Housing Navigation

United Way and Your Medical Plan Can Help You Attain and Sustain Permanent Housing Through Medi-Cal

United Way’s Housing Navigation program utilizes your Medi-Cal membership (through California Advancing and Innovating Medi-Cal or CalAIM) to assist families and individuals with housing instability, deposit assistance and sustainability services.

Learn how personalized support helps individuals and families find and keep safe, stable housing.

How does Housing Navigation Help You?

Housing Navigation allows individuals and families who are unhoused or at risk of being unhoused to follow a path to attainable and sustainable housing. There are three key areas of the program:

Housing Transition Services

A Housing Navigator is assigned to you and their job is to search and identify housing options and assist in the application process.

During this time, the Housing Navigator will identify barriers and housing needs for the individual or family and secure the funding for move-in costs.

Deposit Assistance

The Housing Navigator will gather documentation to identify if you are eligible for CalAIM deposit or other assistance. 

United Way’s Housing Navigation program utilizes your Medi-Cal membership (through California Advancing and Innovating Medi-Cal or CalAIM) to assist families and individuals with housing instability, deposit assistance and sustainability services.

Sustainability

After securing permanent housing, a Housing Sustainability Provider will help participants work on self-identified needs or goals to maintain stable housing. These plans are custom to each individual and family and could include health care, education, substance use, financial literacy or counseling services.

Hear how Annetta and her family were helped by the Housing Navigation program.

Eligibility

There are four points of eligibility that must be met to qualify for this program:

  • Be a Medi-Cal* member with either:
    • Health Net,
    • Molina Healthcare,
    • Anthem Blue Cross
    • Kaiser Permanente
    • Partnership Health
  • Meet one of the following criteria:
    •  Meets the access criteria for Medi-Cal Specialty Mental Health Services (SMHS) 
    • Meets the access criteria for Drug Medi-Cal (DMC) or Drug Medi-Cal Organized Delivery System (DMC-ODS)
    • One or more serious chronic physical health conditions 
    • One or more physical, intellectual, or developmental disabilities
    • Individuals who are pregnant up through 12-months postpartum.
  • Be at risk of being unhoused or currently unhoused, as defined by HUD**
  • Live in Sacramento, Placer County (Rocklin/Roseville Only), Yolo, or Solano County
*Who is Eligible to Receive Medi-Cal Benefits?

Qualifications

  • Be 65 or older or under 21-years-old
  • Have a disability
  • Blind
  • Pregnant
  • In a skilled nursing or intermediate care home
  • On refugee status for a limited time, depending how long you have been in the United States
  • A parent or caretaker relative of an age eligible child
  • Have been screened for breast and/or cervical cancer

If you are enrolled in one of the following programs, you can also get Medi-Cal:

  • CalFresh
  • SSI/SSP
  • Calworks (AFDC)
  • Refugee Assistance
  • Foster Care or Adoption Assistance Program

**What Qualifies as “Unhoused” or “At Risk of Being Unhoused?”

The United States Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) defines “unhoused” as an individual or family who meets one or more of the following:

  1. Primary nighttime residence is not meant for human habitation;
  2. Lives in a temporary shelter (hotel, motel, congregate shelter, transitional housing, paid for by a local, state, or federal program);
  3. Is exiting an institution where member resided for 90 days or less and resided in an emergency shelter or place not meant for human habitation immediately before entering;
  4. An individual or family who received written notice to vacate their residency within 14 days since the date they applied for CS, and has not identified subsequent housing, and does not have the resources or support need to obtain other permanent housing; or
  5. An individual or family who is fleeing, or attempting to flee domestic violence, has no other residence, and lacks the resources or networks needed to obtain other permanent housing

The HUD definition of “at risk of being unhoused” is an individual or family who:

  1. Has an annual income below 30 percent of Median Family Income (MFI) for the area;
  2. Does not have sufficient resources or support networks, (e.g., family, friends, faith-based or other social networks), immediately available to prevent them from moving to an emergency shelter or another place described in paragraph (1) of the “homeless” definition in this section; and
  3. Meets at least one of the following conditions:
    1. Has moved because of economic reasons two or more times during the 60 days immediately preceding the application for homelessness prevention assistance;
    2. Is living in the home of another because of economic hardship;
    3. Has been notified in writing that their right to occupy their current housing or living situation will be terminated within 21 days after the date of application for assistance;
    4. Lives in a hotel or motel and the cost of the hotel or motel stay is not paid by charitable organizations or by Federal, State, or local government programs for low-income individuals;
    5. Lives in a single-room occupancy or efficiency apartment unit in which there reside more than two persons or lives in a larger housing unit in which there reside more than 1.5 persons reside per room, as defined by the U.S. Census Bureau;
    6. Is exiting a publicly funded institution, or system of care (such as a health-care facility, a mental health facility, foster care or other youth facility, or correction program or institution); or
    7. Otherwise lives in housing that has characteristics associated with instability and an increased risk of being unhoused, as identified in the recipient’s approved consolidated plan.

Questions? Please email us at calaim@uwccr.org as this allows us to more effectively track and follow through with these requests. If you would like, you may also call us at (916) 368-3001.

You may also submit the form below to see if you’re eligible and begin receiving help!

Woman holding baby with the header written above the image "Embark on the Path to Sustainable Housing"