Digital Commons Network^™

The 2007 Annual Homelessness Assessment Report To Congress, Dennis P. Culhane, Jill Khadduri, Alvaro Cortes, Larry Buron, Steve Poulin

Dennis P. Culhane

The 2007 AHAR is the first AHAR based on an entire year of data about persons who use emergency and transitional housing programs. In addition, the report contains new information about the seasonal patterns of homelessness and long-term users of shelters and presents new appendices that provide community-level information on the number of homeless persons.

Habitations Of Cruelty - Pitfalls Of Expanding Hate Crime Legislation To Include The Homeless, Scott A. Steiner

Scott A Steiner

Hate crime law has developed and expanded substantially since its earliest form. A concerted effort is currently underway to expand existing hate crime legislation to include the homeless.

This paper provides a history of both state and federal hate crime legislation, examines precisely what a hate crime is (and how that definition differs from state to state), explores the growing problem of violence against the homeless, and analyzes recent developments in expanding state and local law to protect based on homelessness.

It offers both arguments in favor and arguments against the expansion of hate crime laws to include the homeless …

Accountability, Cost-Effectiveness, And Program Performance: Progress Since 1998, Dennis P. Culhane, Kennen S. Gross, Wayne D. Parker, Barbara Poppe, Ezra Sykes

Dennis P. Culhane

The authors summarize the progress made in the past decade toward making homeless assistance programs more accountable to funders, consumers, and the public. They observe that research on the costs of homelessness and cost offsets associated with intervention programs has been limited to people who are homeless with severe mental illness. But this research has raised awareness of the value of this approach, such that dozens of new studies in this area are underway, mostly focused on "chronic homelessness." Less progress has been made in using cost and performance data to systematically assess interventions for families, youth, and transitionally homeless …

Testing A Typology Of Family Homelessness Based On Patterns Of Public Shelter Utilization In Four U.S. Jurisdictions: Implications For Policy And Program Planning, Dennis P. Culhane, Stephen Metraux, Jung Min Park, Maryanne Schretzman, Jesse Valente

Dennis P. Culhane

This study tests a typology of family homelessness based on patterns of public shelter utilization and examines whether family characteristics are associated with those patterns. The results indicate that a substantial majority of homeless families stay in public shelters for relatively brief periods, exit, and do not return. Approximately 20 percent stay for long periods. A small but noteworthy proportion cycles in and out of shelters repeatedly. In general, families with long stays are no more likely than families with short stays to have intensive behavioral health treatment histories, to be disabled, or to be unemployed. Families with repeat stays …

Childhood Risk Factors In Dually Diagnosed Homeless Adults, Laura E. Blankertz, Ram A. Cnaan, Erica Freedman

Ram A Cnaan

Although the negative long term effects of specific childhood risk factors - sexual and physical abuse, parental mental illness and substance abuse, and out of home placement - have been recognized, most studies have focused on just one of these risks. This article examines the prevalence of these five childhood risk factors among dually diagnosed (mental illness and substance abusing) homeless adults in rehabilitation programs. It further assesses the impact of each risk factor individually and in combinations of two on the social functioning skills and rehabilitation progress of these multiply disadvantaged clients.

The Cost Of Homelessness: A Perspective From The United States, Dennis P. Culhane

Dennis P. Culhane

This paper discusses how researchers and others have analyzed the services histories of persons who have experienced homelessness, as well as their imputed costs. This research has been used both to make visible the ways in which the clients of mainstream social welfare systems (health, corrections, income maintenance and child welfare) become homeless and, complementarily, the impact of people who experience homelessness on the use of these service systems. Most published work in this area has been based on the integration of administrative databases to identify cases and service utilization patterns; some have used retrospective interviews. Results have been used …

The History And Future Of Homeless Management Information Systems, Stephen R. Poulin, Stephen Metraux, Dennis P. Culhane

Dennis P. Culhane

This chapter reviews the history of the development of management information systems in the homelessness program area. Efforts begun in the 1980s and 1990s by individual cities are discussed, as are the Congressional initatives that led to the mandated implementation of such systems in the US. The use of these systems for the Annual Homelessness Assessment Report to the US Congress is described, as are potential future uses of HMIS for research, policy and program planning.

Rearranging The Deck Chairs Or Reallocating The Lifeboats?: Homelessness Assistance And Its Alternatives, Dennis P. Culhane, Stephen Metraux

Dennis P. Culhane

Problem: At present, homelessness in the United States is primarily addressed by providing emergency and transitional shelter facilities. These programs do not directly address the causes of homelessness, and residents are exposed to victimization and trauma during stays. We need an alternative that is more humane, as well as more efficient and effective at achieving outcomes. Purpose: This article uses research on homelessness to devise alternative forms of emergency assistance that could reduce the prevalence and/or duration of episodes of homelessness and much of the need for emergency shelter. Methods: We review analyses of shelter utilization patterns to identify subgroups …

’"I’M Glad You Asked’: Homeless Persons Diagnosed With Severe Mental Illness Evaluate Their Residential Care, Katherine Tyson Mccrea Professor

Katherine Tyson McCrea

Homeless clients with severe mental illness can offer considerable insight about their residential care, but there are significant methodological challenges in eliciting their service evaluations: maximizing participation, facilitating self-expression, and preserving clients’ natural meanings. This study addresses those challenges and presents qualitative data residential care staff obtained from 210 clients. While clients prioritized meeting their subsistence needs, they emphasized attaining inner well-being and mutually respectful relationships, and that group services needed to reduce confrontational interactions in order to be helpful. For after-care services, clients sought sustained relationships with staff grounded in client initiative, combining respect for their autonomy with psychosocial …

School Success In Motion: Protective Factors For Academic Achievement In Homeless And Highly Mobile Children In Minneapolis, Ann S. Masten, David Heistad, J. J. Cutuli, Janette E. Herbers, Jelena Obradovic, Chi-Keung Chan, Elizabeth Hinz, Jeffrey D. Long

J. J. Cutuli

No abstract provided.