialogue — evidence of a thriving, collaborative culture.

The Marin HOPE Resource Library now serves as the collective knowledge base for the homelessness response system, housing everything from training modules to policy templates. “We’ve gone from scattered emails and PDFs to a shared library that anyone can Navigate,” said one frontline Marin HOPE provider.

Marin HOPE is leveraging Roundtable with:

• Curated collections such as coordinated entry materials and case management tools
• Clear naming conventions and tagging systems for easy searchability
• An AI-powered “Summarize” tab that gives users quick overviews of key documents
• Ongoing feedback loops where members suggest updates, flag outdated materials, and propose new topics

This structure has made Marin HOPE not just a platform, but a living ecosystem for professional growth and collective accountability.

A Culture of Responsiveness and Shared Success

Real-time collaboration has proven vital during operational challenges — from sudden service changes to urgent updates on benefits enrollment and housing availability. “People have more time to serve those who need help — to do the things they need and want to do,” said Naja-Riese.

Marin’s experience underscores a broader truth: technology alone does not solve fragmentation — people do. By giving staff the right tools and a shared purpose, the County has turned coordination into a daily practice, not an occasional meeting. 

Key Takeaways:

• Start with culture: Collaboration must be intentional, modeled from leadership down.
• Design for usability: Tools like Roundtable and Marin HOPE thrive when staff find them intuitive and relevant.
• Celebrate contributors: Recognizing active members sustains engagement and trust.
• Keep learning dynamic: Regularly refresh training, data, and policies through shared libraries and open discussion.

Looking Ahead

Marin County’s work is far from finished — but its progress offers a blueprint for what’s possible across California and beyond. By aligning partners, sharing resources, and fostering trust, Marin is transforming homelessness response from a fragmented system into a coordinated community of care.

“This is a county one could be deeply proud of working for and working with,” says one partner. “We’ve made progress — and we’re not stopping any time soon.”

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¹ Source: Marin County Point-in-Time Count