You are invited to join The National Center on Family Homelessness at the Massachusetts State House to commemorate National Homelessness Awareness Month during the launch of Looking Into Light, a photo exhibit that highlights stories of homeless families and children. The exhibit engages viewers in the experience of family homelessness and the plight of homeless children, explores why families with young children are a sizable and growing part of the American homeless population, and opens viewers to the vision that with their participation we can put an end to this problem. The exhibit will be on display November 14-18 in Doric Hall at the State House (24 Beacon Street, Boston, MA 02133).

New England HUD-VA Conference:

Building Partnerships to End Homelessness Among Veterans

Friday, November 4, 2011
9AM – 4 PM (Registration begins at 8:00AM)
Boston, MA

What Is It?

• A chance to learn more about policy initiatives and programs on homelessness and veterans and their implications for local homeless systems and providers
• An opportunity to meet and establish relationships with local agencies in your area working with homeless veterans
• Builds on recent and ongoing partnership-building activities

Who Should Attend?

• Staff from agencies serving veterans and/or homeless people, Continuum of Care representatives, state and local government staff, ten-year planners, veterans service organizations, service providers, HUD homeless grantees and sponsors, VA staff, HUD staff, Public Housing Agencies, and any other agency involved with homeless or veterans related issues.

How Do I Register?

• Each individual must register by October 21, 2011 in one of two ways:

1. Click here to fill out the registration online or
2. Click here to download the registration form and fax it to (617) 266-4343

The Commonwealth Workforce Coalition  invites you to the Boston                  Networking Group

 Tuesday, November 8^th, 2011
9:00 AM to 11:00 AM
at the International Institute of New England – Boston Office

This Commonwealth Workforce Coalition network session is open to all workforce development professionals, and: is especially relevant for direct service and supervisory staff; provides a forum to share experiences, discuss on-the-job challenges; learn from peers, build contacts; find support for your work, and; will focus on networking.

This training is provided for you at no cost but online registration is required by November 1^st, 2011. Please see registration instructions on second page of attached flyer.

Click here more information and registration instructions.

Click here to find out more about this training and other CWC activities.

Thank you to all who attended last week’s stabilization strategy session.  As promised we have consolidated all of the notes and flip charts from the convening and put everything together into this document.   Please share these notes as you see fit throughout your agency and region.

Some common themes that emerged from the four discussion sessions include:

• A general lack of clarity around the exact role of the stabilization worker – workers are expected to be experts in too many areas.
• Needed clarification around the difference between home based case management and stabilization services.  Without this clarity is it challenging to set priorities.
• Family empowerment is lacking in the current stabilization model
• Families are unable to access to the necessary resources to stabilize their families, including: child care, transportation, GED and job training programs
• There is a need to create more partnerships, make better connections between provider agencies and staff
• There is a need to improve communication and collaboration between networks, agencies, and staff
• The need to create a stabilization tier system through triage
  • Families that need check ins
  • Families with moderate barriers
  • Families with extreme barriers

We have also reviewed your evaluation and survey feedback and will be announcing future trainings and convenings in the near future.

The Department of Veterans Affairs, VA Boston Healthcare System and, VA Bedford invite you to:

The Homeless Veteran Outreach Summit

Please join in collaboration with our Federal, State, Community and Homeless Veteran Partners, to continue our work in ending homelessness among veterans throughout the region. This meeting will highlight the progress made, and provide an opportunity to strengthen our partnerships to provide “faster, better, smarter” strategies as we work towards this goal.

This meeting will focus on the overarching goal of bringing all of our resources together in order to be successful in this effort.

We will be joined by:

Michael S. Galloucis, Department of Veterans Affairs, Executive Director of the  Office of Public and Intergovernmental Affairs

Where:  Chelsea Soldiers Home, 91 Crest Avenue, Chelsea, MA

When:  October 20^th, 9:30 AM-12:30 PM (REGISTRATION BEGINS AT 8:30 AM)

RSVP:  Please send an email to  Nancy.Lauria@va.gov to let them know if you  plan to attend

Click here for more information.

On Wednesday October 5^th One Family in partnership with the United Way of Massachusetts Bay and Merrimack Valley hosted the Stabilization Strategy Session: Envisioning a Model of Housing Support and Opportunity.  The goals of the session were to:

• Share and enhance a common understanding of what stabilization is and what it can/should be in our system;
• Better define and understand the roles we all (Networks and HomeBASE Providers) play in creating and implementing a new stabilization model;
• Identify the types of trainings and convening that would benefit you, your staff and the field over the next year.

We felt that the session was a good beginning to several important conversations about what stabilization is, each of our roles and responsibilities, how we measure success in stabilization, and what we as convening organizations can do to support the development of a stabilization model that achieves the best possible outcomes for families.

We are still in the process of reviewing the evaluations and synthesizing all of the notes from the session, but we post the outcomes on One Family’s Right Resources Blog next week.  The outcomes will also be sent to DHCD and the ICHH for their information.  The conversations did highlight a few key themes that call for further attention, including:

• Clarifying the roles and responsibilities of stabilization workers
• Developing a deeper understanding of the potentials of a peer support model for families in stabilization
• Developing a clearer understanding of the community based resources that families can access
• Exploring incentive-based and empowerment models for family stabilization

In addition to the facilitated conversations we distributed additional materials on stabilization models, programs, and research that we thought were relevant.  These included:

• The Housing Stabilization section of the 2009 National Alliance to End Homelessness report Rapid Re-Housing: Creating Programs that Work.
• A stabilization chart, developed by a DHCD working group, that breaks down the key components of family stabilization
• An overview of the Corporation for Supportive Housing’s Allies for Employment Initiative
• A housing stabilization overview presentation created by Housing Innovations
• The Institute for Children, Poverty and Homelessness’ brief on the relationships between educational attainment and housing risk
• An overview of the Family Independence Initiative’s Boston pilot and outcomes

This was the first discussion in a series of convenings and trainings that we hope will support and assist the community in developing innovative practices in family stabilization.