USICH Blog
Improving Health, Well Being and Stability Archive
01/23/2013 - Aligning Assets Towards the Goal: A Blog from VA’s Tom O’Toole on the Homeless Patient Aligned Care Teams (HPACT)
The adage, “It takes a village” has been applied to lot of different efforts over the years to the point of over-use. However, when it comes to ending homelessness among Veterans by 2015, there is probably no 
better descriptor for what is needed and what is being done. Last year, as part of this effort, the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) launched an ambitious pilot project to develop Homeless Patient Aligned Care Teams (H-PACT) to provide comprehensive, wrap-around primary care coupled with homeless programming to help Veterans make the transition out of homelessness and to help keep them housed. This joint effort between the Office of Homeless Programs and Office of Primary Care Services funded 32 sites around the country located in a variety of settings, including Community Resource and Referral Centers (easy access community- based centers), VA outpatient clinics (community-based outpatient clinics) and within VA Medical Centers. These are sites where we see homeless Veterans struggling to subsist, where they often find themselves cycling through the system dealing with the consequences of their homelessness in emergency departments and hospital wards, and where we have the resources in place to make a difference.
11/20/2012 - Keeping the Momentum for Ending Youth Homelessness: Reflections from Indianapolis and Beyond
Last week, the Family Youth Services Bureau of HHS’s Administration on Children, Youth, and Families hosted two days of training and workshops on addressing youth homelessness at the National Runaway and Homeless Youth Grantee Conference. More than 550 participants from around the country met in Indianapolis to share knowledge and learn from others as we work together to end youth homelessness by 2020.
The Runaway and Homeless Youth (RHY) provider community has thoroughly embraced the Opening Doors goal to end youth homelessness by 2020. The goal was mentioned throughout conference workshops, it was written in conference materials, and in the hallways of the hotel I heard this goal in discussions among providers, administrators, and policy professionals. It is inspiring to see the resounding commitment and enthusiasm for this ambitious goal has spread outside of Washington, DC and into communities throughout the country.
Given the momentum we have gained from Opening Doors and the USICH Framework to End Youth Homelessness, the RHY conference was ripe with opportunity to build more commitment and enthusiasm for the work ahead. The USICH Framework to End Youth Homelessness held a prominent spot on the conference agenda at a luncheon keynote session. Jennifer Ho provided an energetic keynote address about ending youth homelessness. She discussed two complementary strategies—getting better data on youth and building service capacity—included in the Youth Framework and explained why these strategies are important to our goal of ending youth homelessness.
10/23/2012 - How We’ve Made Progress: Valley of the Sun United Way Shares Their Journey
Valley of the Sun United Way has come a long way in four years. Together, with partners in the public, private, and nonprofit
sectors, we have set ambitious yet achievable goals and have made progress towards the one big goal: ending homelessness in the Maricopa County region. By taking a look at our milestones and key actions throughout the past four years, we identified strategies that have worked for us, and we believe can work for other United Ways or community-wide partnerships across the country.
Take a look.
10/19/2012 - What We’re Talking About: The Week at USICH - October 15-19
Los Angeles County Makes a Smart Move for Ex-Offenders 
As noted in the most recent USICH newsletter, the importance of connecting ex-offenders to safe, stable housing is a key element in successful reentry. In a few months, Los Angeles County Housing Authority, will allow ex-offenders on parole or probation who are also experiencing homelessness to be eligible for vouchers under the long-running homeless set-aside. This move will enable access to the nearly 22,000 vouchers for ex-offenders who are experiencing homelessness – a large group of individuals in Los Angeles County and individuals who face many barriers to housing stability.
The Los Angeles Times notes the importance of this change
Interested in reentry issues like this one? Take a look at our newsletter
10/12/2012 - What We’re Talking About: The Week at USICH - October 8-12
Lessons from Rapid Results Bootcamp Success 
The work of the Rapid Results Bootcamps continues to create a buzz among communities involved in the bootcamps as well as national leaders in innovative solutions to complex problems. The Harvard Business Review posted a blog this week about the underlying principles of how the bootcamps work, their success, and what other corporate and social organizations can learn from this effort. The authors highlight the concepts of mobilizing an ecosystem, having a common goal, and harnessing the power of peer pressure and support as lessons to be drawn from this work.
