CIVIC-PG Track B: Co-Creating a Community Platform to Improve Services for People on the Homelessness Continuum

无家可归包括各种各样的生活经历，从住房不稳定到重新融入社会，从监禁，沙发冲浪到街头无家可归，以及偶发性到慢性，有些人有多种经历，随着时间的推移而变化。作为全国各社区面临的一项挑战，确保政策制定者和社区成员拥有关于无家可归者和无家可归者的高质量、最新数据和信息至关重要。该项目将使无家可归者、政策制定者和其他社区组织聚集在一起，设计一个数据共享和协作平台。该平台将有助于确保无家可归者能够获得服务和资源，同时也为社会服务组织如何最好地利用其资源为这个社区服务提供最佳证据。 我们的政府-非营利组织-大学合作建议共同创建和试点一个社区平台，支持数据集成工作，以便在最需要的时间，地点和人员中更及时，更有针对性地提供环绕式服务。奥斯汀市此前已投资于更有效地利用其数据-一个关键的例子是经济适用房搜索工具，该工具是2019年美国代码峰会的结果。奥斯汀市中心社区法院（DACC）创新的强化案件管理计划为无家可归者提供服务，包括药物滥用治疗，咨询，公共福利申请援助，求职援助和临时住房。良好的系统，UT大挑战，已与DACC和奥斯汀市的其他部门合作，以改善对无家可归者的服务，包括60多个与个案经理和服务提供者的访谈，以及对无家可归者的100多项调查。该平台将包括一个面向公众的仪表板，提供奥斯汀市理事会区一级的信息，创建一个共享界面，使服务提供商、用户和社区成员能够获得和共享有关资源可用性和需求的信息。该系统的后端将作为奥斯汀市的数字孪生模型，可以更准确地预测何时何地需要资源，只有完成谅解备忘录和数据共享协议的可信组织合作伙伴才能访问。该系统将使用户能够对未来的服务和资源需求做出基于证据的预测。服务提供者将能够提供更及时和更有针对性的服务，以主动满足这些社区需求。因此，该平台将弥合必要资源和服务与社区需求之间的差距。弥合基本资源和服务社区需求之间的差距-是NSF、国土安全部和能源部之间的合作。该奖项反映了NSF的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

Homelessness encompasses a wide range of lived experiences, from housing instability to reintegration from incarceration, couch-surfing to street homelessness, and episodic to chronic, with some people having multiple experiences, changing over time. As a challenge facing communities nationwide, it is vital to ensure that policymakers and community members have high-quality, up-to-date, data and information about homelessness and the people who are experiencing it. This project will bring together people experiencing homelessness, policymakers, and other community organizations to design a platform for data sharing and collaboration. The platform will help to ensure that people experiencing homelessness can access services and resources, while also providing the best evidence possible for how social service organizations can best leverage their resources to serve this community. Our government-nonprofit-university collaboration proposes to co-create and pilot a community platform supporting data integration efforts allowing for more timely and tailored provision of wrap-around services when, where, and by whom they are most needed. The City of Austin previously has invested in more effectively using its data – a key example is the Affordable Housing Search Tool, which resulted from the 2019 Code for America Summit. The Downtown Austin Community Court (DACC) innovative Intensive Case Management program provides services to people on the homelessness continuum, including substance abuse treatment, counseling, assistance with public benefits applications, job search assistance, and temporary housing. Good Systems, a UT Grand Challenge, has partnered with DACC and other City of Austin departments to improve services for people on the homelessness continuum, including over 60 interviews with case managers and service providers, and over 100 surveys from people on the homelessness continuum. This platform will include a public-facing dashboard providing information at the Austin City Council District level creating a shared interface enabling service providers, users, and community members to obtain and share information about resource availability and needs. The back-end of the system will serve as a digital twin for the City of Austin, allowing for more accurate prediction of when and where resources will be needed, which will only be accessible to trusted organizational partners who complete a memorandum of understanding and a data sharing agreement. The system will empower users to make evidence-based predictions about future service and resource needs. Service providers will be enabled to provide more timely and tailored services to proactively address these community needs. Hence, the platform will bridge the gap between essential resources and services and community needs.This project is in response to the Civic Innovation Challenge program—Track B. Bridging the gap between essential resources and services & community needs—and is a collaboration between NSF, the Department of Homeland Security, and the Department of Energy.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.