June, 2005
Welcome to the inaugural edition of the Colorado Interagency Council on
Homelessness (CICH) "E" newsletter. Our goal with this
newsletter is to keep interested parties updated on Council activities. The
newsletter will provide brief information and give you the opportunity to go to
the CICH homepage as well as all of the committee homepages by clicking on the
links above (you will need to open this email in HTML). We hope that this
newsletter will be the source of interactive communication with all stakeholders
in the community so read the newsletter, and email us back with feedback and
your ideas. Let us know what you think.
The
Colorado Interagency Council on Homelessness was created on October 28, 2003
through Executive Order of Governor Bill Owens to serve as an advisory body to
the Governor on housing needs and homeless issues.
The council is co-chaired by Marva Livingston Hammons, Executive Director
of the Colorado Department of Human Services, and Mike Beasley, Executive
Director of the Colorado Department of Local Affairs.
Members of the council include: government and elected officials,
foundations, non-profit housing and homeless providers, business
representatives, and representatives from Colorado State Departments that serve
homeless populations. The council
has developed a five point strategic plan that includes the following five
priorities:
Priority
#1: Expand and Maximize Service
Resources
The
priorities and strategies developed by the council are being further developed
and implemented through the hard work of the following six sub-committees:
- Mental
Health, Substance Abuse, Health & Integrated Treatment (MSHI)
- Housing
Development
- Benefits
Acquisition
- Families
and Children
- Discharge
Planning
- Education
The
sub-committees are always looking for additional participation.
Anyone interested in participating should contact the chair of each
committee as listed below and request to be added to the committee.
COMMITTEE
DESCRIPTIONS
Mental Health, Substance Abuse, Health & Integrated Treatment
Committee (MSHI)
The mission of MSHI is to expand and maximize substance abuse, mental health and
health care services for homeless persons. MSHI has identified the
following tasks:
- ADAD
will conduct statewide gap analysis; identify ways to fill gap between detox and
treatment.
- MSHI
will explore feasibility of increasing “alternative” resources to fund
additional alcohol and substance abuse services for homeless persons.
- MSHI
will look at what other states are doing (non-tax) to fund additional alcohol
and substance abuse treatment services.
- MSHI
will identify and, if appropriate, meet with “beneficiary companies” to
discuss possibility of them providing funding or services for homeless programs.
MSHI is also discussing the potential for merging with the Benefits Acquisition
Committee since many of their activities overlap. The committees are
currently aggressively sharing information and will decide in the future
whether to merge.
Date/Time: 3rd Thursday of the month from 2-4 p.m.
Location: Supportive Housing and Homeless Programs
Housing Development Committee
Date/Time: 1st Friday of the month, 8:30-10:00 a.m.
Location: Supportive Housing and Homeless Programs
The Housing Development Committee is tasked with maintaining and developing
housing resources for homeless persons. The committee is currently working
on doing a statewide homeless point-in-time survey. The committee will be
meeting by video conference this month and in future months to include rural
members in the discussion.
Benefits Acquisition Committee
The Benefits Acquisition Committee's initial action plan is focused on
improvements in service delivery in the areas of Health Services (including
Physical, Dental and Mental Health) and Benefit Utilization. Initially, we are
looking to create a series of demonstration projects that connect homeless
clients to services and benefits. As we move forward, we will be identifying
policy and systemic barriers and developing recommendations for improvements to
policymakers.
Our action plan is largely dependent upon creating partnerships and alliances of
existing service providers to develop more effective ways to deliver services or
to bridge existing gaps in services. Equally important, we are developing a
model to improve case management to better integrate existing services and
personalize the referral process.
In future newsletters we will focus on individual projects we are developing.
Homeless Families with Children & Unaccompanied Youth Committee
In anticipation of the federal Policy Academy on homeless families and children
this Fall, the Committee on Homeless Families with Children and Unaccompanied
Youth is looking at the critical components of an effective
state plan to address homelessness for this population. As a result, this
month's meeting time is lengthened. We will set the context of our
discussion with a presentation from Suzette Tucker-Welch about
the self-sufficiency standard in Colorado and will begin analysis of our
strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats (SWOT) as a state, facilitated
by Tracy D'Alanno.
Date/Time: June 28, 10:00 - 1:00
Location: Mile High United Way, Heritage Room
Guests: Suzette Tucker Welch, Colorado Fiscal Policy Institute
Tracy
D'Alanno, Supportive Housing and Homeless Programs
Discharge Planning Committee
The Discharge Subcommittee has recently had two priority emphases. One has
been to work with the Metro Denver Homeless Initiative (MDHI) Discharge
subcommittee on its efforts to impact discharge from hospitals. Another has been
to learn about jail and prison discharge. The committee is working with
George Epp from the Sheriff's Association to expand opportunities for
"behavioral health triage" and has applied for a grant in
conjunction with Jefferson Center for Mental Health and Southeast Mental Health
Center. Work is also proceeding on efforts to replicate the PACE project in
Pueblo. In addition, the committee is educating itself about prison
discharge and has had extensive conversations with the Department of Corrections
about its policies and practices. The next meeting will be an opportunity
to look at how the committee might help with improving prison discharge so as to
avoid homelessness and reentry into the prison system.
Date/Time: June 24th, 2005, 2-4 p.m.
Location: Supportive Housing and Homeless Programs
Education Committee
The Education Committee is tasked with providing education to the community on
issues related to homelessness. This newsletter is the second major
activity of the Education Committee. The first was a forum of Colorado
leaders in the area of homelessness including the Metro Denver Homeless
Initiative, the Denver Mayor's Commission on Homelessness, Mile High United Way,
and the Colorado Interagency Council on Homelessness in October of 2004.
The forum generated a significant amount of information on the activities of
those groups and from forum participants. The information has assisted
many of the committees in planning their activities. The committee has a
number of tasks on its agenda including more education of legislators and policy
makers, building a homeless peer education/mentoring group and coordinating with
other groups working on ending homelessness. We are interested in
recruiting additional members. Please contact Lynn Shine ( lynn.shine@state.co.us)
or Chris Roe ( christopher.roe@state.co.us)
if you are interested in joining the committee.
Date/Time: 2nd Friday of the month, 8:30-10:00 a.m.
Location: Division of Housing
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