Homeless Response System Online Learning Clinic 2018 – Part I: From Managing to Ending Homelessness

Imagine We Could End Homelessness

There are many social ills of the past, that seemed intractable, that people would have said we would never get rid of, from slavery to segregation, from child labor to keeping children with special needs out of school. Imagine we could end homelessness. Not just help individuals. Not just manage homelessness. Imagine we could eradicate it. Imagine we could make this intractable social ill a thing of the past, too.

What do we mean by ending homelessness? We do not mean no one ever becomes homeless. It is a given that in a capitalist economy, there is economic churn, and that that cannot be fully prevented. This is why even Scandinavian social welfare states have some degree of homelessness. What we do mean is that homelessness rarely happens, when it does happen it is brief, and that it never happens to that person again. This is no pipe dream. Research[i] has shown that it is entirely doable.

Out with the Old – Managing Homelessness

The origins of the modern homelessness crisis begin in the late 1970s-early 1980s. It is difficult to narrow down one decisive cause for any social problem. However, roughly speaking, there are two major, somewhat technical, societal shifts that brought about this crisis. First, many persons with mental illness, were deinstitutionalized, and the hospitals they resided in were shut down. Second, a type of cheap housing, primarily for single underemployed, unskilled and/or disabled men, known as single resident occupancies (SROs) was largely discontinued. Many of those affected by these changes became homeless.

Though homelessness had existed before, it had not existed in the numbers akin to this crisis. Much in the way we deal with natural disasters, in the 1980s, our society attempted to deal with this problem through the use of emergency shelter. This did not solve the problem. In the 1990s, the Federal Government and related public and private entities decided through transitional housing programs, replete with myriad rules that the homeless needed to abide by, to help them address all their problems. The hope was that the homeless would graduate from these (often lengthy 24 month) programs “housing ready” and be able to move on their own into stable permanent housing. Unfortunately, only a minority of those who enrolled in these programs ever reached that goal. The Federal Government and local communities needed a viable alternative, but one did not seem evident.

In with the New – Ending Homelessness

Around the same time, a small program in New York City was being tested and was slowly gaining ground. This program/philosophy was called Housing First. The idea of Housing First was simple. Rather than trying to “fix” people, and then house them, these practitioners suggested standing the classic model on its head. House people, with two conditions only: They would need to abide by the terms of their leases, and meet periodically with a case manager. They would be offered wrap-around services to help them deal with their challenges, and they would be encouraged to use them. However, unlike in the traditional model, they would not be forced to do so. 

As opposed to the classical program that worked only for a minority of participants, the Housing First program worked for about 85%(!) of those enrolled in it. These 85% were able to achieve stable permanent housing. Though this program began with a small group of chronically homeless persons in New York City, these numbers held up in study after study, in community after community, in setting after setting. This led the consensus of scholars in the field to endorse Housing First, and the Federal Government to eventually follow suit, and mandate that all programs follow this philosophy[ii]. The message to all American communities was clear: The Federal Government would no longer fund the management of homelessness. It was time for the modern homelessness crisis to end.
 

 

As this was happening, in the 2000s-2010s, communities were developing more and more permanent supportive housing programs for the chronically homeless and others in need of a permanent setting with intense wrap around supports. And, during the Great Recession of the late Aughts, a related idea called Rapid Rehousing, for non-chronically homeless persons proved promising. The idea was that most of these individuals could be quickly housed, offered intense wrap around services for a limited time, and get back on their feet and move on in 90-180 days. As these settings gained ground, the Federal Government encouraged communities to shift their resources to these settings. Conversely, it began to discourage starting new transitional housing programs, due to their low success rate and high cost.

