DC ICH Votes to Approve 5-year Comprehensive Plan to End Youth Homelessness

At the December 13 quarterly meeting of the DC Interagency Council on Homelessness (ICH), members agreed by unanimous voice vote to adopt the ICH Youth Subcommittee’s Comprehensive Plan to End Youth Homelessness (short title TBD). 

The youth plan will complement the ICH’s Homeward DC plan which addresses homelessness among adults and families. The ICH Council’s approval of the plan is a culmination of more than six years of community efforts to bring youth homelessness in the District to light, and to meet that awareness with dedicated action. 

For DCAYA, the first major benchmark was reached in November 2011 with our release of From the Streets to Stability: A study of youth homelessness in the District of Columbia. Before that time, little to no concrete information was available related to the issue of youth homelessness in DC – in terms of the size of the population, or the unique needs and characteristics of homeless youth. The report highlighted the need for a more services and for a diverse array of supportive services and programs for youth, and the groundbreaking effort led to more people taking notice over the next several years. It was followed up in October 2013 with a community coalition-led Bold Strategy to End Youth Homelessness.

In May 2014, DC Council passed the End Youth Homelessness Amendment Act, requiring a new youth drop-in center and a street outreach program, a new intake system to ensure that there is no “wrong door” for youth seeking support, more beds for youth in crisis, a publicly-funded Homeless Youth Census to be completed annually, and finally, a community-wide comprehensive plan to end youth homelessness.

The Youth Plan: Vision Statement and Benchmarks

With the groundwork laid by the 2014 legislation, the District now has the start of structures and supports needed to end youth homelessness. This goal does not mean that a youth will never experience housing instability or homelessness again. Rather, it means that our community will have a system in place to prevent homelessness for youth whenever possible, and if literal homelessness cannot be prevented, to ensure that the youth’s homelessness is brief and non-recurring, with access to stable housing within an average of 60 days or less.

This is vision statement for the Comprehensive Plan: By 2022, youth homelessness in the District will be a rare, brief, and nonrecurring experience.

For youth experiencing homelessness, their housing crisis comes at a key point in their development into independent adults. Recognizing this difference between youth and adults, the United States Interagency Council on Homelessness has developed core outcomes for youth that go beyond resolving the youth’s housing crisis to also helping them with building permanent connections, achieving education and employment goals, and developing social-emotional well-being. Addressing these core outcomes will require a community-wide effort with the involvement of partners in the District beyond the usual stakeholders in the homeless system.

The plan lays out specific benchmarks to assess progress toward the vision, including:

1. Our community has ended chronic homelessness among youth;
2. Our community has a system in place to identify all youth experiencing homelessness;
3. Our community has the ability to provide immediate access to developmentally appropriate emergency shelter for any youth without a safe place to stay;
4. Our community connects youth to stable housing as quickly as possible; and,
5. Our community provides Transitional Housing only for youth that prefer it, and that Transitional Housing is stable, does not have barriers to entry, and has high rates of exit to permanent housing.

What’s Next

The ICH will be formally releasing the plan in early 2017. The plan will be published to include a series of short vignettes written by District youth experiencing homelessness, and there is also a contest underway for youth to determine a name for the plan. 

The plan also lays out more than 40 key strategies which DC agencies and community partners will undertake in the coming years. The ICH’s youth subcommittee will continue meeting monthly in 2017 to work across youth-serving agencies, community-based organizations, local advocacy partners, and young people from the community to support the key strategy work. And as performance and budget hearings approach in the spring, DCAYA will be crafting an advocacy agenda in strong support of achieving the plan’s benchmarks.

To stay informed about the plan’s 2017 release and the title contest, or to find out more about the work of the ICH Youth Subcommittee and DCAYA’s advocacy, please contact Joseph Gavrilovich, Senior Policy Analyst.

#YOUthCountDC 2016: The 2nd Annual Homeless Youth Census is September 16-24!

This week’s blog is a look ahead to the 2nd Annual Homeless Youth Census, set to take place District-wide from September 16-24, 2016. 

