GH CAN Leadership Meeting - May 19, 2021

 

GREATER HARTFORD COORDINATED ACCESS NETWORK MEETING AGENDA

Wednesday, May 19^th, 2021 via Zoom

 1PM – 2:15PM

 

1.       Welcome and Introductions – 5 minutes

2.       ImmaCare Triage Proposal – Matt Morgan/ Rebekah Lyas – 10 minutes

a.       For individual men. Would like to extend it beyond cold weather time.

b.       Initial site for individual men.

c.       20 beds would be triage beds, will accept from outreach and diversion referrals. If beds fill up will keep a list and call those who are on the list. Will refer to fulltime beds as well. Will refer to SPI, Cornerstone, and McKinney. Will be first come basis process. Will notify CAN of who is coming in and going. Shelter can be refused if they have been suspended from a shelter. Would like to start the suspension list again (SmartSheet). Individuals can only decline a shelter if they have had a traumatic event, would need proof from location.  Suspensions are a minimum of 30 days but can do 14 days.

d.       Will look into planning call with other shelters to discuss clients who might be difficult.

e.       Outreach connects folks as best as possible. This allows outreach to be effective.

f.        Will be tracked on who gets referred. Case management will be provided for triage clients, same level of case management. Housing plan will follow the client to the shelter they go to for open beds.

g.       If approved will start clearing out beds. Once a bed becomes available then triage will start.

h.       does this completely replace vulnerability-based prioritization? Will be same priority group, outreach will call and make referrals.

i.         If 20 ImmaCare beds are allocated for triage, are we low on full beds? Will not be fast movement for triage beds. Will not change overall capacity.

j.         DOH is looking into when shelters will go back to full capacity.

k.       What about a women’s triage center? Would like to see how it goes with men. Not sure if there is a need for triage for women right now. – to be discussed further.

l.         Is there an unofficial policy for clients with significant income & low service need don't get transferred to year-round beds so we can divert them? We can use rapid exit to get these folks out and refer them to GBHI for 6-9 months of services. I know SAMH has been doing this with families so if we can do it with individuals it might create more outflow. Rebekah, do you intend on using existing Smartsheets to track triage? Will use existing SmartSheets. Will put in an official policy, and will implement. – to be discussed further.

m.     CAN is supportive of the triage services.

3.       Salvation Army Triage Services – Lisa Cretella – 10 minutes

a.       For families

b.       SA has run a triage model since overflow has closed. Extended funding through triage. 4:30 to 9:30pm. 5 rooms available.

c.       4:30 to 9:30pm - 211 will call triage and triage will complete intake. Families can stay until 7am, after 7am the floor is closed. Room can be used when diverting the family.

d.       Family triage call will discuss year round shelter and diversion for families.

e.       If they do not show for one night, they will need to go through the process again

f.        29 outreach referrals since overflow has closed

g.       Adds additional capacity.

h.       All diversion specialist meet every morning via Zoom and case conference all families. Helpful to have this meeting.

i.         Will need to identify additional funds for this program for families at SA. Will look into funds that are available – Matt will reach out to Lisa C.

j.         CAN is supportive of the triage services.

4.       No Freeze Shelter Service – Matt Morgan – 10 minutes

a.       City of Hartford put out an RFP for a no freeze program. Due June 6^th or the 8^th.

b.       GHHRC has looked into the RFP.

5.       Update on SmartSheet Pending Referrals for Youth, Individuals, and Families – 5 minutes – Lisa Quach

a.       Has been rolled out.

6.       COVID – 19 Agency Updates and ESG Updates – 20 minutes

a.       Updates/Vaccinations

7.       Future Agenda Items or Additional Announcements – 1 minute

a.    CT BOS CoC – 2021 Request for PSH & Joint TH/RRH Proposal – applications due 6/2/2021 HUD COC Application – Connecticut Balance of State (ctbos.org)

                                          i.    Cornerstone will also be looking into it and considering it.

                                         ii.    SPI and Mercy is also interested.

b.    Conflict Mediation training – in June 16, 23, and 30th between 9 and 1 PM, Hartford has 27 slots. Please email Lisa and Sofina if anyone is interested., by Monday 5/24/2021. 

GH CAN Leadership Meeting: May 5, 2021

 

GREATER HARTFORD COORDINATED ACCESS NETWORK MEETING AGENDA

Wednesday, May 5^th, 2021 via Zoom

 1PM – 2:15PM

 

1.       Welcome and Introductions – 5 minutes

2.       SmartSheet Pending Referrals for Youth, Individuals, and Families – 5 minutes – Lisa Quach

·         Pending referrals – matched to housing program, matched numbers have gone up weekly.

·         This sheet will provide efficiency for meetings.

·         Challenging pending referrals can still be discussed at meetings

·         If anyone needs access, please reach out to Nadine Malone

3.       American Rescue Funds Update – 5 minutes -  Matt Morgan

·         Letter and spreadsheet has been sent to group

·         CARES ACT Fund. Prevention has not been included in this document. Diversion, financial assistance, outreach and shelter have been included.

·         Winter shelter dollars have been included.

