FREEHOLD, NJ – November 17, 2025 – Collaborative Support Programs of New Jersey (CSPNJ) officially invites individuals experiencing homelessness for overnight support at their three overnight warming centers, located in Camden, Hudson and Ocean counties. This winter will be the first time that all three locations will be fully operational for the entirety of the cold months. The warming centers that CSPNJ oversees host a yearly average of 1,200 persons living unhoused during the code blue season, ranging from October 15th to March 31st.

This announcement comes as November 16 through 22 is Hunger and Homelessness Awareness Week, a nationally recognized event that highlights the great need for increased funding and access to safe housing and reliable food sources, like many of the persons that CSPNJ serves experience challenges with. With the recent holding of SNAP and EBT benefits due to the federal shutdown, there has been an increase in food insecurity for those living unhoused. CSPNJ currently serves over 15,000 individuals at its Community Wellness Centers (CWC) across the state. Of those that provided demographic data, more than 3,500 of these individuals are unhoused / experiencing homelessness. Many of CSPNJ’s CWCs have begun providing more frequent hot meals and expanding pantry inventory for their members as a result. As for the housing crisis in New Jersey, according to the National Low Income Housing Coalition, New Jersey has a shortage of 205,063 rental homes that are affordable and available for extremely low-income renters.

This advocacy week also endorses the use of housing-first assistance and low-barrier approaches to providing support to the community to eliminate experiences of injustice and discrimination.

On October 21, Chief Operating Officer Anne Smullen Thieling and Deputy Director of Advocacy and Peer Services Heather Simms presented "Care, Not Confinement: Peer-Led Strategies to End the Criminalization of Mental Illness and Homelessness" at New Jersey Association of Mental Health and Addiction Agencies’ (NJAMHAA) Fall Conference. The session explored peer-led strategies to resist the criminalization of people experiencing mental illness and homelessness. They shared how peer providers are leading innovative outreach efforts that connect individuals to housing, recovery, and community—not handcuffs or hospitalization. The workshop also examined peer roles in discharge planning within psychiatric hospitals and advocacy efforts opposing expanded involuntary treatment laws. Through tools, models, and lived experience perspectives, attendees were equipped to promote voluntary, rights-based alternatives rooted in dignity and recovery.

As a nonprofit, CSPNJ depends on private, corporate, and public funding, many of which face uncertainty. Supporters help CSPNJ stay strong and responsive. For more information about CSPNJ or to donate, please visit  www.cspnj.org or contact Chelsea Triano at ctriano@cspnj.org or 732-443-0680.

A statewide behavioral health agency incorporated in 1984, CSPNJ has established itself as a respected innovator of housing, Community Wellness Centers, employment, and economic development services that promote the wellness and recovery of people with the lived experience of behavioral health conditions. Starting with just three drop-in centers to what is now a statewide network of programs, CSPNJ is a nationally recognized leader in the design and delivery of wellness and recovery-oriented services, offering opportunities for people to live, learn, and work in the community of their choice. CSPNJ is celebrating its 40th year of operations in 2025, having provided supportive housing and community wellness centers for decades, respite and homelessness services for over 10 years, and outreach services for the past 5 years. CSPNJ is a HUD-approved Public Housing Agency that provides mainstream and CoC housing vouchers for over 20 years. For more information about CSPNJ, visit www.cspnj.org.