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[i] Much of this blog post draws ideas and language from two sources:

• Opening Doors, the national strategic plan to end homelessness as amended in 2015,  http://usich.gov/resources/uploads/asset_library/USICH_OpeningDoors_Amendment2015_FINAL.pdf
• Housing First: Ending Homelessness, Transforming Systems, and Changing Lives, by Deborah Padgett, Benjamin Henwood, and Sam Tsemberis (2016)

[ii] Randy Mayeux’s book synopsis of the above-mentioned book by Tsemberis and his colleagues is a great primer on the book and the issue. See https://youtu.be/GGlPME5yGa8

Introducing the Homeless Response System Online Learning Clinic 2018

The Metro Dallas Homeless Alliance (MDHA) leads the development of an effective homeless response system that will make the experience of homelessness in Dallas and Collin Counties rare, brief, and non-recurring. MDHA brings together more than 85 shelter, housing and supportive services programs in retooling homeless services into a crisis response system.

Over the course of 2015-2017, MDHA focused on building the necessary components of an effective unified homeless response system. Such a system helps those who can self-resolve do so, places those who cannot self-resolve into appropriate housing, is entirely oriented towards housing as the solution for homelessness, and practices full transparency, as a tool for learning and systems change.

In mid-2017, MDHA shifted its focus to utilizing the system to better house people quickly and permanently, while working with experts and innovators to continue to improve it. The system’s impact has been recognized by the local community, as well as lauded nationally.

This blog series, the Homeless Response System Online Learning Clinic 2018, is designed to walk the reader through our work, at MDHA, since 2015 to the present day, and as we move forward. It will follow this outline: 

Part I: From Managing to Ending Homelessness

Part II: The Need for a Homeless Response System
Part III: Building Dallas’ Homeless Response System – 2015-2017 – Diversion and Coordinated Access
Part IV: Building Dallas’ Homeless Response System – 2015-2017 – All Roads Lead to Housing
Part V: Building Dallas’ Homeless Response System – 2015-2017 – Data Transparency
Part VI: Dallas’ Homeless Response System in Action - 2017-2019

Homelessness in Dallas is Wakanda

I know what you are saying to yourself: Great, another hot take on Black Panther, the zillionth one so far. Hear me out, though.
 
I am not really into comic books. I can think of only one comic book series, recently, which I have watched in full, Jessica Jones. That should tell you something. I have gone to comic book movies, because my children have dragged me to them, but these experiences have only reinforced my understanding that I am not the audience for these flicks. So, I really didn’t know what to expect when my 17-year-old wanted me to go to Black Panther with him, but go I did.

Wow. Like many people, I was blown away, and you can read critics’ reviews, to find out why. You don’t need me for that. I did want to address the message, which I found uplifting, even if my kid is right that the way it was presented was a little too ham-fisted. I really could not stop thinking about the film and its message, and I wondered why. Then I got it. I could not stop thinking about it, because it is so close to the work we do here every day.

 
Earlier this week on this blog, and last week on social media and via email, we shared the news of the Center for Social Innovation’s first public report on incredible work they have engaged in with the Metro Dallas Homeless Alliance (MDHA), and five other cities, towards establishing racial equity in homeless services, through SPARC (Supporting Partnerships for Anti-Racist Communities), a new research and action program.
 
One of the ideas that we, at MDHA, have brought to the forefront of Dallas consciousness these last 16 months, is that homelessness in Dallas is largely about race. When around 60-70% of those experiencing homelessness are African-American, the question Larry James, CEO of CitySquare was asked in public in mid-2016, “Why do you have to make this about race,” is self-evident in its willful blindness.
 
Once you remove the scales from your eyes, be it regarding homelessness in Dallas, be it regarding the history of colonialism, you have two options that can explain the challenges Africans and African-Americans face. Option 1, and this is the option our region of the country held on to firmly into the mid-sixties: There is something wrong with Africans and African-Americans. Hopefully, that sentence just made you flinch, but don’t think that approach does not still exist in our world. The “great” thing about this approach is that it demands no action on our part, as a local or global society.

Option 2, and, spoiler alert, this option is the one backed up by a pesky thing called data or facts: What we see today is the result of how colonial powers treated Africa, and our society in Dallas treated and often still treats African Americans.

