Ending Homelessness: Homeless Response System Online Learning Clinic 2018 – Part VI: Dallas’ Homeless Response System in Action

In 2015-2017, MDHA focused on building the necessary components of an effective unified homeless response system. In mid-2017, MDHA shifted its focus to utilizing the system to better house people quickly and permanently, while continuously improving the system. The Continuum of Care Strategic Work Plan 2017-2018[i] reflects this shift. Its goals are clear, and its objectives are bold.

Goals

I. Increase Access to Affordable Housing

II. End Chronic, Veteran and Elderly Homelessness

III. Improve Access and Coordination of Services and Emergency Housing

IV. Rapidly House Family Households with Children

V. Rapidly House Youth

VI. Drive Decision-making with HMIS Data

VII. Address Racial Disparities in Homelessness and Service Delivery

Objectives

I. Reduce the number of persons experiencing homelessness by 5%

II. Reduce the length of stay in homelessness by 10%

III. Reduce the number of chronic, veteran and elderly homeless by 50%

IV. Increase the number of unsheltered persons prioritized for housing to 500

V. Increase incomes for 20% of zero-income households on housing priority list

VI. Increase occupancy rates for all available shelter and housing beds to no less than 98.6%

VII. Increase housing stability in homeless housing programs to 96%

VIII. Increase HMIS participation rates to no less than 86% of all beds and housing types

Action

We report quarterly on our progress [ii], as a Continuum of Care, on 60 individual action items under the above seven goals. Here are just a few highlights of action we are taking to make homelessness rare, brief and nonrecurring:

· Homeless Count – In January 2018, MDHA conducted the most extensive and technologically advanced Homeless Count in Texas history[iii], mobilizing more than 1,500 volunteers, and using the Counting Us app, from Simtech Solutions. Use of the app was helpful in making the Count easier and more accurate. By capturing the latitude and longitude of each encounter, it enabled MDHA to send out outreach teams the very next morning to aid individuals belonging to specific populations. MDHA provided the results of the Count at its annual State of the Homeless Address on March 21, 2018.

· Homeless Response System Leadership Training and Strategic Planning Retreat – On March 28-29, 2018, we brought together all of the major “players”, in Dallas and Collin Counties, who can affect systems change, for a groundbreaking gathering, facilitated by OrgCode, led by pioneering world expert, Dr. Iain De Jong. With De Jong and former HUD Deputy Assistant Secretary, Ann Oliva, leading a team of facilitators, this retreat, with more than 65 senior leaders in attendance, was designed to usher in a more strategic community response to homelessness. Participating leaders spent two whole days of intense action-oriented participative and interactive hard work. They focused on the critical nature of collective impact, and how an effective system of care can bring about an end to homelessness in our community. Together, through a strategic planning journey, utilizing the Breakthrough Thinking approach, participants made the necessary decisions and vital commitments that will chart our course, as a community.

Ann Oliva

Former Deputy Assistant Secretary, HUD

· Homeless Helpline – A key part of any homeless response system, it refers clients to several hubs: youth, domestic violence victims, families with children, single adults, Collin County residents, and general assistance, with each hub managed by a key CoC service provider. Lessons learned through the current soft-launch period of the helpline (which began in December 2017) will be incorporated into the public launch.

· Housing “Challenges” - We challenge ourselves and our partners to house a specific group of people, during a specific time period. We have already concluded our first Top 50 Challenge; the idea is to house as many of the top 50 persons on the Housing Priority List, as possible. This challenge proved extremely successful, with over 80% of persons ending or on the verge of ending their homelessness! We will now run this challenge every other month, using the off months to learn and improve. We will soon run a Veterans Challenge, focusing on the 67 unsheltered veterans found in the Homeless Count. In the Spring, in collaboration with Dallas shelters, we will run an intensive Emergency Shelter Housing Challenge[iv].

· Youth Homelessness – The MDHA CoC Youth Committee conducted, “See Us Now” the most extensive youth outreach survey to date, among and with the help of homeless youth. The qualitative and quantitative data collected, once analyzed, will help service providers better understand the needs of homeless youth, and serve them accordingly. This effort will be capped off with a “See Us Now” event in April 2018.

· Collin County – MDHA expanded its assistance to Collin County providers, with an MDHA team member officing out of the Assistance Center of Collin County three days a week, and assisting multiple clients with housing navigation and placement.

· Housing Resources – MDHA conducted Housing Resource Clinics for the staff of six different emergency shelters, to give them additional tools to house their guests. We expanded housing search tools for case managers. As part of the Emergency Shelter Housing Challenge, we will conduct Housing Planning Clinics for clients, and encourage every client to build a “My Housing Plan” framework to end their homelessness. An MDHA authored New Tenant Resource Guide, is now available to all CoC member organizations. It is distributed to individual clients upon housing.

· Harvey Relief – MDHA, the City of Dallas, the Dallas Foundation and Catholic Charities of Dallas joined forces to provide housing, services and case management to 200 non-FEMA eligible families, rendered homeless by Hurricane Harvey.

· Faith-Based Organizations – The Salvation Army is now using HMIS for 100% of their programs. Discussions have begun with the Samaritan Inn to join HMIS. We will seek to add other faith-based organizations to HMIS with funding from the City of Dallas. A new CoC Faith-based Collaborations Committee now meets monthly, to help faith-based organizations do their part to help end homelessness.

· Street Outreach – MDHA provides support to the City of Dallas’ expanded street outreach eﬀorts, with resources and training, and in solidifying inclusion in the Housing Priority List, as a standard practice for street outreach.

· Racial Equity – MDHA is committed to ensuring that racial equity permeate its work, as one of six communities working with the Center for Social Innovation’s SPARC project. MDHA has begun publishing a Homeless Response System Community Dashboard Race Addendum [v], to highlight racial disparities in homelessness and service delivery. An MDHA delegation participated in the Center for Social Innovation’s first-of-its-kind national summit on Racial Equity and Homelessness, in partnership with the Raikes Foundation and the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. MDHA will soon conduct a survey of the demographic make-up of the senior management and board officers of all federally funded service providers, with the goal of increasing the diversity of these groups, so they better reflect the homeless population.