Homeless Unfiltered by Invisible People

More Than a Museum: How Love, Art, and Community Is Transforming Homelessnes

Jessica Turtle was born into a community of homeless people in Cardiff, Wales, set up by her own parents. Her father had spent years sleeping rough on the streets of London. That's where this story begins. But this isn't a story about poverty or pity. It's about love, art, and a community that refuses to be invisible. The Museum of Homelessness in London isn't just a museum. It's a shelter in winter, a gallery, a campaign headquarters, and a home for people society has tried to forget. Jess and her co-founder Matt built something the world told them it didn't want. They were offered a morgue. A closed women's prison. They almost gave up. Then they found a park keeper's lodge in North London and a community that made it their own. In this conversation, we talk about what it really takes to change how the world sees homelessness, why babies are still freezing to death in one of the world's richest cities, and why love, not policy, not charity, might be the most powerful strategy of all. For more information and to support the Museum of Homelessness, visit https://museumofhomelessness.org [https://museumofhomelessness.org] Their current exhibition, Criminal: An Untold History of Homelessness, Resistance and Survival, is open now. Check the website for dates, hours, and how to visit.

Those Most Affected by Homelessness Should Be in Power

Youth homelessness is growing. And most people have no idea how bad it really is. Right now, young people are aging out of foster care with nowhere to go. They are couch surfing, sleeping in cars, and falling through cracks in a system that was supposed to protect them. And the data we have does not even capture the full picture. Marcella Middleton knows this firsthand. She aged out of foster care at 21, went through 16 placements, and experienced homelessness in college. Today she is the CEO of Away Home America, leading a national movement to end youth homelessness. Marcella believes that those closest to the pain should lead the solution. That the people most affected by homelessness should be the ones in power. And she is living proof that it works. She breaks down why youth homelessness keeps growing despite years of effort, why lived experience belongs in the boardroom not just the committee room, and what it really takes to change a system that was never built for you. If you work in social services, policy, advocacy, or you just care about young people, this one is for you. To learn more about Marcella and Away Home America, visit https://awayhomeamerica.org [https://awayhomeamerica.org]

Research, Messaging, and the Fight Over Homelessness Policy

We have more research on homelessness than ever before. So why isn’t it leading to better policy outcomes? In this episode, I’m joined by Joy Moses from the National Alliance to End Homelessness and Samantha Batko from the Urban Institute to talk about the growing disconnect between data, messaging, and real-world impact. We discuss why some research fails to influence policymakers, how homelessness messaging is losing ground, why supportive housing is facing backlash despite overwhelming evidence, and how researchers can better design studies that actually shape public opinion and policy. This conversation also explores AI, misinformation, public trust, underfunding, and the future of homelessness research in an increasingly polarized world. Effective Homelessness Advocacy Messaging Toolkit mentioned in the episode: https://invisiblepeople.tv/toolkit [https://invisiblepeople.tv/toolkit ]

How a Parking Lot Is Helping Solve Homelessness

As rents continue to skyrocket across America, more people are being pushed into homelessness—and for many, their car is the last stop before the street. Families, seniors, and working people are increasingly living in vehicles simply because housing has become unaffordable. In this episode, Teresa Smith, CEO of Dreams for Change, explains how Safe Parking programs provide people living in their cars with a safe place to sleep, access to services, and a pathway back to housing. We discuss the growing crisis of vehicle homelessness, why traditional systems are failing, and how simple community solutions like Safe Parking can help prevent homelessness before people end up on the street. When LIVING IN A CAR is Your Last Choice: "Mobile" a Social Impact Film https://youtu.be/dMBVtPx2B_M?si=ARb4L9B7s9iFwRzZ [https://youtu.be/dMBVtPx2B_M?si=ARb4L9B7s9iFwRzZ ]

If We Want to End Homelessness, We Have to Change

Everyone keeps arguing about how to solve homelessness. Housing First. Treatment First. More shelters. More police. But what if we're asking the wrong question? In this conversation with Iain De Jong, his eighth on Invisible People, something shifts. We get real about what's actually happening right now in the homelessness sector. Why the Housing First versus Treatment First debate completely misses the point. Why organizations under pressure keep reaching backward toward approaches that felt like they worked, what Iain calls the nostalgia loop. And why, for the first time in a long time, people are finally starting to say the quiet parts out loud. We're entering a reckoning. Not the kind that makes people comfortable. The kind that forces you to admit what's not working, and why we've been so slow to say it out loud. The homelessness sector has spent years protecting narratives instead of fixing systems. That's changing. And if we're honest about that…Then we have to ask a much harder question: What are we going to build that's completely different? Stay to the end, because that's where this conversation lands. Reckoning. Renewal. Rebirth. A framework that emerged organically from this discussion that we think is worth sitting with, worth sharing, and maybe worth building on. Here's Iain's Substack https://iaindejong.substack.com [ https://iaindejong.substack.com] Playlist of all Homeless Unfiltered episodes with Iain https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PL51CPD51hq2RnsaSDVNP8DfVv8TZnowfj&si=p2aj2gOV2AExjITC [https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PL51CPD51hq2RnsaSDVNP8DfVv8TZnowfj&si=p2aj2gOV2AExjITC ]