# Presentation: 504744

## State of Georgia

- Homeless Action Plan to End Chronic Homelessness in Ten Years

- Paul Bolster, President
- Saint Joseph’s Mercy Care Services

## Members

- Terry Ball, Division Director, DCA
- Juanita Blount Clark, Division Director, DHR
- Karl Schwarzkopf, Division Director, DHR
- Mark Trail, Division Director, DCH
- Scott Federking, Division Director, OPB
- William Riley, Judge, Atlanta Community Court

- Earnestine Pittman, Executive Director, Fulton Regional Mental Health, DHR
- Craig Burnett, Ed.D. Director, VA, Challenge
- E. Wayne Bland, Director, Recovery Place, Savannah
- Paul Bolster, non-profit service provider
- Katheryn Preston, Director, Georgia Coalition

## “A Plan not a Dream: How to End Homelessness in Ten Years”National Alliance to End Homelessness

- Small # who don’t find their way back
- Suffer from physical and mental illness
- “Frequent Flyers” – High users of public services

- Policy Framework

**Notes:**
Courts public hospitals mental health institutions.

## Solutions

- Supportive Housing
- Discharge Policy from Mainstream Services
- Open the back door and close the front door
- Invest public dollars differently – spend to create savings

## Case Study: Kenneth C

- Suffered from depression—repeated suicide attempts
- 58 mental hospital admissions
- Now housed and stable –SSI—Shelter Plus Care at $7.50/day
- Compared to Atlanta costs—Mental Health Hospital $287/day; Grady Psychiatric $630/day; Atlanta Jail $54/day

## First Steps 

- Cost benefit analysis on Georgia supportive housing - OPB
- Re-affirm the Interagency Homeless Coordination Council-Executive Order
- Pursue federal funding
- Improve access to mainstream programs
- Improve discharge policy
- Recommend implementation steps
- Reconvene the Planning Team to review in June

## Goal One: Access to Mainstream Support

- Use Web-based technology for in-take
- Study the barriers and find solutions
- New SSI eligibility workers—case workers
- 30 vacant positions
- Identify state $ match for Medicaid
- Place eligibility workers with service providers

## Goal Two: More Supportive Housing

- Memorandum of Agreement between departments producing housing and those producing services
- Require referral arrangements between state agencies and state funded non-profits

## Goal Three: State Policies to End Homeless Discharge

- Asked OPB to recommend guidelines for departments
- Punt

## Goal Four: Develop a Local Planning Model

- Identified critical collaborative partners
- Training workshops for community planning
- Community Recognition

## Engage State Leadership

- Present the Plan to the Commissioners of the three key departments
- Presentation to the Governor
- Re-affirm the functions of the Georgia Interagency Homeless Coordination Council
- Comprehensive Data Analysis
- Annual Georgia Homeless Status Report
- OPB Cost Benefit Analysis – cost of 1600 units of permanent supportive housing

## Goal 6: Funding—Not This Year, But...

- Increase the capacity of the State Housing Trust Fund
- Match for new SSI eligibility workers
- ID resources of Homeless Recuperative Centers—Healing from acute illness
- Use Housing Authority Project-based Section 8 for supportive housing
- Expand Shelter plus Care in HUD continuum plan

## Goal 6: Continued

- Aggressively pursue all available federal funds in the first year
- Aggressively pursue private funding partnerships

## So Far?

- Blessings from three commissioners
- On the appointment list of the Governor’s Chief of Staff
- Identified funds for the OPB cost benefit analysis
- Plan in use by the Mayor’s Commission on Homelessness in Atlanta
- State meeting on SSI eligibility workers

## The Dream---The Vision

- 1600 Permanent Supportive Housing Units in 10 years---160 per year
- It would take $3 million in capital and $1 million in services each year
- Maximizing federal support
- Administrative capacity to focus efforts
- Local and Private collaboration