2011 State of Hawaii Homeless Persons Point-In-Time County Report

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State of Hawaii and /or the Department of Housing and Urban Development are required to participate in the HMIS. Additionally, some privately funded agencies voluntarily utilize the HMIS. The Violence Against Women Act of 2005 categorically excludes domestic violence providers from having to participate in the HMIS, however most of the domestic violence shelters did participate in the count. Before the 2009 count, HPHA received HUD's permission to deviate from the conventional PIT methodology of a one -night physical count and to instead conduct a multiple -day physical count for the unsheltered homeless. The dates of the sheltered and unsheltered counts adhered to HUD's strict policy that the counts must occur during the last ten days of January. The deviation was permitted based on Hawaii's ability to unduplicate the unsheltered homeless by using the HMIS. This HMIS methodology was used again for the 2011 count; however, several key adjustments were made to ensure that data was as clean as possible and that users were able to quickly enter surveyed unsheltered data. The unsheltered homeless count was a multifaceted process that made use of survey instruments based on criteria contained within HUD's Guide to Counting Unsheltered Homeless. These survey instruments were used by field staff to document unsheltered responses. The surveys for persons determined to be unsheltered on the night of January 25, 2011 were entered into the PIT module of the HMIS. With the assistance of Hybrid International, LLC, the unsheltered single and household surveys were configured to mirror the hardcopy forms. This configuration made it extremely easy for service providers to enter the unsheltered data they had obtained during the six day survey period directly into the HMIS. Users could even populate pieces of the PIT survey forms with data from existing users if they had previously been entered into the HMIS database. After all unsheltered data had been entered into the HMIS; the aggregate data was exported into Excel. All data entered into the online surveys became readily available in a tractable format. This data could then be manipulated to produce the reports that HUD and the CoCs desired. Records containing little or no information, sheltered homeless, duplicate counts, and refusals were removed from the aggregate data in an effort to obtain an accurate unsheltered count. The sheltered homeless count was primarily derived from HMIS client and intake data in the sheltered programs section for the night of January 25, 2011. Shelters were contacted prior to this date and instructed that all clients sleeping in their facility on the night of January 25, 2011, needed to be entered into the HMIS. Furthermore, agencies were advised to make sure that all client and intake data were current. Follow -up with individual service providers was also conducted to verify that the HMIS listing matched the nightly census. Shelters not participating in the HMIS (such as domestic violence shelters) were contacted individually to provide the number of homeless individuals and families residing at their shelters on the night of January 25, 2011, in addition to providing specific subpopulation data. Multiple meetings were conducted Statewide prior to the 2011 PIT. Agencies and persons included: the City's Department of Community Services, the DHS's Homeless Programs Office, PIT Coordinators, interested Partners in Care members, and rural county continuum members. The purpose of these meetings was to develop and refine the count's methodology, and to revise survey instrumentation used for the unsheltered counts. The survey instruments are attached as Appendices 1 and 2. Point -in -Time Teams PIT teams were composed of outreach workers from service agencies that regularly perform outreach to unsheltered individuals and families experiencing homelessness. Agencies were assigned to areas on the islands where they routinely provide outreach services. The reasoning for these assignments flowed naturally from the fact that field staff would be most familiar with sites and persons to whom they routinely outreached and would Z HUD's definition of an unsheltered homeless person is someone residing in a place not meant for human habitation, such as cars, parks, sidewalks, abandoned buildings, or on the street.