·         Vouchers are coming, services will be needed for vouchers

·         Governor proposed funds for affordable housing

·         Concern: Is there no ask around returning the shelter system to its pre-COVID capacity? (e.g., supporting replacement of the system's beds lost to decompression)

·         Concern: Outreach. Include homelessness in the plan.

·         Advocate for needs

·         In support of document. Any concerns, please email Matt and Chelsea Ross. Public hearing next week.

4.       Updates/ Next Steps on Accessing In-home Intensive Services and Accessing Higher Level of Care/Residential Treatment Programs – 20 minutes - Lisa Quach

a.       Updated google doc

 

5.       COVID – 19 Agency Updates and ESG Updates – 20 minutes

a.       Updates/Vaccinations

                                                               i.      Vaccinations are being provided twice a week by GHHRC. 10am to 2pm. Thursdays at Albany Ave. Open to providing vaccines onsite at other facilities. J&J is being provided.

                                                             ii.      Hotel has been tested, next week 2^nd round of Moderna vaccine at BWH.

b.       Partnership with Charter Oak Health Center

                                                               i.      Yolanda will be reaching out to schedule vaccines for clients. Vaccines will be at Charter Oak. Release needs to be signed.

6.       Future Agenda Items or Additional Announcements – 1 minute

a.       Trusted Messenger Forum – Wednesday, May 19^th at 9:30am

b.       NAEH Housing Focused Shelter Training to come soon

GH CAN Leadership Meeting 4/21/2021

 

GREATER HARTFORD COORDINATED ACCESS NETWORK MEETING AGENDA

Wednesday, April 21^st 2021 via Zoom

 1PM – 2:15PM

 

1.       Welcome and Introductions – 5 minutes

2.       COVID – 19 Agency Updates and ESG Updates – 20 minutes

a.       Updates/Vaccinations

                                                               i.      No major updates

                                                             ii.      List of those who have come into shelter/unsheltered if they have not been vaccinated, list will go to Charter Oak? Phone number and email if available. SPI and EH Shelter finds it helpful. Clients would need to go to Charter Oak, appointments will be set for vaccines.

                                                           iii.      Will Charter Oak report if a client has been vaccinated? Releases in place need to be placed for information to be retrieved. Releases can also be accessed on site, Yolanda schedules appointments. Matt will confirm release and report information with Yolanda.

                                                           iv.      Shelter is responsible for identifying hotel and food for client who tests positive for COVID. Challenge with unsheltered clients – verification has been difficult to identify. JH will discuss new plan for unsheltered clients. JH processes authorization but 211 is the main contact. Try to get rooms that allow smoking for those who need it.

                                                             v.      ESG updates – prevention change for entire state. Fridays will not have prevention appointments, will not have an impact on wait time. Fridays will be used for data entry.

3.       Vaccine Hesitancy Trainings – 5 minutes – Matt Morgan

a.       DPH trusted messenger forms. Would CAN like a forum around vaccines. Forum for staff members. Anyone interested in scheduling a forum for CAN, can answer questions. Unsure of length of session (to be determined). Useful for HOH, SPI, SA, and Cornertsone. Combined forum for Central and GH

4.       Definition of Brief – 5 minutes – Matt Morgan

a.       Rare, brief and non-reoccurring

b.       Reaching home campaign is working on drafting this and measuring the definition

c.       Prevention work group

d.       Definition – fewer than 30 days.

e.       HUD performance measure – measures enrollments in shelters and unsheltered time. This information is not calculated in CTCANDATA.

f.        Does this definition make sense?

                                                               i.      Makes sense to Cathy. Different measurements.

                                                             ii.      Barbara – 30 days is far out of reach

                                                           iii.      Working to reach a shorter goal

                                                           iv.      Match time including the documentation time – do we track the process of matching a client and completing housing? JH tracks trends.

                                                             v.      Documentation concern – commitment on how to address this. CHR – notify supervisors if a staff member is missing a document for a client.  

                                                           vi.      Nadine from JH has been tracking the information and asking for update status. Supervisors are looped in after a second attempt.

                                                          vii.      Uploads in HMIS – length of expirations date? HMIS has a glitch, not being able to show file. HMIS is best on Google Chrome.

5.       Length of Stay – 15 minutes – Lisa Quach 

a.       Bring to ops – discussion next month for strategies

6.       American Rescue Funds – 5 minutes -  Matt Morgan

a.       HSS and DPH funds – rescue funds. Similar to HUD home dollars. Home funds for capital projects. Are there capital improvement projects in mind? This funding is just for those who are experiencing homelessness.

b.       Can fund apartments/buildings that already exist, can also help with renovations.

c.       End date is in 2025- nothing in writing yet

d.       Funds for staffing

e.       Year round family triage

f.        Storage for furniture

g.       Day shelters

7.       Future Agenda Items or Additional Announcements – 1 minute

a.       GH Social Services/ Outreach Card – updates to be sent to Alexis Gaynor

b.      Next meeting we will discuss Higher Levels of Care next steps

GH CAN Leadership Meeting Notes 4/7/2021

 

