Housing Safety Nets
Program development, training & support are provided to mainstream or community-based services systems to build capacity to screen, assess & respond to indicators of housing instability.
Rather than a focus on homeless families or families at risk of homelessness, a Housing Safety Net program addresses an entire continuum of housing needs: severe rent burden, poor housing quality, overcrowding, residential displacement, and homelessness.
From single site programs to collaborative and coordinated resource-sharing.
Services system hires Housing Coordinators to work directly with social services staff. When indicators of housing instability are identified, housing interventions are integrated directly into case management planning and services delivery.
Mainstream or community-based services system screens for housing instability and refers household to a collaborative partner for housing interventions, often continuing services delivery.
Mainstream or community-based services system screens for housing instability and refers household directly to a Housing Interventions Response Team comprised of collaborative partners, and often continuing services delivery.
Housing Safety Nets will vary greatly within diverse services systems, communities, and for specific target populations.
The Rationale for “Housing Coordinators”
A Housing Coordinator can work closely with services providers on a community level to help identify gaps in resources and services, improve coordination and collaboration, address barriers to accessing services, track outcomes of housing instability interventions, and identify areas to improve or build new partnerships.
Housing issues today are complex and require specialized knowledge and skills. Trained Housing Coordinators can provide information and support to staff interacting directly with clients/patients/students in those systems – or become the direct services provider to families experiencing housing instability.
The Place-Based Approach
The types of housing instability most prevalent in a particular community will help to direct the types of interventions to be implemented. Housing interventions depend, of course, on the housing issue being addressed.
Development of a place-based Response Matrix to help guide housing-related interventions can improve access to existing services and resources and begin to address gaps in services and resources.
Depending upon the specific focus of housing interventions, local resources and ervices, and the target populations to be served, a Housing Safety Net program prioritizes specific indicators of housing instability most relevant to a neighborhood, community or target population—while, at the same time, responding immediately to serious housing instability indicators that may arise
Housing Safety Nets also require the development of new staffing patterns within mainstream systems and collaboration within and across diverse sectors, as mainstream and community-based services systems become First Responders.