We reached out to our friends at the Community Partnership for the Prevention of Homelessness (TCP) to help respond to some frequently asked questions about the census: what it is, who is counted, and what is its impact.

What is the Homeless Youth Census?

In May 2014, the DC Council passed the End Youth Homelessness Amendment Act, funding an expansion of accessible youth-friendly services. The Act also mandated an annual census of District youth experiencing homelessness to address the lack of consistent and reliable data. The Homeless Youth Census (HYC) is an annual count and survey of unaccompanied minors and transition-aged youth experiencing or at risk of experiencing homelessness or housing insecurity.

The first census was conducted by the Department of Human Services (DHS) in close collaboration with TCP over a nine day period at the end of August 2015. The census revealed there were some 545 unaccompanied youth experiencing homelessness in the District of Columbia – almost half of whom identified as LGBTQ. This marked the first time that we have had such a thorough estimate of youth who are homeless (and particularly those identifying as LGBTQ) and the importance of having this knowledge cannot be overstated: it has implications for expanding services, targeting outreach and fine-tuning supportive services.

How Does Doing a Census Help End Youth Homelessness?

During the Council’s performance oversight hearing for DHS last February, DCAYA testified that the agency and community partners were on track in their expansion of services to youth, but that continued progress was going to require added investment in the coming fiscal year. 

Because of the availability of data from the HYC, advocates had a strong case to make at the DHS budget hearing in April for scaling up prevention services, as well as adding to the supply of crisis beds and transitional and independent living spaces for youth. The Council and the Bowser administration committed $2.3 million in the FY2017 budget in new investments for these services. This represented a significant increase over previous years and one which can largely be attributed to the use of census data.

Conducting the census on an annual basis enables the District to track data and trends over time^, which can shed light on the interventions and support needed to stem the tide of youth homelessness. The census process and its results strengthen advocacy efforts to annually secure the public funding necessary to reach the District-wide goal of ensuring homelessness among unaccompanied minors and transition-aged youth is rare, brief and non-recurring by 2020.

Who is Counted?

Through surveys conducted by street outreach professionals, in drop-in centers and meal programs, and though other community partnerships, the HYC collects information about demographics, housing and homelessness status, education and employment status, health and well-being, and system involvement (e.g., child welfare, juvenile justice) across the following youth populations:

• Unaccompanied Minors (under the age of 18) living apart from their parents or guardians, excluding those in the physical custody of the District
• Transition-Aged Youth (age 18-24) who are “economically and emotionally detached from their parents and who are unstably housed”
• “Literally Homeless” Youth who are residing on the street or in emergency shelter and transitional housing situations
• “Housing Insecure” Youth who are residing in non-permanent housing situations, including “couch-surfing” and “doubled up”, which are often identified as risk factors for experiencing literal homelessness
• Subpopulation Information is also captured (e.g.,  pregnant and parenting, gender expression, sexual orientation) to better understand population trends.

Of fundamental importance, the results of the census show us that at any given time there are hundreds of youth moving from couch to couch, and when their options run short, shelter to shelter. 

How Can I Help?

The HYC equips youth, advocates and service providers with vital knowledge about youth in crisis. Each new community partnership helps to expand that knowledge and work toward ending the crisis. 

The 2nd Annual HYC is set to take place District-wide September 16-24, 2016:

1. To sign up as a community partner, please contact Eileen Kroszner, Program Officer, at the Community Partnership for the Prevention of Homelessness: EKroszner@community-partnership.org or 202-543-5298
2. For HYC survey sites and more information, including how you can be counted if you are a youth experiencing homelessness, please visit www.youthcountdc.org.

_____________________________

^ track data and trends over time: For example, HYC survey data help to identify patterns in responses and factors which affect how youth experience homelessness, including special subpopulations (i.e., LGBTQ Youth, Mental Health, Justice System involvement); to identify patterns in responses describing services used and gaps in services; and, quantify and qualify the scope of minor and young adult homelessness to guide resource decision-making.

