Chattanooga, TN, Agency Partners with Local Faith Community

Churches, temples, mosques and other faith communities are the source of caring community members, and their help can go a long way towards augmenting local agencies’ programs. The Chattanooga Regional Homeless Coalition (CRHC) has experienced great success incorporating local churches into their Housing First model. The faith community’s donations, both of their time and resources, have proved an effective alternative to expensive to implement interventions. This initiative, which focused on a tent community with 27 residents, combines the efforts of the churches and agencies that provide primary health care, mental healthcare and housing services. Tent city residents had been homeless average of three years and five months, and none had been connected to traditional homeless services. Here’s how the imitative works:

• A representative form Mustard Tree Ministries, a faith-based group which ministered to all residents of the tent community, announced the opportunity to access services and distributed an intake survey, which was completed by all interested parties.


• CRHC social workers reviewed the surveys to identify each individuals’ needs and connected each person to corresponding services, such as obtaining identification, and mental health and primary healthcare services. CRHC staff and volunteers helped individuals apply for benefits, rental assistance and other housing supports.


• Individuals searched for housing, either with the help of church volunteers or on their own. A network of five landlords and two property management companies provided housing options for those who faced significant barriers to obtaining housing.


• Each household received a Church group sponsor; the sponsors donating furniture and house wares, and coordinating move-in dates and transportation


• Church sponsors provided social support by getting to know the residents through a mentorship program: mentors provide encouragement and listen to clients’ concerns, and help clients acclimate to the change from the activities needed to survive on the streets to the responsibilities of maintaining housing. If a volunteer notices a need, he or she can contact the Coalition social worker for support.


• Clients do not need to attend church to receive assistance from church volunteers


• Initiative success: of the 27 individuals living in the tent city, 70% were housed within the first 30 days of the program and 89% within the first 60 days. The program kicked off around Thanksgiving, and since then 24 have entered housing, and three are in temporary housing and are approved for vouchers.

CRHC will follow these 27 individuals for 12 months to monitor the program’s long term outcomes.

Mary Simons (pictured), Executive Director of Chattanooga Regional Homeless Coalition, makes the following recommendations:

• Sunday school/Bible study classes have been very receptive to helping – each group or class can work together as a unit


• Ask each group/class what they’d like to do and fit it into the program (instead of mandating what they must do)


• Let group/class members know that this is a great way to connect to members of the community and that they will learn a lot from the experience as well.

Chattanooga Regional Homeless Coalition plans to implement a similar model with an additional 14 homeless individuals.

Reducing Recidivism through Relationship-Based Care

For agencies working with individuals reentering the community after incarceration, a significant challenge is breaking the cycle of recidivism. To address this challenge, Hialeah, Florida-based Citrus Health Network, which provides mental health and primary care services and also assists individuals with accessing housing, adopted a relationship-based model of care, which is proving to have significant success. Manuel Sarria (pictured above) of Citrus Health Network has done research of the programs efficacy and found this model is proven successful in creating strong relationships between client and service providers.

• The relationship-based care model operates on the premise that healthy relationship qualities such as respect, connectedness, and empathy, are important to engaging individuals in therapy and empowering them to take responsibility for their lives


• This model uses motivational therapy techniques, including expressing empathy and indirectly confronting clients by helping them see the discrepancy between their aspirations and current situation


• Clients must be included in the intervention-development discussion
  

Here’s how it looks in practice

• Stage One: During the engagement process, motivational interviewing techniques establish the foundation


• Stage Two: Clients begin to feel secure and safe, leading to greater stability and commitment and stronger relationships with staff - It is not uncommon for individuals to remain in the second stage; however, those who progress beyond stage two were more likely to experience long-term positive outcomes


• Stage Three: Clients have an “awakening” and experience a desire for more than just meeting their basic needs


• Stage Four: client maintains stability, shows signs of psychological flourishing, practices new adaptive behaviors and is ready to transition to independent living


• Access to mental health and primary care must be a priority

This model is best suited for agencies that, like Citrus Health Network, provide integrated care: primary care, mental healthcare and housing services. Integrated services allow for easier care coordination and effective clinical staffing sessions.

Positive Change for a Lifetime in Alabama - by Shamiso Zisengwe

You can wait on the world to change or you can be the change the world has been waiting to see. Brenda Allen realized that she had to make a change in her life and the lives of others. From working with men in parole, treatment facilities and therapeutic programs, she realized that there was nothing for women. “God had given her a plan” and that was to found a facility focused on women. Her idea was to bring women together from all different cultures, backgrounds and ethnicities, and that is how Life Time Resolutions (LTR) began.

Life Time Resolutions “envisions a troubled woman as a lotus flower” and she starts off at the bottom and continues to grow to the surface to become a beautiful flower. Ms. Allen sees all the women that come to LTR as lotus flowers and by the time they graduate from the program they are “beautiful, beautiful, beautiful flowers,” that have opened up into new life. Life Time Resolutions is a place where women get back what they have lost. They are given opportunities to regain custody of their children and become a family again.

Life Time Resolutions provides supportive housing and clinical services. There is also a unit devoted to the mothers and children ages 5 and younger. The clinical unit focuses on family therapy, domestic violence, sexual trauma and drug addiction. Within the community they also offer a GED program, computer lab, job placement, and community involvement opportunitites.

Ms. Allen does not have a waiting list yet, but Life Time Resolutions community continues to grow. Whenever there is an empty bed a person is assured a place to stay. Women who are accepted into the program range from ages 18 to 74 along with children 5 years old and younger. Children over the age of five are allowed visits. Life Time Resolutions is located in Montgomery, AL, and continues to “strive to make itself one of a kind.”

Ms. Allen participated in the Innovations Forum 2012 in Atlanta at the end of February as a panelist for “Innovations in Ending Homelessness for Women,” along with panelists from Mississippi, Louisiana and Georgia.

For more information, visit http://lifetime-resolutions.com/The-Visionary.html.

Embracing Innovation in the South

Last week, the Georgia Alliance to End Homelessness and United Way held a forum on “innovation,” a topic that is not common in the nonprofit world. Keynote speakers included David Wertheimer, Deputy Director at the Gates Foundation, Anne Miskey, Executive Director of Funders Together, Anthony Love, Deputy Director of the United State Interagency Council on Homelessness, and Nan Roman, President & CEO of the National Alliance to End Homelessness. They participated in a lively discussion on innovation in ending homelessness.

Over 35 homelessness experts from more than 10 states discussed their innovative ideas and practices in workshops about rapid re-housing, veterans, creative housing options for difficult populations, regional plans, social enterprise, and much more.

In addition, 27 experts participated in a southern collaborative roundtable discussion about future plans to work together in the southern region to end homelessness. The following recommendations were made:

· Supporting a blog with positive stories

· Connecting and advocating around policy affecting homelessness issues in our region

· Create a brand for the region

· Coordinate a funding initiative for a special demonstration project across a few states in the region

They plan to reconvene at a conference in Clearwater, FL, in September of this year.

Do you have any thoughts or ideas to add? Comment here or email ktemple@unitedwayatlanta.org.