Dan Straughan retired in April after 20 years of serving as the Executive Director of Homeless Alliance.

In 2004, after working at the Federal Reserve and then United Way, Dan was eager for a new adventure. A visionary group of civic leaders, that later became the founding board of the Homeless Alliance, was searching for better ways to serve Oklahoma City’s unhoused population and selected him as the organization’s first employee. 

In his speech at his retirement celebration in historic Capitol Hill, Dan recounted the difficulties and creativity in the early days, revealing that he often sneaked back to United Way to steal office supplies since Homeless Alliance didn’t have money to buy them at the time.

Now, Homeless Alliance is one of the largest service providers when it comes to the unhoused population in Oklahoma City. The organization has also expanded into social enterprises such as Curbside Chronicle, Curbside Flowers, Curbside Apparel, and Sasquatch Shaved Ice.  

Dan went on to give credit to his team for establishing all these groundbreaking initiatives and more, including bringing the Housing First model to Oklahoma City. This model is now the standard for housing providers, largely due to Dan’s work.

“I just execute,” insisted Dan. “I’m just along for the ride.”

Continuing to take on groundbreaking projects throughout his career, Dan oversaw the establishment of the first permanent winter shelter in Oklahoma City which opened in October of 2023. By March, it served 3,535 unduplicated clients and provided 43,702 bed nights. An average of 280 people were served each night over 156 nights, indicating that we are successfully addressing a gap during the cold Winter months.

“I have been incredibly blessed with the people that I work with,” Dan said. “The people that I’ve worked for, and the population that we have tried to serve. We have made a lot of progress.”

Dan is leaving the Homeless Alliance in very dedicated and capable hands. Their new CEO, Meghan Mueller has been with the organization for 10 years. Our team here at AFF is proud to celebrate Dan’s long career and Meghan’s new role and we’re excited to continue our work together in finding solutions to homelessness in Oklahoma City.