Friends & Neighbors (F&N) is the sole provider of Coordinated Street Outreach services in York County.  Due to the increase in the number of people struggling with homelessness and housing insecurity the need for our services continues to increase. Street outreach team members maintain current knowledge of supportive services including (but not limited to) emergency shelter availability, critical service provider procedures, community-based services, and York City/County policies regarding the unsheltered population.  As they engage unsheltered neighbors and assess their needs, they are prepared to provide accurate information to service recipients and connect them to applicable services. In many cases, street outreach team members engage unsheltered neighbors multiple times each week.  Through these engagements, team members build respectful and trusting relationships with service recipients and are able to gain a deeper understanding of the underlying circumstances that have led to the recipients’ current situations.  This often allows advocates to suggest and coordinate additional service opportunities that ideally lead to stable housing for the service recipient.  This “hands on” approach is more comprehensive than some other outreach efforts.  The specific activities often include physically guiding a service recipient to shelter, helping to make phone calls for benefits and other types of connections, aiding clients with acquiring essential documents (Social Security Cards, Birth Certificates, Photo ID), providing Tracfones for essential communication, wellness checks and first aid, working with clients to enter rehab or obtain mental health services, providing transportation support in order to return to a safe sheltered place (often with familial support), providing supplies to those choosing to remain outdoors, or those who cannot access shelter space for various reasons.

Prior to the launch of F&N’s street outreach efforts in 2020, no formal outreach services were provided to the unsheltered.  We believe that a “collaborate always” mindset helps ensure that the continuum of services is comprehensive and complete – where neither duplicative services nor service gaps exist.  This leads directly to effective and maximized efforts to make homelessness rare and temporary in York County.

Through our experience in the first year of this program, we recognized the need for multidisciplinary case conferencing for clients who have complex issues.  These clients are involved not only with F&N but many of our collaborative partners.  A few of the partners are: York County Coalition on Homelessness, York County Reentry Coalition, York County Probation, MH-IDD, York City Police Department, Adult Protective Services, and the START Program.  When F&N or a partner agency identifies a client with complex issues, one or more representatives from each involved partner agency participate in recurring “case conferences” to share information, develop support and action plans, and create an overall strategy to help the client.  Continuation of funding for our homeless outreach advocates helps ensure this approach to collaborative client services will become more and more effective over time.