Greater Hartford CAN Meeting 1/14/15

GREATER HARTFORD COORDINATED ACCESS NETWORK

Meeting Notes

January 14, 2015

In Attendance:

Rubi Alegria – Mercy Housing

Shannon Baldassario – MACC

Sandy Barry – Salvation Army Marshall House

Wendy Caruso- 211

Crane Cesario – DMHAS

Bryan Flint – Cornerstone

Rosemary Flowers- My Sisters’ Place

Mary Gillette- Mercy Housing

Ruby Givens-Hewitt- Salvation Army Marshall House

Mollie Greenwood – Journey Home

Amber Higgins - CHR

Donna Larcen – Charter Oak Cultural Center

Steve MacHattie – ImmaCare

Dalila May – Interval House

Philomena McGee- CHR

Matt Morgan – Journey Home

Pieter Nijssen – Tri-Town Shelter

Veronica Nixon – My Sisters’ Place

Roxan Noble – Chrysalis Center

Heather Pilarcik – South Park Inn

Patricia Pollicina – Chrysalis Center

Amy Robinson – CRT SSVF

Sara Salomons – CRT / Hartford COC

Barbara Shaw – Hands On Hartford

Kathy Shaw – My Sisters’ Place

Rob Soderberg – CHR

Sandra Terry - CRT

Tamara Womack – My Sisters’ Place

1.      Introductions & GH-CAN Meeting Notes for last week, 1/7/2015 (emailed)

2.      Updates:

a.      Assessment Appointment Schedule – Currently booked out until April 6^th

                                                              i.      This means that for someone who calls today, their appointment will be eleven weeks away from the time of their call. 

                                                            ii.      Our rate for booking out appears to be slowing.  At last week’s meeting we had booked out 14 days further from the previous meeting.  This week, we only booked out ten days of appointments since last week.   Although we still have a large volume of assessments scheduled, the rate at which we are scheduling appears to have slowed since the holidays.

                                                          iii.      As a reminder, when calling 211, you cannot press any of the prompts (3,1, or 8) until the recording has read you the prompt options.  If you are having difficulty getting through to 211, please contact Wendy Caruso at wendy.caruso@ctunitedway.org

b.      CA Data Quality Updates- DQ information is now available to staff

                                                              i.      Everyone received a CA HMIS guide which outlined the steps to processing referrals in the CA HMIS system.  The last page of this document outlined how to check data quality, and make sure that all referrals from 211 to the GH CAN were processed fully.

                                                            ii.      This guide is available here: https://docs.google.com/document/d/1eVuvfBpm9JqM7ts7O7LaIwDSm2QUq1QrRZXTVJnm4iE/edit?usp=sharing

                                                          iii.      As a point of clarification, for our CAN the only outcomes after an appointment are Diverted, Enrolled, and No-Show.  Enrolled means that a client is accepted into our CAN for shelter tonight.  If they stay somewhere other than one of our shelters, even if it is only temporary, their outcome should be recorded as diverted.  

                                                           iv.      We discussed the importance of checking for duplicates whenever someone is entering a client into HMIS.  211 checks for duplicates, but it is not always clear if the client already has a record in HMIS.  If any staff finds duplicate records for a client, they should contact Nutmeg and request that the duplicate IDs be merged.

c.       CAN HMIS Training – Next Training is February 12^th.  Register for this training on www.cthmis.com/events/training  

                                                              i.      We had hoped that there would be spots available in the New Haven training for our staff to fill, but there were no openings.  Right now our CAN has 20 staff that has requested training.  The next training that has been posted is February 12^th.

d.      Updates: Discharges from Shelter- Last week the DSC group decided that when a client reached the end of their length of stay, they would be directed to call 211 to locate an available shelter bed.

                                                              i.      The goal of this decision was to empower the clients to take responsibility for the next place that they would stay.  Historically, at some shelters if a client had reached the end of their length of stay, and extensions were not possible, clients would have to call around to all different shelters.  Now, we are asking that they call 211, explain that they have already had an appointment, but need to find shelter tonight.

                                                            ii.      One issue that shelters have begun to notice is people using 211 to shelter-hop.  If a client does not agree with a case manager, or shelter policies, they will call 211 and try to locate shelter.  In the past, clients had to call around to every shelter, but now with the new 211 and triage system, clients only need to make one phone call to locate availability.  This is an issue that we need to discuss on a statewide level. 

e.      HMIS Downtime due to New Haven Conversion – HMIS will be down from Friday 1/16 until Wednesday 1/21. 

