A Unified Command to End Hunger and Homelessness – Vincent Marzullo

Every night in America, more than half a million people sleep without a home, and millions more worry about where their next meal will come from. The United States has no shortage of compassion—or funding—devoted to fighting hunger and homelessness. What we lack is coordination.

Programs at the federal, state, and local levels often work in isolation, duplicating efforts while leaving critical gaps. It’s time we treat these crises with the same urgency and discipline we bring to natural disasters—by using a unified command approach to align resources, leadership, and accountability. The concept comes from emergency management, where it has been proven to save lives.

When a hurricane strikes, a unified command brings together police, firefighters, public health officials, and relief agencies under one coordinated structure. Each partner maintains authority over their own resources, but they agree on shared goals, strategies, and communications. The result is faster action, clearer accountability, and better outcomes.

We should be using that same playbook for hunger and homelessness. Instead of a patchwork of disconnected programs, imagine a local unified command in every community—bringing together housing authorities, health departments, food banks, workforce agencies, and nonprofits around one table. Federal and state partners could join virtually, ensuring that policies and funding streams align with on-the-ground needs. Together, these teams could set measurable goals—say, reducing unsheltered homelessness by 25 percent in a year—and track progress in real time.

It’s not theory – it’s best practice

This approach isn’t theoretical. During the COVID-19 pandemic, several cities created emergency coordination centers to house people quickly, deliver food to seniors, and keep families from losing shelter. Where agencies worked together through unified command structures, they moved faster, spent resources more efficiently, and helped more people. These lessons should not fade with the pandemic—they should become the foundation of a smarter, permanent strategy.

A national unified command could be anchored in the White House Domestic Policy Council, connecting directly with governors and mayors. It could ensure that every community has a coordinated plan to tackle hunger and homelessness—integrating federal housing vouchers with local food programs, aligning data systems, and establishing clear lines of responsibility. The focus should shift from counting how many meals are served or beds are provided to measuring long-term stability, self-sufficiency, and dignity for those in need.

The challenge of hunger and homelessness is not beyond our ability to solve. We mobilize unified commands to fight wildfires, hurricanes, and pandemics because we recognize that lives depend on swift, coordinated action. The same should be true here. Every person without a home or a meal represents a failure of systems that are too fragmented to meet the scale of the problem.

America has the resources, technology, and heart to end these crises—but only if we act together. A unified command approach won’t just coordinate agencies; it will unite communities. It’s time to move from managing hunger and homelessness to ending them—together, under one mission and one command.

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Vincent Marzullo served for 31 years as a federal civil rights/social justice Director in Rhode Island with the Corporation for National & Community Service. Vin is a previous Chair of the RI Federal Executive Council which facilitated intergovernmental coordination. For the past 8 years, Vin has been a weekly playroom volunteer at Hasbro Children’s Hospital and regularly serves meals to the homeless at Mathewson St. Church in Providence with Better Lives RI.