DCAYA’s Budget Updates Part II: Expanded Learning & Youth Homelessness

The final vote by the Council occurred yesterday, and the District’s FY17 budget now goes to Mayor Bowser. Today we continue to reflect on the work of our members and partners throughout this year’s advocacy season, and provide an update on successes for youth, families and children within the FY17 budget. Last week’s blog focused on Youth Workforce Development and Disconnected Youth, and we continue this week with a look at Expanded Learning and Youth Homelessness.

Expanded Learning

A Path Forward for Funding Afterschool and Summer Learning

After the mayor proposed $4.9 million to the DC Trust for community-based afterschool and summer programming in FY17, our initial ask was to double that investment in order to serve up to four times as many children and youth in need of quality expanded learning opportunities. While we were optimistic about the strength of the proposed amount compared to recent years, it was not enough to reverse a downward trend for out-of-school time programming we have seen each year in the District since 2010.

While we will continue to advocate for scaled-up, multi-year funding beginning in FY18, the advocacy priority for FY17 quickly shifted with the announced dissolution of the DC Trust on April 26. Since then, DCAYA and our community-based partners have worked hard to preserve the $4.9 million intended for expanded learning programs. Our coalition has held more than a dozen meetings with members of DC Council and their staff, as well as the Deputy Mayors for Education and Health and Human Services, to build support among policy makers for an established, nonprofit intermediary with youth development expertise to administer out-of-school time (OST) funding in FY17. We continue to be an active partner in this effort, as Deputy Mayor Brenda Donald presents this recommendation to Mayor Bowser.

We’d like to thank the Deputy Mayors and members of Council, as well as all of our expanded learning partners (simply too many to list here) who stepped up to provide resources and insight in the wake of the Trust’s collapse. Most especially, we’re grateful to those members who met with policy makers and offered public testimony to advocate for the preservation of out-of-school time funding. We'd like to give a special shout out of thanks to Fair Chance and Gretchen Van der Veer for helping coordinate our members and Fair Chance partners to do a final round of walk arounds with DC Council on the importance of out of school time programming.

Sustaining 21st Century Community Learning Centers

Earlier this year, the Office of the State Superintendent of Education (OSSE) announced that due to internal efforts to streamline grant making processes and decreased federal funds, there would be no new competition for the federal 21st Century Community Learning Center (CLC) grant program in the 2016-2017 school year. This action immediately affected three community-based OST providers who all stood to lose approximately $995,413 in the coming school year. The disruption of these services, which have all demonstrated quality programming and remarkable outcomes for students, would have caused significant ramifications next year for up to 1,000 at-risk students and undermined years of investments.

Recognizing that families, youth and children deserve more than a haphazard and inconsistent delivery of these key critical services, DCAYA and these three partners launched a targeted advocacy effort to find support and funding. These efforts paid off with Council identifying $800,000 to sustain 21st Century CLC’s in FY17. We’d like to thank these organizations and their families for rallying to support the students, as well as Superintendent Hanseul Kang and everyone at OSSE for their support in working toward a solution, and Councilmembers David Grosso, Brianne Nadeau and Charles Allen for their outspoken support for sustaining this important and life-changing funding stream.

Youth Homelessness

Building Capacity for a Youth-Friendly System

This year, DCAYA advocated to an additional investment of $800,000 to create more transitional housing and independent living options for youth experiencing homelessness. While the mayor’s proposed budget included significantly more funding for crisis support and prevention and diversion services, which we had advocated for and certainly applaud, more funding for meaningful housing interventions will be needed in future years if we are to meet the intent of the 2014 End Youth Homelessness Amendment Act and make homelessness among unaccompanied minors and transition-aged youth rare, brief and non-recurring by 2020.