                                                              i.      New Haven’s HMIS system is undergoing a conversion.  HMIS will be down over the holiday weekend and on Tuesday to convert New Haven to the statewide HMIS system.  All HMIS data will need to be collected on paper, and put into HMIS later.  Assessment sites will need to review their appointment schedules before the system goes down.

                                                            ii.      Paper copies of HMIS intake forms are available here: http://www.cthmis.com/files/file_category/category/getting_started_with_hmis/

f.        VI-SPDAT Master List- In preparation for PIT, we want to develop a community-wide master list of scores

                                                              i.      Journey Home is working to collect all VI-SPDATs where the score has not yet been input into the UHA.  It will be possible for CA HMIS to give us a report for all the VI-SPDAT scores from assessment appointments, but we know more VI-SPDATs have been completed.

                                                            ii.      For all shelters that VI-SPDATed their clients prior to CAN going live, we need to collect that information for this centralized list.

g.      Airport Updates- New information from Sara Salomons

                                                              i.      Sara was contacted by the deputy director of landside operations, and was thanked for our visit last week.  He took a head-count on Tuesday night, and there were 17 people staying at the airport.  Airport staff is still trying to figure out how to implement their no-trespassing policy.  A suggestion was for us to go up there after the PIT count for 5 nights in a row.  Instead of a one-time visit, we might be able to have a larger presence and explain the changes that are coming.

h.      PIT Training - at CRT, 555 Windsor St., Hartford.  Training will be on January 21st from 10-12 am or 1-3 pm.  There will be no GH CAN Meeting Next Week.

                                                              i.      This is not the volunteer training, it is a training for all staff who will be participating in PIT.  You only need to attend one session.

1.      The volunteer training will be held Thursday, January 22^nd from 5:30-7:30 at the Lyceum and Monday, January 26^th from 5:30-7:30 at the Lumsden Center, at CRT.  Additionally, the volunteer training for sheltered PIT is Wednesday January 28^th from 5:30-7:30 PM.

                                                            ii.      In addition to the regular Point in Time count this year, there will also be a youth count, which hopes to identify runaway and homeless youth.  The definition is broader for the youth count than for the regular PIT count.  The youth count includes people who are under 24 years old, and includes couch-surfing.  We are partnering with local schools to work on the count planning.  If any shelters have clients who are unaccompanied, under 24 years old, Matt has a survey for those clients.

i.        PIT Unsheltered Outreach Meeting -  Tuesday, January 20^th at 10:30 AM at Journey Home

                                                              i.      Homeless outreach staff should attend this meeting.

j.        100 Day Rapid Results Campaign- It will be important to have people on the ground, and frontline providers involved in the upcoming campaign.

                                                              i.      If anyone is interested in participating in this campaign’s implementation, talk to your supervisors, and talk to Matt and Crane. 

3.      Working Groups:

a.      Duty Services Coordinators:

                                                              i.      Feedback for the system

1.      We discussed the continuing concerns about people coming to appointments who are not literally homeless.

2.      We also discussed the increasing problem of clients who are using the new 211 system to shelter-hop.  We need to all continue the same message that we are not a right-to-shelter state, and we don’t have the resources to offer multiple bed options.

3.      We also discussed safety concerns of DV shelters who have to send people through the GH CAN.  This is an issue that needs statewide attention, because in some cases it might be important for DV shelters to refer people to different CANs for services, because of safety concerns.

4.      We also discussed the importance of updating the Google Document daily.

5.      We finally discussed different length of suspensions at shelters, or how long until clients can return somewhere they have stayed in the past.  Shelters have varied policies about this. 

b.      Housing Referral Group:

                                                              i.      As a reminder, please complete the Housing Availability Report online whenever you have a unit that will become available.  You can access the Housing Availability Report here: https://docs.google.com/a/journeyhomect.org/forms/d/1G4L9g2IMkah_-ROMAi1BHD9_rr8CfoDWG8Yfzu4iBYI/viewform

1.      We need to decide what the length of time should be between when a client fills out a Housing Availability Report and when we will match a client with housing. 

                                                            ii.      Interim Housing Plan – Using the VI-SPDAT reports, we have located the top 4 known VI-SPDAT scores for review.

1.      We looked at the top VI-SPDAT scores that have already been entered into the UHA.  Some of these applications have not been updated for a while, so we needed to try and locate the clients.  With input from shelter staff, we were able to identify the location of 3 clients. 

                                                          iii.      Reminder: In the UHA, once a client is housed, housing programs should change their housing status.

4.      ANNOUNCEMENTS

GH CAN Coordinators:

Matt Morgan, Journey Home     matt.morgan@journeyhomect.org 

Crane W Cesario, CRMHC – DMHAS    crane.cesario@ct.gov