Arizona Homelessness Prevention Project

Drawing on $10M in funding from the Garcia Family Foundation, Society of St. Vincent de Paul of Phoenix, and the Arizona Department of Housing, this project provides direct financial assistance to households at imminent risk to prevent homelessness, and to divert or rapidly rehouse households who have recently become homeless. The project leverages existing homelessness prevention program infrastructure by partnering with more than a dozen community agencies to coordinate the distribution of funds. Community Partner agencies include:

The project also includes comprehensive process and outcome evaluations using both qualitative and quantitative methods, conducted by AzHAC students, staff, and faculty from the 3 Arizona Public Universities. The process evaluation, led by Dr. Micaela Mercado from ASU Watts College of Social Work, focuses on answering the ‘how’ questions related to the identification of households in need of support, as well as the procedures for allocating funds and providing supportive services. The outcome evaluation, led by Dr. Robert Wickham from NAU Psychological Sciences focuses on understanding the long-term impact of prevention, diversion, or rapid rehousing funds by attempting to identify recipient households’ living situation using surveys, case management follow-up information, and administrative data sources. Finally, Kelsie King from NAU Psychological Sciences serves as the Project Manager, and is responsible for coordinating data collection procedures for process and outcome evaluations.

The overarching goals of the process and outcome evaluations is to support the ongoing improvement of homelessness prevention services by identifying the processes and procedures associated with better outcomes for fund recipients. Through iterative refinement, these insights will allow provider agencies to most effectively use their resources to support Arizonans experiencing housing insecurity.