Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Using Adult Linkages Project Data For Determining Patterns And Costs Of Services Use By General Relief Recipients In Los Angeles County, Stephen Metraux, Dennis P. Culhane

Dennis P. Culhane

This study examines services use and related costs for two cohorts of General Relief (GR) recipients in Los Angeles County. The study is made possible by the creation of the Adult Linkages Project (ALP), a data warehouse containing data on the GR recipients that spans eight Los Angeles County departments. This integration of data sources and County departments enables a unique window into the comprehensive use of County services by GR recipients, and allows for the exploration of hidden costs that GR recipients incur to Los Angeles County. The identification of such services use patterns forms the basis for service …

The 2008 Annual Homelessness Assessment Report To Congress, Dennis P. Culhane, Jill Khadduri, Alvaro Cortes, Larry Buron

Dennis P. Culhane

The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) is pleased to present the 2008 Annual Homeless Assessment Report (AHAR), the fourth in a series of reports on homelessness in the United States. The reports respond to a series of Congressional directives calling for the collection and analysis of data on homelessness. The 2008 AHAR breaks new ground by being the first report to provide year-to-year trend information on homelessness in the United States. The report provides the latest counts of homelessness nationwide—including counts of individuals, persons in families, and special population groups such as veterans and chronically homeless people. …

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 …

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 …

Homelessness And Child Welfare Services In New York City: Exploring Trends And Opportunites For Improving Outcomes For Children And Youth, Dennis P. Culhane, Jung Min Park

Dennis P. Culhane

No abstract provided.

Translating Research Into Homelessness Policy And Practice: One Perspective From The United States, Dennis P. Culhane

Dennis P. Culhane

Like social scientists everywhere, homelessness researchers in the US are usually ignored. Good science that identifies what causes homelessness, sound evaluations which document that certain programs will never work, and even evidence that promising solutions deserve broad replication, are often disregarded. Such wanton indifference for science would constitute malpractice in the field of medicine, but it sometimes passes as acceptable policy in the field of social welfare. Ideology, politics and preservation of the status quo usually prevail. So, what’s a well intentioned researcher to do? Persevere and become more tactical. After all, policy failures can’t be ignored forever. Like good …

Homeless Shelter Use And Reincarceration Following Prison Release, Stephen Metraux, Dennis P. Culhane

Dennis P. Culhane

This paper exmaines the incidence of and interrelationships between shelter use and reincarceration among a cohort of 48,424 persons who were released from New York State prisons to New York City in 1995-1998. Results show that, within two years of release, 11.4% of the study group was again imprisoned. Using survival analysis methods, time since prison release and history of residential instability were the most salient risk factors related to shelter use, and shelter use increased the risk of subsequent reincarcerations.

New Strategies And Collaborations Target Homelessness, Dennis P. Culhane

Dennis P. Culhane

No abstract provided.

Homelessness Among Persons With Severe Mental Illness In An Enhanced Community-Based Mental Health System, Eri Kuno, Aileen B. Rothbard, June Averyt, Dennis P. Culhane

Dennis P. Culhane

Objective: Homelessness and patterns of service use were examined among seriously mentally ill persons in an area with a well-funded community- based mental health system. Methods: The sample consisted of 438 individuals referred between 1990 and 1992 to an extended acute care psychiatric hospital after a stay in a general hospital. Those experiencing an episode of homelessness, defined as an admission to a public shelter between 1990 and 1993, were compared with those who were residentially stable. Data from a longitudinal integrated database of public mental health and medical services were used to construct service utilization measures to test the …

Help In Time: An Evaluation Of Philadelphia's Community-Based Homelessness Prevention Program, Yin-Ling I. Wong, Meg Koppel, Dennis P. Culhane, Stephen Metraux, David E. Eldridge, Amy Hillier, Helen R. Lee

Dennis P. Culhane

This report provides an evaluation of Philadelphia's neighborhood-based homelessness prevention initiative. Results indicate that nearly all households served do not become homeless. But it is unclear if households would have become homeless had they not been served. Recommendations are made for targeting prevention interventions to families requesting shelter.

One-Year Rates Of Public Shelter Utilization By Race/Ethnicity, Age, Sex And Poverty Status For New York City (1990 And 1995) And Philadelphia (1995), Dennis P. Culhane, Stephen Metraux

Dennis P. Culhane

This study calculates public homeless shelter utilization rates by sex, race/ethnicity and age status for New York City (1990 and 1995) and Philadelphia (fiscal year 1995) to determine the relative risk for shelter use among different demographic groups in these cities. The resulting shelter utilization rates reveal large disparities among age groups and across racial/ethnic groups, as well as showing different trends in shelter utilization among the two cities. Among the results reported, the rate of shelter utilization declined by 11% in New York City over this period, while the overall utilization rate in Philadelphia has increased to where it …

Where Homeless Families Come From: Toward A Prevention-Oriented Approach In Washington, Dc, Dennis P. Culhane, Chang-Moo Lee

Dennis P. Culhane

No abstract provided.

Making Homelessness Programs Accountable To Consumers, Funders And The Public, Dennis P. Culhane, David Eldridge, Robert Rosenheck, Carol Wilkins

Dennis P. Culhane

This paper discusses how different types of performance measurement can be used to improve the accountability of homeless programs to consumers, funders and to the public. A distinction is made between the kinds of data used in formal research projects and data that can be practically obtained in a practice setting. Consumer outcomes are discussed in terms of accountability to consumers, program outcomes in terms of accountability to funders, and systems outcomes in terms of accountability to the public. Cost-benefit analyses are also discussed as providing another critical dimension of accountability to funders and the public.

Where To From Here? A Policy Research Agenda Based On The Analysis Of Administrative Data, Dennis P. Culhane, Stephen Metraux

Dennis P. Culhane