Ending Street Homelessness In Your City

POST-CONFERENCE RESOURCES

Ending Street Homelessness in Your City, IGH’s second biennial conference, took place in Chicago from June 5 – 6, 2017. The event brought together 115 thought leaders from 30 countries and touched on what it means to end street homelessness, how to measure progress, and how to solve some of the most complicated challenges cities face in meeting this goal.

To those who attended, thank you for your contributions. To those who were unable to join us, we hope the resources available here will help you feel like you were there!

Opening Plenary

Using measurement and data to end homelessness

Panelists Mayra Aldama, Kimberly Schmitt and Volker Busch-Geertsema discussed the role of measurement as part of a successful effort to end homelessness. They provided perspectives from the city level in Chicago, USA; Montevideo, Uruguay; and on the role of street homelessness in measuring homelessness in Europe.

Defining an end to homelessness

This session set the context for measurement of homelessness on a global scale. The speakers discussed how national efforts to end homelessness in Canada, the USA and Finland developed and operationalized definitions
of success, with attention to lessons learned.

Plenary: Ending Homelessness in Chicago

CEO of All Chicago Nonie Brennan and Keynote Lisa Morrison Butler, Commissioner of the Chicago Department of Family and Support Services, discussed the state of homelessness in the city of Chicago.

Using real-time data to end homelessness

During this workshop, Jessica Marcus of Community Solutions introduced the concept of real-time data, and
why it matters in efforts to end homelessness. Attendees learned tips for collecting and using real-time data.

Using Real-Time Data to End Homelessness - Jessica Marcus

Counting homelessness across contexts

Presenters in this session examined methods to measure homelessness in a variety of cultural and economic contexts. Learn about inclusion of people experiencing homelessness in the 2017 Chilean census; integration of questions related to homelessness by Eurostat, the European Union’s statistical office; and an effort to estimate the number of children experiencing homelessness in seven cities in Cambodia.

Strategies to address encampments

This session shared lessons for addressing homelessness among people living in encampments. Presenters shared context and lessons learned from the USA, with a special focus on an encampment resolution approach in San Francisco, and from the United Kingdom.

Migration and homelessness

This international panel addressed homelessness among cross-country migrants in South America; internal migrants in Kazakhstan; and asylum-seekers in Europe. Discussion surfaced common challenges across these contexts and any promising approaches.

Legal and enforcement issues

This session examined questions related to engaging law enforcement in efforts to end street homelessness and considered homelessness and legal issues broadly.

Begging and panhandling

This session examined the nature of begging in different contexts, including how begging interacts with public perception, outreach work and efforts to address homelessness.

Solutions Showcase

This session explored a series of projects, campaigns or innovations related to ending street homelessness through short presentations.

Plenary

The Latin American Network on Homelessness presented about the work that they are doing with redLAC, and IGH board member and President of Community Solutions Rosanne Haggerty spoke about the need for building coalitions and honesty in work to end homelessness.

Plenary - Latin American Network on Homelessness

Using Housing First to End UK Street Homelessness:

Opportunities and Challenges

This workshop explored the opportunities and challenges surrounding the housing first approach as a strategy to end street homelessness in the United Kingdom (UK).

Using Housing First to End UK Street Homelessness - Nicholas Pleace

Tackling Homelessness in India with Grace, Dignity, Rights and Equity

This workshop unpacked information about the experience of homelessness across India, including defining homelessness in the country, discussing factors that play a role in one experiencing homelessness, and exploring initiatives in place to solve the issue.

The CityMakers - Indu Prakash Singh

Is your local community the answer to to ending hidden homelessness? The Nightstop model of addressing hidden homelessness in the UK

During this workshop, the CEO of Depaul UK discussed the Nightstop program, an initiative to prevent young people in the United Kingdom from experiencing homelessness through community hosting.

NightStop: Preventing Homelessness Through Community Hosting - Martin Houghton-Brown

IGH Global Framework of Homelessness in Argentina, Brazil and Puerto Rico

This workshop examined how the IGH Global Framework can be applied to homelessness in Argentina, Brazil, and Puerto Rico. The analysis included definitions of categories and subcategories of homelessness in accordance to the framework, methodology of measuring homelessness in those countries, and policies and practices in place.