Quarterly Meeting

December 6, 2023

Agenda

  • Introduction
  • Informational presentation re: Medicaid updates (10 mins)
  • Public comment opportunity
  • Welcoming new members and OPEH staff (35 mins)
    • Breakout discussion
    • Group discussion
  • OPEH updates The Advisory Council's 2023 recommendations to the Interagency Task Force on Homelessness (1 hour)
    • Overview presentation
    • Discussion
  • Next Steps

Informational presentation

re: Medicaid updates

Public Comment

Welcome new members

  • Welcome to new Community Advisory Council members and new OPEH staff!
    • John Herring - Executive Director, Illinois Network of Centers for Independent Living
    • Linda Warner - Executive Director, Stopping Woman Abuse Now, Inc. (SWAN)
    • Kylon Hooks - Deputy Chief Homelessness Officer, OPEH

Break out groups

  • We are going to go into small groups for ~20 mins. You will receive a reminder 5 minutes before we return to the main room.
  • When we come back, please share some takeaways from the conversation.

Prompts:

  • What's something you're working on you'd like your CACH colleagues to know about?
  • Is there someone in homelessness/housing/advocacy/etc. spaces who has been a teacher to you? What do you want to embody that you learned from them?
  • When you think about our collective work around homelessness and housing, what does the future we're working toward look like for you? What does it feel like?

OPEH Updates

The Community Advisory Council's 2023 Recommendations to the Illinois Interagency Task Force on Homelessness

Presentation for the Council

12.6.2023

Goal:

  • CAC members understand the Community Advisory Council's 2023 recommendations to the Task Force and discuss opportunities to begin collaborative implementation.

Agenda:

  • Background on new annual recommendations requirement
  • Summary of the Council's recommendations
  • Discussion of implementation opportunities and rec. development process

Recommendations Development Process

  • 7/26: Bill 2831 signed, included a new requirement for the CAC to submit recommendations to the Interagency Task Force annually
  • 9/6: initial discussion during Community Advisory Council meeting
    • Work group established to draft recommendations. Members: Brenda, Debbie, Niya, Otha, Jennifer, Ron, Susan, and Tamela.
    • Colleen Mahoney hired through SHPA TA Center to support work group and write report.
  • 9/19-10/26: Work group to develop report met 4x and consulted with other stakeholders.
  • Intermittent updates provided via email and circulation of draft for review emailed to full Community Advisory Council
  • 10/23-11/13: Colleen worked with graphic designer
  • 11/15: Report submitted to Interagency Task Force by email
  • 12/14: Community Advisory Council will present our recommendations to the Interagency Task Force

2023 Recommendations

The 2023 recommendations focus on:

  • strengthening relationships between Interagency Task Force and Community Advisory Council members,
  • increasing interaction between people with lived experience of homelessness and the Interagency Task Force and
  • building on the strong foundation laid in the Home Illinois FY 23-24 Plan.

See the full recommendations in the report the Community Advisory Council's 2023 Recommendations to the Illinois Interagency Task Force on Homelessness.

Overview of the Recommendations

Recommendations

1

Build in standing updates at Interagency Task Force and Council meetings about the current work of the other group and opportunities for engagement.

2

Utilize Council member expertise for relevant Interagency Task Force meeting agenda items (i.e. youth, reentry, rural homelessness).

3

Partner with the Council to host Interagency Task Force members and their senior staff at Council-member's organizations to learn about their work to solve homelessness.

Goal #1

Strengthen relationships between Task Force and Council members.
This theme contains recommendations meant to deepen collaboration in order to advance community-driven implementation of Home Illinois.

Recommendations

4

Hold a special session for Interagency Task Force, Council members and OPEH staff to build community and celebrate progress at the 2024 Home Illinois Summit.

5

Collaborate with the Council to support State agency staff in deepening their understanding of the systemic causes of homelessness, the trauma of the experience and the intersections between homelessness and the work of Interagency Task Force departments.

6

Prioritize collaboration between the Council and the OPEH Fellows, five new senior-level policy experts who will work within IDOC, IDHS, IDPH, HFS and IHDA.

7

Collaborate with the Council to improve SRN policies and processes, with a focus on the program's ability to house clients in a timely and person-centered manner and on the scale of the program.

Goal #2

Increase interaction between people with lived experience and the Task Force.
We know that the systems we work and live within often are not designed to value lived experience or foster power sharing. Therefore, intentional space must be created to foster this collaboration. This section contains recommendations related to this goal.

Recommendations

1

Hold at least one yearly session dedicated to conversation between Interagency Task Force members and people with lived experience of homelessness.

2

Consult people with lived experience to advise and participate in the development of State homelessness-related policy and programmatic decisions.

3

Ensure lived experience members of the Council, Subcommittee on Youth Homelessness and similar groups are offered support if desired to maximize their participation in these groups, including the opportunity to meet in an affinity group.

4

Explore weighing lived experience of homelessness or housing instability when hiring for State staff roles related to homeless services or policies. Encourage the State's delegate agencies to do the same.

Goal #3

Build on the strong foundation laid in the Home Illinois FY 23-24 plan in the development of the FY 25-26 plan.

The Home Illinois FY 23-24 plan laid a strong foundation for our collective work to end homelessness. It fostered a new level of interagency collaboration and recognized that an explicit racial equity lens is central to the success of these efforts.

This section contains timely recommendations to build on this work and shape the FY 25-26 plan.

