Luke Shaefer and Benita Miller have a bold charge from Detroit Mayor Mary Sheffield in their new jobs at the city: reduce poverty and make it easier for vulnerable Detroiters to get the help they need.
They take on their roles in a city where more than 30% of the population, and half of young children, live in poverty, and many struggle to afford the basics, and as homelessness is increasing.
How will they tackle a problem that has vexed Detroit for decades?
They say they want to change systems and policies rather than people.
Miller, director of the new Department of Human, Homeless and Family Services, returns to the city where she grew up after working in government and nonprofits on the east coast for about three decades. Her department will be overseen by Shaefer. He is the city’s first chief executive of Health, Human Services and Poverty Solutions. Shaefer has built a research center focused on anti-poverty initiatives and co-founded the fast-growing Rx Kids program in Michigan.
Rx Kids, which provides direct cash to pregnant moms and babies, signals the system-change the administration may pursue. Joining Rx Kids was the first policy announcement Sheffield made in office earlier this year. In the three weeks since the program officially launched in Detroit, Rx Kids has so far distributed $935,500 and enrolled 811 families.
Programs and strategies in other cities such as New York, Houston and Seattle have inspired Shaefer and Miller.
Seattle, for instance, has something called CiviForm, Shaefer said, allowing residents to apply for various services at once, including home repair loans, trees and free toilets. Miller said she wants to solve problems through the eyes of children, and cited family enrichment centers – standalone community hubs providing families with resources.
“If the children are doing better, the health and safety and well-being of community becomes more productive,” she said.
The Free Press sat down with Shaefer and Miller to learn about their new jobs, vision and game plan, so far, to tackle one of Detroit’s most intractable problems.
Meet Shaefer and Miller
Shaefer, a prominent social policy scholar, is now in charge of the Detroit Health Department, Office of Immigrant Affairs and Economic Inclusion and the Department of Human, Homeless and Family Services, led by Miller, an attorney and nonprofit executive.
Originally from Detroit, Miller has worked at organizations in New York and New Jersey focused on children, mothers and families and was the founding executive director of former Mayor Bill de Blasio’s New York City Children’s Cabinet. She led New York City’s foster care system under former mayor Mike Bloomberg and worked with the New Jersey government to reimagine the child welfare system.
She was drawn to the role because of Sheffield’s vision and commitment to Detroit, its people and neighborhoods, Miller said. She wants to bring the lessons she’s learned to a city she described as resilient and forward looking.
“I grew up here and to have someone talk very specifically from the heart about making change for real people resonated with me,” Miller said, referring to Sheffield.
Shaefer comes from the University of Michigan’s Poverty Solutions initiative where he served as the inaugural faculty director. Poverty Solutions has partnered with the city of Detroit since 2018 to improve economic mobility and that relationship is slated to expand. A professor, author and researcher, Shaefer has focused on anti-poverty policies including the federal Child Tax Credit and cash aid programs. Shaefer is expected to take a two-year leave from U-M for the city job, according to a news release.
“I love graphs, I love data, but the end result − the thing that I’m really about − is trying to use public policy to make people’s lives better, to empower people to live healthy and productive lives,” he said.
Shaefer and Miller want to change systems as opposed to individual behaviors. For example, adding a bus route that would help someone get to a work shift or making public transit more accessible for kids who have trouble getting to school.
“How do we change systems so they work better for families and we get better outcomes and families are empowered to live healthy and full lives?,” said Shaefer.
New roles and a new department
So far, Shaefer and Miller have been getting acclimated to their new roles, taking stock of what already exists – such as the Rides to Care program for Detroit moms to get to and from doctors’ appointments – and listening to community members, faith-based leaders and nonprofit partners.
“What I’ve been doing is a lot of listening, spending time in community,” Miller said.
Shaefer highlighted the importance of Detroiters filing their income taxes to receive earned income and child tax credits and city efforts to partner with agencies to help residents with tax prep. Detroit recently worked with the state to send a text message to all Detroiters who are on food assistance to notify them about the tax prep, he said. Data from that effort revealed a three-fold increase in people signing up and getting tax prep services after the text messages, compared to the week before. Those benefits represent about $400 million coming into the city and can not only help families but the local economy, too, he said.
Another example of recent efforts: street outreach teams and the city’s Department of Neighborhoods were in the process of getting staff trained as navigators to help residents apply for food assistance, Medicaid and utility help – public benefits that sit at the state level. It’s one way to ease frustrations for Detroiters who may come to the city for help but must then go through the state, Shaefer said.