Learn more about those lessons here
Last week another bootcamp was held in Denver, this time with participation from six communities. Look for a blog post from one of the USICH National Programs team on this event soon!
Photo courtesy of 100,000 Homes
10/03/2012 - Keep an Eye on Portland, Oregon: The New Coordinated Care Organization
"Big systems change requires big systems to change."
That's what the Chief Medical Officer for Health Share of Oregon told me was the approach to change that the new Coordinated Care Organization, created out of the State of Oregon's health reform plan, needed to take. I had a chance to meet leaders in this effort when I travelled to Portland September 19. One change that was visible was who was at the table. Big hospital systems are pairing up with nonprofits that have been delivering care on the streets and at community clinics, hoping to learn from the work that organizations like Central City Concern have been doing for years. One of the premises of health homes and accountable care organizations, called Coordinated Care Organizations in Oregon, is that the only way to achieve the "triple aim" of health reform that is, better care, better health, and lower costs, is to change the whole approach to patient care. That can start with big systems like hospitals and their data about who has multiple hospital admissions or many trips to the emergency room. And it also has to start with actual patient care.
08/06/2012 - The Siemer Institute on Family Stability: Maintaining Housing Stability to Ensure Academic Success
One of the most detrimental trends affecting a student’s ability to succeed in the classroom happens outside of school walls. When parents or guardians are struggling to make ends meet financially or shifting housing locations due to work, the children involved are often forced to move from one school to another and then another and so on. This constant mobility is disruptive, making it difficult for a child to feel connected to a school, to make connections with new friends, to be accepted socially, but most importantly, to stay on target academically. The Siemer Institute for Family Stability (SIFS) headquartered at the United Way of Central Ohio is responding to the challenge.
07/27/2012 - What We’re Talking About: The Week at USICH - July 23-27, 2012
What We're Talking About is a new weekly column from USICH Communications on the topics and issues in the news and on our minds. Topics range from international and national conferences, news from around the country, innovative work to highlight, and more. We look forward to catching you up news you may have missed and connect you to articles and resources.
This week the International AIDS Conference was in Washington, DC for the first time in 22 years, shining a spotlight on HIV/AIDS both in America and around the world. For us at USICH, this conference also pointed to the topic of housing instability and homelessness among those with HIV/AIDS in America. There are more than 1 million people in the United States currently living with HIV/AIDS, and for those with low incomes or experiencing homelessness, managing the disease is complicated and expensive...
06/04/2012 - What will it take to end family homelessness?
For those who ask me to describe the face of family homelessness, I often recommend they start by looking into a mirror. 
Whether from an act of nature or recession-era unemployment and mortgage foreclosures – even the more fortunate among us could find ourselves homeless tomorrow. Although a host of different factors can catapult a family into crisis, we know some families are more at risk than others. More than 80% of homeless families are headed by single parents, and more than 80% of these parents are women. Most have young children. Families of color are at disproportional risk. These characteristics suggest poverty is, of course, at the root of family homelessness – single mothers, particularly those with limited educations and skills – find themselves at the bottom of the economic ladder, often not able to keep their families housed with the income generated by one wage earner working minimum wage.
However, poverty and the lack of sufficient financial capital is only one of the roots of homelessness.
05/30/2012 - Checklist: Ten Principles of Care for Families and Children Experiencing Homelessness
According to America’s Youngest Outcasts 2010, a report by The National Center on Family Homelessness, more than 1.6 million, or one in 45 children in America, experience homelessness each year. Family homelessness is increasing in all parts of the country and families represent an ever growing sub-set of the overall homeless population. 
Most homeless families have experienced extreme poverty and violence, have been unstably housed, and have limited education and work histories. Service providers can better serve homeless families and help mitigate the devastating impact of homelessness by implementing ten basic principles of care. Does your organization implement these principles when serving homeless children and families?
