GH CAN Operations 7/13/16

Greater Hartford Coordinated Access Network

Operations Committee

Wednesday, July 13^th, 2016

1.      Welcome and Introductions

·        Janet Bermudez – Hands on Hartford

·        Cordelia Brady – The Open Hearth

·        Crane Cesario – DMHAS

·        Marcel Cicero – CRT East Hartford Shelter

·        Stephanie Corbin – Community Health Network

·        Tylon Crump – CRT McKinney Shelter

·        Catherine Damato – CRT

·        Ruby Givens-Hewitt - My Sisters’ Place

·        Tenesha Grant – Mercy Housing

·        Mark Jenkins – Blue Hills Civic Association

·        Cynthia Lazore – Chrysalis Center

·        Roxan Noble – Chrysalis Center

·        John Oliver – Chrysalis Center

·        Chris Robinson – Chrysalis Center

·        Amy Robinson – VA

·        Camille Roach – Salvation Army Marshall House

·        Sandra Terry – CRT

·        Kelly Gonzalez – CRT

·        Alicia Akers – CRT

·        Je’Naya King – CHR

·        Yolanda Potter – Mercy Housing

·        Wendy Walker – CRT McKinney Shelter

·        Angel Fernandez – The Open Hearth

·        Rochelle Currie – The Connection

·        Albert Arnold – Chrysalis Center

·        Ymonne Wilson – CRT

·        Iesha Lopez – CRT McKinney Shelter

2.      Zero: 2016 Updates – see p. 2

a.      Recently Housed Clients – Tenesha Grant –

               4 people housed since last CAN meeting

3.      Diversion Center at Mercy Housing and Shelter – Yolanda Potter –

a.      The Diversion Center is up and running. First day was hectic and busy. Pretty slow on 2^nd day, by week 2 on Monday, they were swamped. 6 people waiting before Ruby even punched in to the building. Someone from SHP come down to start CAN assessments. It’s been like that the past 3 days. 211 scheduling and Hands on Hartford assessments also made it busy. Big thing that changed with the opening of the diversion center is the assessment schedule. First time in GH in the city that we have full coverage Monday-Friday. In the past we had gaps, had days where nobody was doing drop in times for single men or families. New diversion center is somewhere for folks to go Monday-Friday

b.       211 is directing people who are homeless in the past to the shelters, add to the waitlist if they’re looking to get re-added. People who haven’t been homeless in the past to go to diversion center to do robust diverting. In the past there was an issue for single men because no coverage for Mondays or Fridays so if they called Thursday night they would have to wait until Tuesday. Thank you, for the last meeting a lot of people stepped up and volunteered their staff for people calling weekends. Special shout out to EHFS, McKinney, The YWCA, Mark and Amy. Any issues with assessment?

c.      Rubi said if they had a CAN assessment before it won’t let them change outcome. Cordelia asked a question about assessments that weren’t closed and linked to their agency. Question sent to nutmeg before and thought it was fixed but it hasn’t been.

d.      If you’re cleaning out assessments and see errors from the past, keep track of the HMIS IDs to send to Nutmeg to dig. Is the assumption they’re all no shows? Yes, about 98% of the time it’s a no-show. Camille asked if we’re getting more program guidance since a lot of programs closed. Guide of what’s still around and what closed. Any programs you know that relate to housing, send to JH so we can send to everyone.

e.      Everyone that does CAN assessments, planning an email for meeting to get everyone together. If your agency does CAN appointments, we need someone to be there with us or at least call in. Want to pull all CAN assessment people together for troubleshooting and how to figure the process better.

4.      SmartSheets Policies and Procedures – Steve Hurley

a.      End User Agreements

               Process Guide for Shelter Waitlist – Certain situations that happen with clients that no one can be prepared for. Most popular situations of when someone doesn’t know what         to do or when the client doesn’t know what to do.

b.      Quick sheet people can look at and reference. If someone calls in this situation, what are the next steps for this household? Make sure we’re giving out same information to people.

c.      End User Agreements – Duty service coordinators, End users need to complete. Yesterday’s mass email was not the latest version. If you completed it yesterday, please complete new form. Form is for security. Make sure everyone is on same page about expectations. Keep end user agreements on file for clarity.

d.       One more change for the shelter waitlist that just got discussed in leadership relating to guidance from USICH on how to reach functional zero. Couple of things we need to do to make sure we’re serving the chronically homeless is to prioritize chronic homeless clients for shelter beds. Suggestion that leadership agreed is to have chronically homeless be a tiebreaker for priorities. New section on the Smart Sheet to determine if client is chronic or not.

