Housing For Health and California Policy Lab Named a 2025 Ivory Prize Top 25 Finalist
Finalists for the 2025 Ivory Prize for Housing Affordability Announced
Los Angeles, CA – The Los Angeles County Housing for Health Division and the California Policy Lab have been named a Top 25 Finalist for the 2025 Ivory Prize for Housing Affordability for their work designing, launching, and managing the Homelessness Prevention Unit (HPU). The HPU uses Artificial Intelligence to identify Los Angeles County households at high risk of homelessness. Experienced case managers then proactively reach out to those individuals and families and provide them with wraparound services and flexible financial assistance to keep them housed.
The Ivory Prize is an award recognizing ambitious and feasible solutions to housing affordability. It is designed to award innovators for their efforts and provide material support to advance their work. The prize is one of the longest-standing and most prestigious awards of its kind in the United States, culminating in $300,000 of grants to winners in three categories: Construction & Design, Finance, and Policy & Regulatory Reform.
“We’re deeply honored to be named as an Ivory Prize Top 25 Finalist,” commented Dana Vanderford, Associate Director of Homelessness Prevention for LA County Department of Health Services. “We are proud to serve every client with flexible, supportive services at a critical moment in their lives. We hope to help other communities use data-driven and client-centered approaches to homelessness prevention.”
The program has worked closely with the LA County Chief Information Office since 2018. “The joint efforts in driving the HPU demonstrate the potentialities of evidence-based practice and advanced analytics to a degree I’ve rarely if ever seen in almost 25 years with Los Angeles County,” said Max Stevens, Chief Analytics Officer at Los Angeles County Chief Information Office.
“This is an incredible honor,” said Janey Rountree, Executive Director of the California Policy Lab at UCLA. “UCLA’s predictive model and our public-private partnership with Los Angeles County Housing for Health has been the foundation for innovating new approaches to homelessness prevention.”
The Homelessness Prevention Unit was launched by Los Angeles County in 2020 and operates out of the Housing for Health division of the Department of Health Services in partnership with the California Policy Lab, which provides the predictive model. The unit also closely collaborates with the Chief Information Office (CIO) and Department of Mental Health (DMH).
As a finalist for the Ivory Prize, HFH and CPL unlock access to Ivory’s network of innovators, capital partners, and capacity builders. Finalists can also receive in-kind support such as sponsored student interns and pro bono consulting services.
In April, Ivory Innovations will perform more thorough diligence to narrow its top 25 list down to 10 finalists and will choose one winner from each of the aforementioned categories. Those three winners will split a $300K grand prize.
The Housing for Health Division of the Los Angeles County Department of Health Services is improving the health, dignity and wellbeing of the most vulnerable Los Angeles County residents experiencing homelessness or housing instability. through providing integrated housing, social services, benefits advocacy, physical and behavioral healthcare.
The California Policy Lab is an institute based at the University of California that generates research insights for government impact. Through hands-on partnerships with government agencies, CPL performs rigorous research across issue silos and builds the data infrastructure necessary to improve programs and policies that millions of Californians rely on every day.