Recommendations

In the Home Illinois FY25-26 Plan:

1

Incorporate recommendations from the Homelessness & Racial Equity Roundtable.

2

Continue and build on the use of local Continuums of Care as partners in local policy and funding allocation decisions.

3

Expand the capacity of Interagency Task Force departments to solicit, receive and implement feedback from community experts around program and policy development.

Recommendations

In the Home Illinois FY25-26 Plan:

4

Elevate the lessons learned and the outcomes achieved through Home Illinois-connected pilot projects.

5

Include a status update on each of the State actions committed to in the Home Illinois FY23-24 plan and explain barriers encountered, lessons learned and next steps.

6

Include housing and shelter needs of asylum seekers/ new arrivals.

12/14 Interagency Council Presentation

  • We are going to present the recommendations to the Interagency Task Force during their 12/14 meeting
  • Goals:
    • build relationships,
    • socialize the recommendations, and
    • introduce 5 specific next steps for implementation
  • Now, we'll present the next steps we've identified.
    • We want to hear your thoughts! While the recommendations are finalized, the next steps we'll present on 12/14 aren't. We want the Council's help today refining them.

Next step: Goal 1, Rec. 3

Recommendation: Partner with the Council to host Interagency Task Force members and their senior staff at Council-member's organizations and other organizations to learn about their work to solve homelessness.

Goal: Host visits that are worthwhile for and respectful of site hosts and program participants, build the Task Force's knowledge and create excitement about the collective work.

Next steps:

  • Aiming for sites visits in February, OPEH staff will support planning logistics
  • During the 12/14 presentation will solicit input from Interagency Council members about site types of interest, locations, etc.

Discussion Questions:

  • What have you seen make programmatic site visits mutually meaningful?
  • What types of sites might be most relevant for state leaders to visit going into the next Home Illinois plan?
  • What other thoughts, comments, or ideas do you have?

Next step: Goal 2, Rec. 1

Recommendation: Hold at least one yearly session dedicated to conversation between the Interagency Task Force and people with lived experience of homelessness.

Goal: Increase mutually meaningful interaction b/t the Task Force and people with lived experience in order to inform policy.

Next steps:

  • Recommend that the March 2024 Interagency Task Force meeting include a conversation b/t the Council and people with lived experience.
  • This will be right before the Home Illinois 25-26 plan is released and the FY25 State budget will be in the planning process, opportunity to engage around these.
  • SHPA through the OPEH TA Center contract can support planning/logistics along with the Council.

Discussion Questions:

  • How should this conversation be structured?
  • Who should be invited?
  • What should our goals be for what State staff might take away from this conversation?

Next step: Goal 3, Rec. 3

Recommendation: Expand the capacity of Interagency Task Force departments to solicit, receive and implement feedback from community experts around program and policy development.

Background: The Council's report uplifted recs. from other community groups which present opportunities for the State. Utilize the four new Home Illinois Fellows to facilitate this work where possible.

Next steps:

  • Recommend that the Interagency Task Force create workgroups that bring together relevant agencies (IHDA, DCEO, DHS, etc.) to focus on community recommendations raised in the report.

Examples of potential work groups:

  • rural homelessness,
  • increasing access to public benefits, or
  • increasing housing access for people required to register as sex offenders

Are these the right focus areas? Do you have recommendations or would you like to be looped in further?

Next step: Goal 1, Rec. 7

Recommendation: Collaborate with the Council to improve SRN policies and processes, with a focus on the program's ability to house clients in a timely and person-centered manner.

Background: Recognizing that SRN must be one tool in a much larger strategy to end homelessness in Illinois, this work is an example of the way the Council and the Task Force can collaborate to uplift community insights and improve State programs together.

Next steps:

  • Council workgroup to request a meeting with relevant IDHS, IHDA, and delegate agency staff to engage around the work group's findings and next steps.

Next step: Goal 3, Rec. 6

Recommendation: Building on this groundwork, we recommend the Home Illinois FY 25-26 plan…include housing and shelter needs of asylum seekers.

Goal: Avoid silo-ing the responses to asylum seekers and to other Illinoisans experiencing homelessness in order to integrate best practices into the supports available to both groups and recognize that the wellbeing of all neighbors is interconnected.

Next steps:

  • We are working with OPEH to determine if relevant State staff can present on the State's plans and actions so far at the 12/14 Task Force meetings as an initial step.

Discussion- Implementation steps

  • Do the five implementation steps we just talked through feel like the right immediate next steps?
  • Are there other recommendations identified in the report that you feel should be included in immediate action items (1-4 months)?
  • Where else do you see opportunities for greater coordination between the Council and the Interagency Task Force?

Discussion- Recs. development process

  • Strengths this year:
    • Collaborative process,
    • engaged Council work group,
    • staffing support for writing and project management
  • Challenges this year:
    • Relatively quick timeline,
    • breadth of possible and worthwhile topics, and
    • question of what recommendations make best use of the Council's perspective
  • What can we learn to inform how we structure the process of developing recommendations next year?
  • What would we like to adjust?
  • What should we continue doing?
  • Are there things the Council should do throughout the year to support the next recommendations development process?
Thank you!
  • Thanks to each of you for your work on this project!
    • Special thanks to Otha, Jennifer, Niya, Ron, Tamela, Brenda, and Susan for their leadership in the work group.
  • Please attend the Interagency Task Force meeting if you're able on 12/14 from 1 pm to 2:30 pm. The link is available here: dhs.state.il.us/page.aspx?item=157073