Thread by @omarpassons

1/UPSTREAM PREVENTION. The social determinants of health are important. Poverty/lack of income relative to cost is important. We are on a journey to push towards an evidence-based approach to root causes as it relates to homelessness and this past week things got complicated

2/For those of you who want to engage in a meaningful, shared conversation as this work continues, I'd like to try sharing. Some of that sharing will be hard, I may even talk about missteps I/we make. But it is all in service of helping people never become homeless

3/I learned that a massive analysis of L.A. County yielded results that, if generalizable, could have impacts to how we think about true prevention here. A researcher told me that 85% of people who experienced first-time homeless in L.A. rec'd safety net services

4/Got more clarity on this same thread today and added some additional positive steps. First, the 85% number is not *all* homeless in L.A. County, the denominator is those who are flagged as homeless by any County dept plus those in HMIS.

5/Also, this wasn't just first-time homeless nor social safety net recipients alone but ALL County programs. While CalFresh was the largest block, included several others including justice involvement. Percent of 1st time was down closer to 50% of the total

6/One item that really requires attention is a truly data-driven look at causes of first-time senior homeless. I do not mean immediate causes, I mean real learning about what happens to lead to first-time homelessness that late in life

7/I'm not ruling out the most obvious suspect - rent that increases faster than the fixed income - but given that a relatively small percentage of people who fit that circumstance fall all the way into homelessness, there is likely more to the story

8/Another interesting point: for most people, risk of homelessness increases until middle-age and then tapers with age. For those who have justice involvement, that risk just keeps rising with age.

9/For those following along and interested, I'm also re-reading Beth Shinn (of @vupeabody) seminal Family Options Study on Homelessness Prevention. Here's the link:

huduser.gov/portal/family_…

@vupeabody 10/ This and the next screen capture are taken from page 30 of the pdf version of the long-term outcomes study. This snippet compares Rapid Rehousing to "usual care" (paraphrased: supportive services available with no priority to anyone in need)

@vupeabody 11/Also from page 30, this screen capture compares Rapid Rehousing (CBRR) to Long Term Subsidy (SUB)