Community Government Health & Wellness

Family Promise uses AI to help combat homelessness in Pierce County

Posted on November 13th, 2025 By: Conor Wilson

Steve Decker began a presentation to a Pierce County Council committee last spring by proclaiming himself a radical for believing the state’s second-largest county could eventually achieve the lofty goal of functional zero on homelessness.

Pierce County remains miles away from that goal. The number of individuals experiencing homelessness increased 11%, to nearly 3,000, this year, according to federal data.

Yet Decker, CEO of Family Promise of Puget Sound, has found a model he believes could help close the gap.

Family Promise has been around fewer than two years and carries little name recognition. But in a short span, the agency created by a Spanaway pastor has rapidly become a central player in Pierce County’s efforts to combat homelessness.

Using AI to combat homelessness

The agency is obviously not a silver bullet. But combining intensive case management and small shelters with its own artificial-intelligence software, Family Promise developed a model that appears to be delivering results for Pierce County residents — specifically, families with children who are unhoused.

Steve Decker

People seeking emergency shelter in Pierce County are now routed through Family Promises’s shelter hub, a first-of-its-kind 24/7 resource center in Pierce County. The hub, launched using a $1 million county grant, connects people experiencing homelessness with emergency shelters.

Family Promise has connected with more than 4,000 residents experiencing homelessness and — central to the agency’s mission — put more than 160 families with children into permanent housing, often without the need for federal subsidies.

“Innovative is definitely the word I’d use to describe them,” Pierce County Councilmember Robyn Denson, whose district includes Gig Harbor, said of Family Promise.

Expanding to other communities

Family Promises hopes to replicate its early success. Last month, the agency announced plans to expand services into Kitsap, Mason, King and Thurston counties using a $400,000 state grant.

They have already started receiving calls to their intake hub, Decker said, and begun looking for single-family homes to lease as emergency shelter for families with children in those communities. Family Promise already operates a six-room, single-family home shelter near Parkland.

“At the end of the day, what I care about is there are kids sleeping at bus stops or in tents or maybe in the back of a car if they’re lucky,” Decker said. “I need those kids to be somewhere safe. I’ll partner with absolutely anyone to get them safe.”

Homeless families

Family Promise of Puget Sound is the local affiliate of a national organization focused on addressing family homelessness. That demographic has grown in recent years.

While individuals still comprise the majority of the homeless population, families with children saw the largest increase of any group between 2023 and 2024, according to a report published this year by the National Alliance to End Homelessness.

Getting families into emergency shelter is extremely difficult, verging on impossible. Most resources target individuals experiencing homelessness.

That is evident in county data. At any point between July and October, a waitlist for emergency shelter in Pierce County included at least 100 families, according to data from Family Promise. That includes anywhere from 70 to 150 children younger than 5.

Samara Jenkins became acutely aware of that reality a few years ago, when her church began offering a safe parking program for those living in their vehicles.

From pastor to housing provider

Jenkins, who has been pastor at Spanaway Methodist for five years, spent a period of her life unhoused with her five children. Years before Jenkins became a pastor, she swore to help other families in need if she ever had the opportunity.

“Many families are made to feel like being homeless with children is a crime. They’re fearful of what’s going to happen to them,” she said. “Creating that sense of safety, that you don’t have to run anymore, that was huge for us.”

The safe park site can hold up to 10 vehicles and has more than 200 graduates. But getting additional resources, including housing, for families at the safe park was difficult. Church staff spent time calling around and working with case managers but often had little luck.

That is why Jenkins helped co-found a local Family Promise affiliate in Pierce County. Jenkins learned about Family Promise while leading a presentation about her church’s safe park program with friend Jessica Pair.

Family Promise recently helped organize a similar safe park program in Gig Harbor.

Jenkins and Pair, now a case manager at Family Promise, founded the agency’s board in 2023 and officially began serving families at the start of 2024. The agency now has 19 employees, with Jenkins serving as its board president.

“I cry all the time,” she said of the organization’s growth. “This has been a dream of mine for years.”

Money shortage leads to innovation

Family Promise hired Decker as CEO about two months before it opened its doors. He quickly realized it had little funding. He could not afford even a basic client management software.

His solution was to build one himself.

Before his 25-year career in social work, Decker worked in information technology. He “was a full-fledged nerd,” he said.

Decker applied for a Google Workspace grant available to nonprofits and got access to cloud services that his agency otherwise could not have afforded.

The system, now called Ash Nazg, was born out of necessity. Yet it has become a key to the agency’s success. The in-house software, which Decker says he built 80% himself, now includes everything from a HIPPA-compliant AI platform to help Family Promise process information for individuals to a financial tracking system that keeps their finances in order. Google hosts all of it for free.

Leveraging artificial intelligence, the in-house software also functions as an assistant for Family Promise’s case managers. Decker said his agency cut out much of the administrative process involved in case management. Automation gives them the ability to increase the volume of their case load and get to the heart of people’s issues quicker.

Needs assessment

Clients fill out a brief survey on Family Promise’s website. They rate their need for housing stability, income, budget skills, education, childcare options or other needs on a 1 to 5 scale.

The site spits out a tailored action plan in minutes. Based on their selections, the plans give them step-by-step instructions of how they can address those needs.

This system is part why Family Promise has been successful, Decker says. Case managers historically might spend one to two hours taking a client’s information and developing an action plan.

“The big lift we get through using Google technology is that we’re able to streamline everything so that the conversations we’re having with people are more about building trust and really focusing on specific targetable things that need to be addressed . . . instead of wasting time on, let me pull out your file or let me pull out your documents,” he said

Housing and job searches

The software can also help score individuals jobs and housing, Decker says. A person, even a diligent one, can only spend an hour or so a day looking for work or a place to live.

A machine, like the one they have created, can look all day. It notifies a client via text message when it finds something that matches their needs or skill set. This allows clients to be the first person to apply for a job or rental, often giving them a better chance of landing it.

Family Promise has reported housing families at rates twice as fast as other agencies. To date it has helped 164 families get into permanent housing. Notably, only four used federal subsidized housing vouchers.

U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development vouchers are a common way to help people on low-incomes secure housing. The vouchers allow families to pay about 30% of their income towards rents, with the rest being subsidized.

Yet they are also in short supply. Decker argues that the county should not depend on HUD or a lottery system to get people housed. Rather, he says the county can help individuals raise their incomes and get off the streets permanently.

“We need to recognize that there are real limits on how much HUD has available, how many subsidies are available, how many transitional living units are available,“ he said. “We need families to just really buckle down, get a job, and get housed because that’s what their kids need.”

Families or individuals facing homelessness and in need of emergency shelter can call Family Promise of Puget Sound at 253-444-4563 to complete an intake form or go to getbed.org.