 
Black Panther allows us to imagine what would have happened had colonial powers not plundered Africa of its natural and human resources. Beyond that, it imagines an Africa with superior natural resources, that breeds technology beyond our wildest dreams. Though my 17-year-old might think this is a little too inelegant a presentation, I find the simplicity of it refreshing. The message of the Afro-Futuristic past and present of Wakanda is: The only difference between the condition of real world Africa and its diaspora and Wakanda is that the former lacks the resources of the latter, and that the latter suffered the trauma that did not befall the former. To bring it back to homelessness in Dallas: The difference between the white person who is housed and the black person experiencing homelessness, is that the black person comes from a traumatized community, robbed of its resources, and the white person does not.

Ok, so practically speaking, what now? The movie explores three paths. Path 1 is the status quo, the path of Wakanda up until that point, which was, essentially, to do nothing. Both Killmonger and the Black Panther realize that that path is no longer tenable. Path 2 is the path of Killmonger, the villain, who is uncharacteristically for comic books, rather nuanced. He favors the Wakandans treating the world like the world treated Africa. Path 3 is the path that the Black Panther chooses, that Wakanda begin to share its resources with the African Diasporas, in order to create racial equity.  

 
We, as Americans, confronting a crisis of homelessness, that has lasted for forty years have to decide what to do in our real world. The SPARC report is unflinching in its assessment:
 
The homelessness field stands at a crossroads: continue to use color-blind strategies to solve an entrenched social problem that disproportionately impacts people of color, or embrace a racial equity approach to addressing homelessness… Commitment to racial equity must permeate all other tactics and strategies that cities, counties, states, and the nation use to prevent and end homelessness… Unless we as a field address structural racism within housing, homelessness response, criminal justice, child welfare, employment, education, and health care, we will continue to witness high rates of homelessness for people of color. Our responses must be ambitious and focused on dismantling racist structures, systems, and programs.
 
We, in Dallas, stand at a crossroads too. There is no escaping that. Will we have the courage to rise to the challenge? Will we have the courage to marshal our abundant resources to end homelessness and create racial equity in this and all other areas? Only time will tell.

On the Release of SPARC’s Phase I Report of Research on Racial Inequity and Homelessness

Since late 2016, with the support of the United Way of Metropolitan Dallas' Unite Dallas Relief Fund, we, at the Metro Dallas Homeless Alliance (MDHA), have been partnering with five other cities, towards establishing racial equity in homeless services, through SPARC (Supporting Partnerships for Anti-Racist Communities), a new research and action program from the Center for Social Innovation (C4).

Our motivation to join this effort was born out of the deeply tragic and difficult work of assisting in closing multiple large homeless encampments, in 2016. MDHA President and CEO, Cindy J. Crain, described the realization that experience brought about, “The truth of the dramatic overrepresentation of persons of color, predominantly black, in this population, was right in front of us. Our annual homeless counts and periodic reporting to the Federal Government affirmed these facts too. We wanted our community’s experience to be a part of a greater body of research and action necessary to effect system change and address this racial disparity head on.”
 

Cindy J. Crain, with a friend, in 2016

Today, March 2, 2018, the Center for Social Innovation released its first public report, based on careful analysis of qualitative and quantitative data, from Dallas and five other cities, including, “111,563 individual records of people from HMIS (homeless management information systems)… 148 oral histories of people and data from 18 focus groups in six communities across the United States.” (pg. 4)
 
The research and action over the course of the last 16 months has shown us, as it has shown the Center for Social Innovation researchers that, “it is critical to understand that racial equity should not simply be another initiative or program that is implemented in the mix with other strategies. Instead, commitment to racial equity must permeate all other tactics and strategies that cities, counties, states, and the nation use to prevent and end homelessness.” (pg. 21)

We are thankful to United Way of Metropolitan Dallas, and to all our friends and supporters who have traveled and continue to travel with us on this journey of social justice, and we invite you read the full report.