DCAYA continues to work in a leadership role with the Interagency Council of Homelessness (ICH) and the ICH Youth Subcommittee, and we are optimistic that with the Fall release of the ICH’s Strategic Plan to End Youth Homelessness, we and our partners will be positioned to make an even stronger ask next budget season. We’d like to thank ICH Executive Director Kristy Greenwalt, DHS Director Laura Zeilinger, and DHS Deputy Administrator for Youth Services Hilary Cairns for their continued leadership and support for scaled-up funding, as well as Kimberly Henderson with Child and Family Services Agency, for her role co-chairing the Youth Subcommittee. We are grateful to our members and partners from Sasha Bruce, Casa Ruby, the Latin American Youth Center, Wanda Alston, Covenant House and the DC Center for the LGBT Community for their leadership, advocacy partnerships and public testimonies.

Dignified Housing for Homeless Children & Families

In February, the mayor made good on her promise to voters to deliver a plan to close D.C. General and move homeless families into safe and dignified housing throughout the District, and the plan was met both with intense support and praise, and resistance and criticism. The months that followed saw some of this teased out as policy makers, advocates, and members of the community worked toward a middle ground.  We are pleased that Council has since passed a revised plan that calls for the use of government-owned properties in Wards 3, 5, 6, 7 and 8, and the purchase (instead of leasing) of the sites in Wards 1 and 4. These revisions effectively respond to resident concerns about cost while maintaining the overall intent of the plan. We believe that the housing these families will receive, along with improved access to local amenities and on-site case management services, will have life-changing results for their children well worth this effort and its capital expenditures.

For more on youth issues in DC you can FOLLOW us on Twitter, LIKE us on Facebook, SUBSCRIBE to this blog and VISIT us at www.dc-aya.org.

Busting Myths On Youth Homelessness

During these busy months of advocacy season, it’s always a good idea to do a quick refresher on the basics. That’s why we’ve updated our Youth Homelessness one-pager. Take a look! The one-pager gives the basic stats on youth homelessness in DC and summarizes recent efforts to tackle the issue.

Besides just the facts and figures though, advocacy season is also an important time to identify and debunk policy myths that have been floating around. So here are the top three youth homelessness myths that we’ve heard this past the year, along with how we debunk them.

  

Youth Homelessness One-Pager

MYTH: Providing emergency shelter for youth encourages them to leave their families.

REALITY: 

Family reunification is the top priority for DC agencies and community-based organizations. From the moment a young person walks through their door, the service providers are thinking about if, how, and when the youth can connect to family members who can support them. This is best practice and follows federal guidelines. 

Family reunification is achieved through different paths, depending on the dynamics of the situation. Sometimes functional family therapy is the best tool. Sometimes finding other relatives where the youth can stay for a period of time is the best solution. Other times the youth needs to form a therapeutic bond with service providers before they can learn to mimic that with their own family. Usually the solution is some combination of these three. 

It is important to remember, though, that family reunification is not always achievable or a good idea. One quick example is when a youth identifies as a member of the LGBTQ community and no family member is willing to support them based on their sexuality. 

Remember, these youth are not leaving home as a result of a little fight with their parents. Youth do not check into shelter like you would check into a hotel. DC homeless youth have told us that they seek services because they have nowhere else to turn.

MYTH: Youth from outside DC come into DC just to take advantage of our homelessness services.

REALITY:

Historic oppression, a struggling education system, and rising inequality have created a dire situation for DC youth. It is heartbreaking. Yes, youth, like most people, go in and out of the boundaries of DC every day. Homeless youth, especially, have to shuffle from family member, to friend, to acquaintance in order to find food and shelter. But make no mistake: these are our youth, and they are not “shopping around” to find the best deal. 

Sleeping on peoples’ couches, whether they are in DC or a half mile outside it, can be dangerous for a young person. Youth will tell you, receiving favors usually comes at a cost; some form of payment for sleeping on a person’s couch is eventually required, which could mean running drugs or engaging in unwanted sexual acts. We have to protect our youth and that starts by claiming them as our own.

MYTH: Youth homelessness issues should only be dealt with by the Child and Family Services Agency (CFSA).

