gold coast project for homeless...

Established in 1984

“INNOVATION FROM WITHIN”

The STAY House Program

GOLD COAST PROJECT FOR HOMELESS YOUTH

STRUCTURE2 YEARS AGO

LAWSON HOUSECRISIS ACCOMMODATION

16 to 18 years - 7 beds

(Department of Housing Property)

BANNISTER HOUSEMEDIUM TERM

ACCOMMODATION

16 to 19 years - 6 Beds

(Owned by GCPHY)

JESSICA DUNNE LODGEMEDIUM TERM

ACCOMMODATION


(Owned by GCPHY)

Independent Cottage1 young person

Attached to Bannister House

(Owned by GCPHY)

MOBILE SUPPORT PROGRAMOUTREACH – Sustaining Tenancy, Budgeting, Life skills

16 to 25 years

GAP GAP

• No rental record or reference

• YP deciding against ongoing support when

transitioning

• Going from 24 hour support to minimal support

• Share Housing – unable to deal with conflict before

they become serious problems

GAPS

WITHOUT THE ABOVE RESULTED MANY TIMES IN:

* The continued cycle of Homelessness – back to Crisis

Not only back to Crisis but being potentially being

blacklisted

FUNDING

• There is no extra funding

• As we are told time and time again

Had to look at INNOVATION from within, how could we self-fund a program that would deal with these GAPS and help to Break the Cycle of Homelessness?

STAY SUPPORTED TRANSITIONAL

ACCOMMODATION FOR YOUTH• Head lease a property from local real estate

• 2 Units – 2 bedroom – 2 YP per house, not gender specific

• YP pay full rent – including two weeks rent in advance + key deposit

• Major rule outside of a normal rental is that there is to be no drugs or alcohol on the premises

• YP sign a property management and support agreement

• Have weekly property management and support visits to start, then goes to fortnightly if all going ok

CONTINUED…

• Have a 3 strikes and your out policy – unless severe enough to exit

• YP learn how to budget along with other life skills like hygiene, cooking, nutrition and cleaning

• YP have regular House Meetings to discuss any shared accommodation issues – e.g. one cleans more than the other

• In their time in the unit YP are referred into relevant services if facing issues outside of their accommodation – e.g. mental health, drug and alcohol

EVALUATION

• After 2 years of program

• Had to follow up with YP after they had been exited from the STAY House Program for 3 months to find out if they had sustained that accommodation for over that period of time – were sometimes non-contactable.

THE RESIDENTS

• Mixed Genders (9 Female, 12 Male)

• Aged Range between16 & 23 (Average 18 years)

• Length of time in program,

range = 1.5 to 7 months, Average = 4.5 months

• Out of 16 who exited – 11 achieved ½ or more of their goals in their case plans

CONTINUED…..

Family, 1

Crisis, 6

Med Term,

10

Shared, 3

Before STAY Program

Family, 1Crisis, 0 Med

Term, 1

Shared, 7

Private, 6

After STAY Program

On exit from the program 50% of young people needed a reference to gain independent accommodation.

On the 3 month follow up the question was asked to young people:

Did the STAY program assist you to obtain or sustain your current accommodation?

0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14

Yes

No

Unknown

CHALLENGES

• Conflict between residents

• YP understanding cleanliness and hygiene and its importance

• Working with body corporations and real estates

• YP knowing where the STAY units are located

• Burst taps (how and where do we turn the water off?)

Early intervention is what has helped workers to get through these challenges with YP.

Educating YP on strategies of how to deal with difficult situations that will occur when they are on their own in independent living.

ADVANTAGES TO YP

• Rental record and reference for future accommodation opportunities

• Learned life skills – budgeting, cooking, cleaning

• Learned strategies of dealing with difficult situations – conflict between residents, complaints from other tenants in the unit block

• Real life experience of what it means to live independently

• How to pay rent on time!

• Learning what makes a good tenant and how to negotiate with landlords

ADVANTAGES TO OUR ORGANISATION

• We are getting results for Young people

• We are working towards breaking the cycle of homelessness –“Homelessness to Housing”

• We are able to look at how we can better improve our service to help young people to succeed better in Independent accommodation

Example

• Checklist of where they need to be at before coming in the program

• What do they still need assistance with?

PREVIOUS STRUCTURE


16 to 18 years - 7 beds


BANNISTER HOUSEMEDIUM TERM

ACCOMMODATION


(Owned by GCPHY)

JESSICA DUNNE LODGEMEDIUM TERM

ACCOMMODATION


(Owned by GCPHY)


Attached to Bannister House

(Owned by GCPHY)


16 to 25 years

OR OR

TRANSITION MODEL


16 to 18 years7 beds


BANNISTER HOUSEMEDIUM TERM ACCOMMODATION

16 to 19 years6 Beds

(Owned by GCPHY)

JESSICA DUNNE LODGEMEDIUM TERM ACCOMMODATION

16 to 19 years5 Beds

(Owned by GCPHY)


Attached to Bannister House(Owned by GCPHY)


Independent Living - 16 to 25 years

STAY (Supported Transitional Accommodation for Youth) Units2 x 2 bedroom units – 2 young people per unitHead lease property through local Real Estate

The organisation used its own money to support an innovative program with so far many successes.

GCPHY took a risk in initiating this program, but without risk, we believe that it is to easy to become stagnant in our approach to supporting homeless young people.

gold coast project for homeless...

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