BREVARD COUNTY, Fla. – Scott Billue sees a troubling trend among the new people walking into his Matthew’s Hope ministry in Merritt Island. He calls it the “silver tsunami.”
“First-time homeless baby boomers has exploded over the last six to 12 months,” said Billue. “But particularly the last six months, we’re up to about 35% of those that walk in here are first-time homeless baby boomers.”
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According to the annual census of homeless people in Brevard County, the Point-in-Time Count, from 2023 to 2025, one in three homeless people are over the age of 55, and many were living out on the streets.
“What we’re finding is a few things, we’re finding a death of a spouse, where their income was significantly affected. We’re seeing people that own homes, but they can no longer pay the taxes and the insurance on those homes. So they’re losing them,” Billue said.
But shelter space is at a premium in Brevard County.
A project in Titusville promises to chip at the housing problem. Apollo Gardens is a $75-million complex with dozens of housing units for elderly homeless people and people with disabilities who are homeless.
But a chunk of funding for the project is in limbo, a bystander in the Trump Administration’s march to tie federal funding to compliance with the president’s executive orders.
Applying again and again and again
The Brevard Homeless Coalition, the lead coordinating agency for homeless groups in the county, explained the problem in a Facebook post on Sept. 22.
Carrfour Support Housing applied for a grant from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development in 2024. Congress made $75 million available for the program. But in January, the Trump administration took over.
HUD required applicants to reapply for the grant in June. Then, in August, the agency notified Congress of the grant winners.
Carrfour and the Brevard Homeless Coalition were awarded $5.6 million for Apollo Gardens, the only project in Florida to get a grant.
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Then, on Sept. 5, HUD reissued the grant competition again, opening it to all qualified groups. There was new criteria, and applicants had a deadline of Sept. 12 – just one week to get the application in.
Representatives at neither Carrfour nor the Brevard Homeless Coalition were willing to speak on the record about the HUD grant.
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Billue and Matthew’s Hope were not part of the application for Apollo Gardens, but he said he’s seen other community partners frustrated because of changes in federal funding.
“You just wipe everything off the table and say, ‘Well, let’s start again from here.’ Meanwhile, you’ve got a segment of the population out there that has no place to go,” he said.
News 6 reached out to HUD to ask what happened.
A HUD spokesperson responded, “HUD does not comment on pending litigation.”
That’s how we learned the Trump administration was being sued.
‘Jurisdictional criteria’
In the Notice of Opportunity HUD posted in September, the agency cites President Trump’s executive orders for the decision: The July 24 executive order on “Ending Crime and Disorder on America’s Streets,” which, among other things, demanded states implement public camping bans and loosen restrictions on involuntary commitment, among other things, as ways to end homelessness.
The second order, signed on Aug. 7, requires that federal grant programs advance the president’s priorities, including his views on immigration, sex and gender ideology, race, or anything the administration considers anti-American.
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The National Alliance to End Homelessness, the lead plaintiff in the lawsuit against HUD Secretary Scott Turner, says the new jurisdictional criteria mean many grant applicants are now shut out by virtue of where they exist in the country.
And it’s not just so-called blue states, according to the lawsuit.
“Under either scenario, Alliance members are ineligible if their proposed projects are located in any state that HUD would deem to fail to meet one or more of the Jurisdictional Criteria mentioned above. While the vagueness of the criteria make it difficult to identify every jurisdiction that is excluded, the Department of Justice has compiled a list of “sanctuary jurisdictions” (which the Department has concluded are not cooperating with the federal government on immigration enforcement), as well as a list of jurisdictions that have not substantially implemented SORNA (Sex Offender Registration and Notification Act).”
The lawsuit says the criteria shut out applicants in 36 states, along with Puerto Rico and the District of Columbia. You can read the full lawsuit at the end of the story.
Florida is not one of the states. However, the alliance says states like Alaska, Kentucky and Texas are.
“HUD largely replaced criteria that was included in the first two iterations of this notice for funding that had a lot to do with the quality of the program and what is happening with homelessness in a specific community that was applying for these funds and replaced it with criteria that have nothing to do with homelessness,” said Ann Oliva, CEO of the National Alliance to End Homelessness.
Temporary restraining order
Aside from the ideological requirements, HUD also substantially narrowed the focus of the grant program, restricting the types of projects that could get money.
“They actually changed the entire nature of the program and then decreased the number of days that the competition was open for folks to develop good programs to respond to the need,” Oliva said. “And so they went from permanent supportive housing, especially for people who have been homeless for a long time and have disabling conditions, to older people and people with physical disabilities in a medical respite setting. And medical respite is traditionally not permanent housing. It’s short-term housing to help people who are experiencing homelessness.”
Oliva said homelessness advocates were aware that changes in how HUD would handle funding in the future were coming.
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However, Congress holds the constitutional purse strings and sets the criteria, and the alliance’s lawsuit argues that HUD should not be allowed to mess with that after the fact to support a new ideology.
“Simply put, the work to end homelessness shouldn’t be partisan, and this notice of funding opportunity really only allowed places that align with what the Trump agenda to even apply for these dollars,” Oliva said.
A federal judge in Rhode Island agreed.
Judge Mary McElroy, who was appointed by President Donald Trump in 2019, issued a temporary restraining order last month and further blocked HUD from awarding that grant money.
Congress had set a Sept. 30 deadline for HUD to award the grant funds. McElroy suspended that deadline, so the money could be awarded in the future once the case was settled.
“The court concludes that plaintiffs have established a strong likelihood of success on the merits, irreparable harm, and that the balance of equities and public interest favor the plaintiffs,” McElroy wrote.
Back in Brevard County, homeless advocates were sure they would get the money again, even after the third application. Now they have to wait.
Carrfour said construction is ready to begin. They wouldn’t tell News 6 if construction could proceed without the HUD grant.
[READ the full lawsuit “National Alliance to End Homelessness v. Scott Turner”]