The Data Committee met on Thursday, May 27 at the Springfield Housing Court.
In attendance: Pamela Schwartz, Andrea Miller, Charlie Knight, Judge Robert Fields, Michael Doherty, Lori Ingraham, Deb Merkman, Suzanne Smith, Jen Geertsma, Gwen Gannon.
Performance Measurement – The committee reviewed the latest shelter entry and motel census numbers for the region, as well as monthly individual and family ICHH reports. The number of families in motels in Western Mass has continued to fall and shelter entries continue their downward trend. Twenty-four chronically homeless individuals have now been housed with ICHH grant money, with 14 housing slots still to fill. The committee also discussed strategies to decrease turn around time for assessments for housed individuals.
Draft Progress Report – The data committee reviewed a draft “progress report” template, which is being developed as a communications tool to present varied audiences (leadership council, consumers, providers, general public, media) with baseline numbers for the region, showing progress towards goals as well as the challenges faced. The intent is for the progress report to present annual numbers with quarterly updates. This draft will go to Steering Committee for input, and a second draft will be reviewed at the next data committee meeting, to be finalized in time for the Leadership Council meeting in July.
Housing Court Initiative – An updated housing court data collection report was presented. This covered four months of Housing Court Record of Service data entry. There were 168 cases presented from January through the end of April. Of these, 158 were eviction cases. During this time period, 81 of these tenancies were preserved, 19 resulted in eviction, 41 cases were continued, and 24 had unknown results. An analysis of the missing items on the data collection form was presented, and the data analyst will work with Judge Fields on improving data collection.
Next Data and Evalution Committee Meeting:
Thursday, June 24th
1-2:30
Springfield Housing Court
Agenda items will include performance measurement, review of second draft of progress report, update on data integration efforts, discussion of the use of focus group research per discussion at the April Leadership Council meeting.