Miller’s department will be funded with nearly half of the city’s Housing and Revitalization Department (HRD) budget – $41.4 million (for the 2026 fiscal year ending June 30) from HRD’s $90.6 million allocation, according to city officials. Splitting the budget in that way would leave $45.9 million for the housing department.
Sheffield’s 2027 budget proposal is expected to show future funding amounts for all departments. Chief Financial Officer Tonya Stoudemire said at a Feb. 25 Detroit City Council committee meeting that next year’s budgets for both departments will look similar.
The new Department of Human, Homeless and Family Services will have a staff of 109 and is expected to take over programs such as the Homeowners Property Exemption (HOPE), rental tenant escrow, downpayment assistance and home repair, according to Chief of Staff David Bowser at the committee meeting. Some programs were previously within the Housing and Revitalization Department, while others were in the Detroit Health Department.
“We would like to nudge our infant health outcomes in the city, infant mortality, low birth weight, prematurity,” Shaefer said.
Sheffield last week tapped Ali Abazeed, Dearborn’s founding public health director, to be Detroit’s new chief public health officer. Priorities for the health department – which Shaefer oversees – include addressing chronic diseases, households affected by lead, asthma and reducing infant mortality in Detroit.
Shaefer’s salary is $250,000 and Miller’s compensation is $205,000.Annual salaries for other top officials in Sheffield’s administration are similar: Winnie Liao, the new city’s new chief operating officer, will make $290,000 and Abazeed’s salary will be $235,000.
Plans to reduce homelessness
Homelessness in Detroit has been growing, local housing experts have said, and changes to improve the system can’t keep up. The city of Detroit ramped up efforts to reduce homelessness after the deaths of two children a year ago, whose family was apparently unhoused and living in a van parked at a Detroit parking garage. The Wayne County Medical Examiner determined the children died of carbon monoxide toxicity and that the deaths were accidental.
Homelessness increased 16% from 2023 to 2024, according to the latest comprehensive data from a one-night tally that takes place each January across Detroit, Hamtramck and Highland Park. A narrower pulse check on homelessness in 2025 found a 2% increase in people living in emergency shelters and other housing programs year-over-year.
The city is dividing its strategy into three parts, city officials said, including reducing the number of people who need to enter the shelters, improving services within the system and having permanent housing options for people.
Shaefer said homelessness and housing affordability need a “multi-pronged” approach. The city, he said, needs to respond to the demand for shelter beds but also consider the longer term plan as people exit shelter, including: increasing the number of affordable units, permanent supportive housing and recovery housing.
Having Miller’s new department focus on homeless services means the city’s housing department can explore innovative strategies to get more affordable housing units in the city, Shaefer added.
Miller said the city has started communicating with providers about services that can help keep vulnerable families from re-entering the shelter system.
“What might they need to maintain the stability once they are moved out of shelter and even into permanent housing? What’s in the community that could also serve as assets and supports to those individuals?” she said.
There’s no one-sized-fits-all solution to ending homelessness and shortening the length of time in a shelter, added Bowser, Sheffield’s chief of staff.
“We have to be vigilant about having individualized approaches to ending homelessness for particular families and individuals. There’s behavioral health interventions. There’s service interventions in terms of employment, transportation. … We don’t have as much funding as we used to have to do some of these things, so we have to get super creative,” he said.
Other cities have decreased the cost of construction by providing land grants and technical assistance to developers, Bowser said. The city is also looking into an infill strategy to create more homeowners, he said.
The city is exploring transitional housing options, outside of the shelter system, such as landlords willing to offer a short-term rent contract while families receive case management so they can move into more permanent housing, he said.
“How do we make housing as cheap as possible and attainable for everybody in the city? We’re going to have to identify many, many different tools. It’s not going to be one thing. There may be philanthropic support, city support, partner support,” he said. “We have to really look at all of our avenues to make this a reality, but that’s the only way that we’re going to have outflow, in particular from the shelter system, is if there is somewhere for folks to go.”
BridgeDetroit reporter Malachi Barrett and Free Press reporter Dana Afana contributed to this report.
Nushrat Rahman covers issues related to economic mobility, including poverty and homelessness, for the Detroit Free Press and BridgeDetroit. Reach her at nrahman@freepress.com for tips and story ideas.
Mayor Sheffield have you considered working with Habitat for Humanity and the students at Randolph Career Center to build tiny-houses for unhoused people?