                                                    i.     Tylon asked who’s going to be looking to see if the client is chronic. Mollie said they’re asking duty service coordinators to input it in the CAN assessments but Steve and Lisa will be doing oversight. Cordelia asked for assistance with the by name list and how to view and Mollie said they can bring it up in CAN meeting. Wendy asked for screen shots of how to access by name list.

5.      Section 8 Housing Choice Voucher – Application Forms – Matt Morgan

a.      The City of Hartford has created a preference in Section 8 program for individuals who are in PSH who want to move on with a voucher or who are chronically homeless and not yet housed. Announcement will come out this Friday or Monday for this opening. Will go out in the newspaper. City of Hartford is opening sec 8 vouchers exclusively for chronically homeless. If you have someone in PSH, you may have marked them green or yellow. Green meaning this person doesn’t need case management services and could do fine if they didn’t have services. Best target in this program is getting those individuals in the program.

                                                    i.     If it’s a scattered site program, may be able to stay where they are. May be able to transfer section 8 housing choice voucher. They could move anywhere in the country. What we’re hoping for is, 80 people identified in supportive housing program to move to HCV to reopen 80 slots in PSH for chronically homeless clients. May be some people on the current list of chronically homeless who would do fine without services who may be a good candidate for this program. Journey home is happy to help, bring them to office to assist. Ideally if you can fill it out with them, bring it to us with their documents. Can’t do anything until next Friday (day they open the list).

b.      Journey home is estimating 10-20 turnover per month that would be available. 60 applications all at once, can only go 10-20 people. Same prioritization as the CAN except for those who are already in PSH. Marcel asked what’s the difference for people in PSH for 8 years and those who are in the TLP for 2 years? Crane said they have to be chronic. Once we get through all the chronics, we can look at non-chronics. Not lottery type, not first come first served for chronic… those in PSH are first come first served. Everyone else is CAN prioritization. Only geographic limitation is that it needs to go through GH CAN. Cynthia said they have someone in PSH in East Hartford that may qualify. Population is eligible for those 10-20 vouchers a month, people in PSH who don’t need services or people who are chronically homeless not housed who don’t need services. Really need to push enough people in PSH who are ready to move on. One big thing for Section 8 is “are you illegally using drugs or current substance abuse?” – We had about 15 identified from the chronic clients’ case conference. No felonies in the last 3 years. No drug related offenses. If client had substance abuse problem in the past, in recovery, completed program, may make exceptions. Make sure they know eligibility.

6. VI-SPDAT Policy – When to Complete – Mollie Greenwood

7. DOH Policy for Coordinated Exit Matching – Kara Capobianco

c.      Rapid ReHousing Override Form- They will be going top down for Rapid Rehousing Referrals and it will only be through the Coordinated Exit housing matching meetings. No more Google Doc. If they are accepting a referral for someone who doesn’t score in RRH range, this override form will need to be completed. Tylon asked when and having people lined up for RRH. He said it might get hectic if he has 15 and someone else has 15. Lisa said they are considering having the hosing matching meetings in person, biweekly, alternating between conference calls and meeting in person. More info will be provided once we get more definite times and locations.

Clients In Other Regions – Lisa Quach – Form will be used for clients who are InterCAN or churning so that we aren’t duplicating navigator’s efforts. Really need to make sure clients designate the CAN they want to live in so that we can make sure we know who we need to house or if they’re just in Greater Hartford temporarily.

8. Announcements:

d.      There are still openings in CCEH’s upcoming Diversion Trainings – register at cceh.org

e.      There are still openings in Journey Home’s upcoming CAN Trainings- email Mollie.Greenwood@journeyhomect.org to register for this training