Regional Networks to End Homelessness in Massachusetts

SPRING 2010

Last fall, the Interagency Council on Housing and Homelessness, with funding from The Paul and Phyllis Fireman Foundation, engaged MHSA to provide technical assistance to the Regional Networks to End Homelessness in Massachusetts. Since then, MHSA has collected data on more than 80 participants who have been placed into housing through the regional networks.

The number of participants is expected to jump to more than 100 by the end of this week. Of the 80 participants, 24 moved directly from the streets into their own homes and 47 moved out of temporary shelter into permanent homes. The average length of homelessness is 2.7 years. Fifty-one percent of the cohort is between the ages of 31 to 50 years, and 39 percent are 51 to 61 years.

MHSA will continue to ensure the appropriate targeting of resources, collect relevant data statewide, audit housing and service delivery and measure outcomes from both qualitative and cost-benefit perspectives. We will share the successful results and outcomes as they are recorded.

Read below for more information regarding MHSA's involvement in the Regional Networks to End Homelessness in Massachusetts.

FALL 2009

TECHNICAL ASSISTANCE

With funding from The Paul and Phyllis Fireman Foundation, the Interagency Council on Housing and Homelessness engaged MHSA to provide crucial technical assistance to the Regional Networks implementing innovative low threshold housing initiatives. These initiatives will be similar to MHSA's Home & Healthy for Good, which the ICHH considered a "best practice."
 
MHSA will oversee a systemic effort to approach street and chronic homelessness as a public health issue and gather data on the effectiveness of a Housing First strategy. MHSA’s oversight will ensure that critical but scarce resources will go to the poorest, most disabled and vulnerable population living on the streets, in woods and in shelters across Massachusetts.

MHSA will be responsible for ensuring appropriate targeting of resources, collecting relevant data statewide, auditing housing and service delivery, providing technical assistance related to service provision and measuring outcomes from both qualitative and cost-benefit perspectives.

MHSA will work with the Regional Networks to achieve these goals by:

• Offering guidance on approaches to target chronically homeless individuals for housing
• Producing appropriate consent forms for data collection, research and reporting
• Providing entry, follow-up and exit interviews to collect self-reported data and monitor regional databases
• Analyzing cost benefit information
• Providing technical assistance in the regions to access claims data from the Office of Medicaid to measure savings in the Commonwealth’s emergency healthcare system
• Providing training to case managers in:
  • Low Threshold Housing
  • Harm Reduction
  • Motivational Interviewing

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