REALITY:

CFSA's mandate is to remove minors (under age 18) from high-risk, domestic situations where parental abuse or neglect is reported. This unimaginably difficult work is critical to protecting DC children and youth. 

However, youth who are experiencing a hostile home environment – but not abuse or neglect – are the young people who fall through the cracks and often become homeless.  

Take the earlier example of the young person who identifies as LGBTQ. The young person may be experiencing a hostile environment because their parent or guardian does not support them based on their sexuality. This fact does not necessarily mean that the parent or guardian is abusing or neglecting their child, however, the young person is at a high-risk of leaving or feeling forced to leave and becoming homeless 

CFSA does however, have the power to refer parents of minors in low- to mid-risk situations to Community Collaboratives which provide voluntary services, such as family reunification and counseling programs. Many times though, families will not follow up with the Community Collaboratives because of a lack of trust and fear of stigma around receiving services from the child welfare system. 

This is why DC must look beyond just using CFSA as an agency to house homeless youth and work closely with community based organizations that are designed to provide services to both minors and youth up to 24 who leave their home because of reasons that fall outside of CFSA’s mandate.

Thanks for brushing up on your youth homelessness policy basics. Be sure to let us know if you’ve heard any youth homelessness policy myths floating around and tell us how you debunk them!

Katie Dunn is the youth homelessness and expanded learning policy analyst at DCAYA. You can follow learn more about youth issues in DC by following Katie on twitter at @kdunntweets.

For more on youth issues in DC you can FOLLOW us on Twitter, LIKE us on Facebook,SUBSCRIBE to this blog and VISIT us at www.dc-aya.org.

To Reduce Family Homelessness, DC Needs to Focus on Young Parents

Photo taken by Tina Dela Rosa of Charmia Carolina and her child.

We end our Youth Homelessness Awareness Month blog series with a guest post from policy analyst Kate Coventry of the DC Fiscal Policy Institute.

According to the Community Partnership for the Prevention of Homelessness, 661 families applied for shelter during the FY2013 Hypothermia Season and the number is predicted to grow to 820 families during FY2015. Of those families experiencing homelessness, nearly half are headed by a parent 24 years or younger.

______________________________________________________________________________

An increasing number of DC’s homeless families are young, with a parent 24 years old or younger. These families face unique challenges, because the parents often lack a high school diploma or GED, have limited work experience, and have never had their own home. Addressing the huge increase in family homelessness in DC will require focusing on these families.

No one knows exactly why this is happening, but a clear factor is DC’s uneven economic recovery that has left many residents, including young people, behind. Young workers face a 16 percent unemployment rate, nearly double that of older workers. And wages have fallen since 2008 for residents other than those with a college degree. These worsening job realities and DC’s increasing lack of affordable housing undoubtedly are making it difficult for young families to make ends meet.

Other cities are finding that young parents need tailored services. Like the District, Hennepin County (Minneapolis), helps most families exit shelter with Rapid Re-housing, a program that combines rental assistance and case management for generally up to 12 months. But because they found the program does not work well for youth-headed households, they are piloting a program with more intensive case management, life skills training, and education on how to support their child’s development. Additionally, young families can remain in the program for up to 24 months.

It is likely that young families in the District also need special help. Yet it is not clear what added interventions are needed, because the city has not done much to assess the circumstances of youth-headed homeless families. In April, a coalition of community organizations, including DCAYA and DCFPI, recommended that DC release data on the Rapid Re-housing outcomes for young parents, but this still has not happened.

As the District takes more steps to reduce family homelessness, we recommend the District do more to understand why so many young families are seeking shelter, and then review its assessment tool and case management services to make sure they are sensitive to the special circumstances of young families.

The DC Fiscal Policy Institute conducts research and public education on budget and tax issues in the District of Columbia, with a particular emphasis on issues that affect low- and moderate-income residents. Kate Coventry is a DCFPI policy analyst who focuses particularly on TANF benefits, Interim Disability Assistance (IDA), and homelessness.

