The mission of the Boston Public Health Commission (BPHC) is to protect, preserve, and promote the health and well-being of all Boston residents, particularly the most vulnerable. The BPHC envisions a thriving Boston where all residents live healthy, fulfilling lives free of racism, poverty, violence, and other systems of oppression. The BPHC sets an expectation that all staff and leadership commit, individually and as part of the BPHC team, to hold ourselves accountable to establishing a culture of antiracism and advance racial equity and justice through each of our bureaus, programs, and offices.

The Boston Public Health Commission's Homeless Services Bureau (HSB) provides emergency shelter, job training, behavioral health support, and housing services to unhoused individuals in Boston. We serve close to 5,000 individuals every year, and we are one of the largest providers of emergency shelter in New England. We aim to make homelessness in Boston rare, brief, and one time. We do that by problem-solving with new guests at the front door to try to prevent anyone from entering homelessness to begin with. For individuals who do become homeless and use our shelters, we help them quickly move from homelessness to housing by finding a safe place to call home. Once housed, we provide in-home supports to ensure someone does not return to homelessness again. We use a Housing First and racial justice framework, which is built on the foundation that housing is a social determinant of health and a basic need that everyone deserves and does not require sobriety. We believe that everyone, with the right support, can succeed in housing. We foster evidence-based approaches such as trauma-informed care, harm reduction, and motivational interviewing in the delivery of our services, and we ensure services are low-threshold and accessible to our guests.

PROGRAM/DEPARTMENT DESCRIPTION

Our housing team helps clients quickly find and move out of homelessness and into permanent housing and then helps clients succeed in housing. Through housing navigation staff engage clients in housing conversations, help them assess and access all possible housing options, and coordinate unit viewings, lease signings, and move-in logistics. Through landlord relations and housing location, staff build rapport with current and potential landlords, explain program details, and help locate viable housing opportunities. Through housing stabilization staff ensure that clients succeed in housing and do not return to homelessness by providing in-home, community-based supportive services. Through asset development and income maximization, staff help clients increase their income and apply to and connect to public benefits so that that they can be successful in housing. This position focuses primarily on housing navigation for individuals using substances and other long-term homeless individuals, and is grant funded through June 2024.

Housing staff work quickly and creatively to identify solutions to help each client. While staff are assigned to focus on specific areas of housing support as described below, elements of each are included in all housing positions.

DUTIES

As assigned, responsible for the delivery of services to help clients find, move to, and remain in permanent housing.

Housing Navigation

* Outreaches to and builds rapport with clients to engage them in housing.

* Assists clients to navigate and stay up to date on all possible housing options they may qualify for, including but not limited to subsidized housing, market rate/private housing, shared housing, and permanent supportive housing.

* Completes intakes and assessments on participants to determine housing choices, needs, and barriers, which includes completing housing histories and viewing credit reports and criminal background checks.

* Creates individual housing plans and identifies strategies to help clients remove barriers and find appropriate housing options.

* Assists clients in obtaining all required documents for various housing opportunities.

* Searches for housing opportunities and assists clients in interacting with potential landlords and housing providers.

Housing Location and Landlord Liaising

* Searches online and through all available resources for affordable rental housing options.

* Creates, maintains, and regularly updates an inventory of housing options.

* Outreaches to potential new landlords and recruits them to become landlord partners in the program.

* Completes and coordinates required housing documents including rent reasonableness checklists and housing inspections. Helps client understand their leases and facilitates rent sharing agreements when necessary.

* Matches clients' needs and choices with housing options.

* Working with housing navigators, provides mediation and advocacy with landlords as needed to resolve concerns or problems to help the client maintain stable housing.

* Coordinates move-in logistics, including understanding and signing the lease and obtaining furniture initial start-up funds.

Housing Stabilization

* Uses critical time intervention (CTI) to provide in-home housing stabilization services to individuals placed in housing.

* Creates and monitors individual service plans to address barriers help clients gain the necessary skills to succeed in housing, focusing on but not limited to housing payment, legal issues, income and employment, independent living skills, community engagement, health care, and mental health.

* Builds knowledge of and connections to community-based resources and helps clients utilize these services.

* Develops service transition plans to reduce the level of care needed and refer clients to community-based resources.

* Help clients search, identify, and move to more suitable and sustainable housing placements when necessary.

Department-wide Responsibilities

* Engages all clients using a Housing First approach, delivers services using principles of trauma-informed care and harm-reduction, and promotes racial equity.

* Actively coordinates with other departments to provide integrated services to guests.

* Maintains up to date and accurate service plans, client files, and client records/documents, entering timely and accurate data into BPHC's and the City's HMIS databases.

* Coordinates referrals and connects clients to key services to help them find and succeed in housing, including but not limited to external housing navigation services, benefits and income maximization, community-based resources, and stabilization services.

* Transports clients to critical appointments to find and/or maintain housing.

* Participates in regular team meetings and trainings.

* Working to help BPHC become an antiracist organization by meeting or exceeding the standards set by the BPHC Anti-Racism Policy.