GREATER HARTFORD COORDINATED ACCESS NETWORK MEETING AGENDA

Wednesday, April 7^th 2021 via Zoom

 1PM – 2:15PM

 

1.       Welcome and Introductions – 5 minutes

2.       Shelter Referrals – 10 minutes – Amanda Gordon

a.       Cold weather has ended on 4/1/2021. One hotel still open for a few individuals.

b.      Conversations with SAMH (Geri) and outreach workers. Family plan – outreach 7 days a week for families, able to verify those outdoors, extended triage (month now) will evaluate the need. Diversion specialist are entering outreach referral to locate family, triage is then called for a room, will determine if divertible or year round shelter beds. Off hours – 211 will report the family to outreach/triage. 211 will hotel family for the night if outreach is not available. Protocols will come soon.

c.       Will communicate with 211 and finalize protocols after 9:30pm.

d.      SAMH can possibly cover/extend hotel funding.

e.       Individuals – in the past had a priority list that was long. Goal this year is to minimize list. Need to verify unsheltered, only shelter those who are verified. Those who are paid for by 3^rd party, those coming out of institutions homeless before entering back in, will have immediate access to shelter beds if possible. Shelter bed availability will be used to track numbers of beds that are available. Shelter bed estimates the length of stay. Will continue to track in smart sheets.

f.        Efficiency to move into shelter – YWCA had a few beds that were open in the past few months.

g.       SPI having offline conversations about women beds about upper bunk – most women have refused top bunk beds. Should we add this to the referral/intake?

h.      Smaller group to meet and discuss needs/protocols for individuals. Reach out to Amanda.

3.       City of Hartford ESG Allocation FY 21-22 – 10 minutes -  Lionel Rigler

a.       Regular ESG funds not COVID. Formula determined every year. Related to HUD funding for emergency solution grants. Formula is based on total number of beds, census of 70 beds, gross number of permanent exits achieved. Do not have permanent exits from calendar year 2020 due to COVID, used numbers from 2019. Numbers were also based on the census. Census in sheet is Column D.

b.       Lionel will check the funding for ImmaCare.

c.       SPI received a reduction. Decrease was due to capacity decrease. Numbers decreased due to social distancing guidelines. Majority agree to use last year’s pre pandemic allocations so it’s not a decrease. Some will be an increase due to HUD increase.

d.       Anyone disagree reach out to Lionel by Thursday, 4/8.

e.       Next year – can look at performance.

4.       Documentation Readiness for Referrals/ Vacancies in the CAN – 10 minutes – Matt Morgan

a.       Documentation has been a barrier for some referrals

b.      Vacancies due to documents readiness

c.       HUD document readiness guidelines to be used – aimed to make low barrier

d.      Homeless verification – 45 days after client has been housed – need to confirm. The waiver has not been used by any of our programs yet.

e.       HUD waivers have been extended till June 30^th

f.        Referral times have been lengthy in the past few months

g.       List are filtered with disabling condition

h.      Crane has not been receiving ROI

i.        Referrals with no income should be also referred for openings if they are eligible without the income

j.        JH and SPI are working together to hire new housing search staff

k.       CCT release can be used to see if DV can be filled out for client

5.       COVID – 19 Agency Updates and ESG Updates – 20 minutes

1. ESG New Diversion and Rapid Exit Funds – Matt Morgan

                                                               i.      Funds through CCEH

                                                             ii.      Plenty of funding for Rapid Exits

                                                           iii.      In support of using the funds for Diversion assistance

2. New Protocol for COVID Positive Cases – 10 minutes -  Amanda Gordon

                                                               i.      Jan – March SPI offered space for COVID positive/ isolation, space is no longer available. Positive cases can for through CRC. We do not have a quarantine location. Proposal – JH can authorize hotel stay that shelter has identified, shelter to provide food to quarantine location. Outreach can also reach out for hotel stay for those unsheltered exposed/positive.

c.       Vaccination Fields now in HMIS– Matt Morgan

                                                               i.      New fields in COVID assessment. Can specify if they received vaccine, have not, or refused. Strong encouragement to enter in the data.

                                                             ii.      https://cceh.org/provider-resources/webinars/

d.       Updates/Vaccinations

                                                               i.      McKinney – first clinic of the month is today to test for COVID. J&J vaccine next week – only 60 doses are available.

                                                             ii.      GHHRC – will start vaccines twice a week on Tuesday at South Green 25-30 vaccines a day, Thursday at 557 Albany Ave site. Will determine where they need to go to target community we serve. Vaccine ambassador to schedule vaccines for clients and staff. Will distribute J&J.

6.       End of Cold Weather/Winter Updates – Lisa Cretella, Bryan Flint, Kara Capone, Mark Jenkins, and Emily Soucy, and Amanda Gordon– 15 minutes

a.       Lisa – keeping triage open for families. Families are still in overflow, anticipating movement.

b.       Mercy ended on 3/31.

c.       Mark has about 15 folks still in hotel.

d.       Cornerstone – first year! Served 38 people.

7.       Future Agenda Items or Additional Announcements – 1 minute

a.       CT CAN Entity – Matt Morgan or Amanda Gordon