For more on youth issues in DC you can FOLLOW us on Twitter, LIKE us on Facebook,SUBSCRIBE to this blog and VISIT us at www.dc-aya.org.

Sex for Shelter

Photo Courtesy of Fair Girls 

The following blog is part of the DCAYA Youth Homelessness Awareness Month blog series. 

People often place homelessness and sex trafficking into two different buckets of vulnerability. In reality, these issues are often one in the same, as homeless children are sexually exploited at an alarmingly high rate. When they do not have a safe place to sleep or trusting adults to turn to, young people are forced to find a way to survive. Many times, the only currency they have to offer are their own bodies. Sometimes adults force or coerce a young person into the sex trade – sometimes their situations do – either way, this form of sexual exploitation is mentally and physically damaging to a minor’s well-being. To add insult to injury, in DC, these minors are arrested and prosecuted for engaging in unlawful sexual behavior; going from one system of control established by a pimp, to another system of control brought on by a police officer.

On November 18, DC Council will vote on a bill to change this practice. The 'Safe Harbor' bill will ensure minors get care, not punishment, when trying to survive on the streets. Below is an excerpt from our one-pager with a FAQs section that addresses common misperceptions about minors and the sex trade.

It is fitting that this bill is being voted on during Youth Homelessness Awareness Month. It is time we stop arresting and prosecuting vulnerable children who need basic necessitates: food, shelter, and a caring adult.

View outline of the legislation.

_____________________________________________________________________________

“When I was a kid being sex trafficked, I was threatened with arrest, not refered to services. DC law has to change. Kids shouldn’t be arrested for being sex trafficked or survival sex.”

- Kiana
 College Student, Survivor Advocate at FAIR Girls DC 

“Our Safe Harbor law has been a tremendous tool as we combat this horrific crime. With the help of service providers, we focus on the rescue and recovery of young victims caught up in the sex trade.”

 - Anita Alvarez
   State’s Attorney, Cook County, IL

“As a Law Enforcement Officer, it is our sworn duty to    protect the public, and that includes our children who are the most vulnerable.  Safe Harbor laws acknowledge that children, who are not adults, do not have the maturity to give consent to be trafficked.  Safe Harbor laws help us put the real perpetrators in jail.”

- Retired Officer Dan Goldsmith, California State Investigator

FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

Q: What is child sex trafficking and survival sex?

A: The federal Trafficking Victims Protection Act (TVPA) defines a sex trafficking victim as any child under 18 who is engaging in commercial sex acts.  Survival sex occurs when a child engages in sexual acts in exchange for food, shelter, or other basic needs, whether or not they have a pimp. Under the TVPA, minors engaging in survival sex should be treated as trafficking victims.

Q: Isn’t arrest & prosecution a good way for victims to get services?

A: No, instead victims need to be able to voluntarily access services through police referrals — police training on how to do this is included in the bill. A jail cell or a courtroom are not the most effective ways to present services to victims of child sex trafficking. Victims need to have the time and space to commit to accepting services in order for the services to be effective.  As Andrea Powell, Executive Director of Fair Girls says, “we’ve never had any victim tell us no to services … if they are asked correctly.”

Q: But don’t we need to arrest these kids and threaten them with prosecution so they give information about their pimps?

A: No, arresting victims of child sex trafficking will only lead them to distrust, be hostile toward, and withhold information from authorities. When a victim has the opportunity to voluntarily choose services, the young person is more cooperative in a police investigation.

DOWNLOAD THE "SAFE HARBOR" ONE-PAGER

Photo Courtesy of Fair Girls 

Before the vote on Tuesday, November 19th 2014, reach out to DC Councilmembers through their social media channels. View sample tweets and councilmember twitter handles for guidance as we work together to pass this significant and groundbreaking legislation to protect victims of child sex trafficking. 

For more on youth issues in DC you can FOLLOW us on Twitter, LIKE us on Facebook,SUBSCRIBE to this blog and VISIT us at www.dc-aya.org.