What is Housing First Housing First uses housing

What is Housing First? Housing First uses housing as a starting point rather than an end goal. Providing housing is what a Housing First service does before it does anything else… A Housing First service is able to focus immediately on enabling someone to successfully live in their own home as part of a community. Source: Housing First Guide Europe www. housingfirstguide. eu English, French, Italian, Spanish, Hungarian, Czech, and coming soon Swedish and German

What is Housing First? • a recovery-oriented approach to homelessness • moving people who experience homelessness into independent and permanent housing as quickly as possible, • no preconditions • providing people with additional services and supports as needed • The underlying principle of Housing First is that people are more successful in moving forward with their lives if they are first housed (Framework for Housing First, 2013)

What does Housing First look like? • Housing comes first, not after someone is deemed ready • There are no conditions, like sobriety, applied to tenants • People are not discharged into homelessness

Core principles 1. Housing is a human right: Legal security of tenure, affordability, habitability, location, etc. 2. Choice control for service users: Self-determination = starting point, shared decision making, essential to recovery model 3. Separation of Housing and Treatment Housing is not conditional on behavioural change or accepting treatment 4. Recovery orientation: Focus on the overall well-being of an individual including mental and physical health, social support and social integration

Core principles 5. Harm reduction seeks to persuade and support people to modify drug and alcohol use that causes them harm…and offers support, help and treatment but does not require abstinence 6. Active engagement without coercion Positive engagement with HF users to engage with the help that they need. 7. Person-Centred Planning Organise support and treatment around an individual and their needs; emphasis on choice and control for service users. 8. Flexible support – as long as required Support intensity can rise and fall with individual need, from a few months to beyond. Needs change over time.

Housing First Framework What kinds of SUPPORTS are needed?

Key Supports Housing Supports • Help finding housing • Negotiate with landlords • Build relations with landlords • Obtaining rent subsidies • Setting up apartment • Landlord mediation • Develop skills for independent living Social Supports • Health • Mental health • Addictions Complementary Supports • Life skills - Relationships - Conflict resolution - Meaningful activities - Volunteering • Income supports - Finding work - Education - Training • Community engagement

Housing First – going global USA, Canada, Australia EU: Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Ireland, Italy, Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, UK… Scaling-up - Evidence of effectiveness; Advocacy

Why Housing First? • International evidence – proven practice, ready for adoption and adaptation • Cost effective – reduces costs in a range of services including law enforcement, emergency health care, social services • The shift is not as difficult as it seems – pilot projects can be scaled up • It works; tenants/residents and staff report positive results – outcomes for homeless people, new skills and satisfaction for staff…

Evidence – cost savings Canada – At Home/Chez Soi experientation project For every $10, an average savings of $9. 60 for high needs/Assertive Community Treatment participants and $3. 42 for moderate needs/Intensive Case Management participants. For the highest needs clients (top 10%) every $10 invested in HF services resulted in an average savings of $21. 72. (Goering, et al. , 2014 National At Home / Chez Soi Final Report)

Evidence snapshot - Finland • Implementing Housing First on a large scale: • Homelessness dramatically reduced • Cost savings estimated that for each homeless person that is housed - off the streets - saves social and other services around € 15, 000 a year • Cooperation between govt, NGOs, social and other housing sectors • Integration of HF in national homelessness strategy • Important role for prevention

Evidence snapshot – EU France – study + results = legislation and scaling up UK – pilot projects + national network + feasibility study = increased interest at NGO and govt levels England, Scotland (testing Housing First for Youth), Wales, NI (strategies) Denmark – established practice = impact on homelessness Belgium – pilot projects + evaluation = national policy to scale up

Housing First üPilot projects provide solid evidence base – it’s time to start scaling up üIt works and it’s possible üEvidence shows that it reduces homelessness, respects human rights, and results in better outcomes for people who have experienced homelessness; üOpportunity to use ESF – e. g. Hungary, Czech Republic üIf you have a homelessness strategy – HF can be a very useful part of the solution;

The Housing First Europe Hub • Launched in 2016 by FEANTSA and YFoundation to promote the scaling up of Housing First • Organisations, foundations and public authorities • Finland, UK, France, Belgium, Sweden, Spain, Italy, Ireland, The Netherlands, Norway