1. Ending Family Homelessness in Cuyahoga County
Why we are doing this –
1. concern about children in shelter.
2. Felt it is a solvable problem at the scale that is occurs in Cleveland (480 – 530 families/year)
3. Address non chronic, non single community needs
4. Many system overlap issues and possibilities for leverage
I have identified 3 components – will describe , and then a fourth slide highlighting system challenges.

2. 1. Coordinated Intake & Assessment
“FRONT DOOR” to CoC system
1 location: single men /single women &
families
Diversion
Standard assessment and HMIS entry
Housing plan
Immediate shelter placement
Coordination of housing resources
Linkage to System Resources
Utilize system resources more fully
Assure that highest need households are being served
Match resources to needs better across the system
Assure accurate data entry, referral tracking and documentation of homelessness

3. 2. Opening the Back Door……
Housing First value
Rapid ReHousing for all HHs
referred in 7 days; housing selected in 30 days
Shelter focus: IDs, furniture,
utilities, assist with housing search
Shift paradigm of shelter as program based location
Reduce shelter length of stay for two reasons: better for families and enables more families to be served without adding shelter beds.

4. 3. PROGRESSIVE ENGAGEMENT
72 ZHS
8 Months of Assistance
342 Housed
No More Subsidy
414 RRH
4 Months of Assistance
88%
Remained Housed
10%
Returned to Family 2%
Shelter
All families are referred for RRH in 7 days
No barriers to referral
A single agency manages the RRH Housing program: locators assist with finding housing, inspections, Rent reasonableness; documentation of client and housing eligibility; coordination of RRH case management and client stability tracking; refrral for Zacceus Housing program.

5. 2016 RRH – Progressive Subsidy Exiting Households
11 HH
PSH/PH Ongoing Subsidy
61 HH
No Ongoing Subsidy
72 ZHS HH
8 Months of Assistance
85%
Remained Housed 1%
Other
Shelter
13%
Returned to Family
Referrals for ZHS and PSH/PH are being coordinated in addition with Coordinated Entry – staff position that will maintain “byname” list of families in RRH, ZHS and in need of PSH/long term PH.
Bi-monthly meetings for review of family stability, planning for additional needs.

6. CoC FAMILY RESOURCE ALLOCATION
PSH /PUBLIC HOUSING………………….
ZACCEUS HOUSING SOLUTIONS…
RRH – 1 X……………………………..
SHELTER……………………………..

7. 4. CHALLENGES (A) GETTING EVERYONE ‘ON
BOARD’ WITH HOUSING
FIRST AND PROGRESSIVE
ENGAGEMENT
(B) DETERMING THE AMOUNT OF RESOURCES NEEDED AND THEN DEVELOPING THE RESOURCES
(C) ASSURING HOUSING STABILITY
Still shifting from old paradigm that believed that people had to be “ready” for housing…shelter was a place to learn skills for living in housing…and that if someone is challenged in maintaining housing, they should return to homelessness;
If you are serious about doing this, need to calculate the # of families who experience homelessness annually ; considering resources available, determine the # of families that can be assisted within set subsidy amounts/lengths of subsidy; what is strategy for families who are not stable within the time frame?
How to reduce returns to shelter by most vulnerable families?