INDIANAPOLIS – The Indiana Housing and Community Development Authority (IHCDA) announced today that seven organizations will receive a combined $1.95 million in funding under Indiana’s Housing First Program. With this funding, these organizations will provide rental assistance and support for individuals and families facing a persistent mental illness or chemical addiction across 14 Indiana counties.
“Indiana’s Housing First Program is an important component of our efforts to attack the drug epidemic in Indiana,” said Lt. Governor Suzanne Crouch, who serves as board chair for IHCDA. “While many of our efforts focus on drug prevention, this program will help support Hoosiers currently suffering from an addiction.”
Provided below are a list of organizations that received funding along with the primary areas they will serve:
The Housing First Program was created last year under Senate Bill 242. In December of 2017, IHCDA released a draft program manual for public comment. The final program policy and Request for Qualifications (RFQ) were released on January 29, 2018. The organizations listed above responded to the RFQ and were approved by the IHCDA Board of Directors for funding after it was determined they met the criteria set forth in the program policy.
The organizations will use a housing first model, meaning that services they provide are voluntarily selected by program participants and are predicated on a harm reduction approach to addiction, rather than mandating abstinence. Rental assistance provided under this program may not exceed 24 months, with the goal of increasing self-sufficiency and building support networks so assistance does not last longer than is necessary.
Critical Time Intervention (CTI) is an approach the program will use which has demonstrated to be highly effective at providing housing assistance to individuals with a serious mental illness.
“The goal of CTI is to build long-lasting stability and increase the impact of assistance by developing a community support network for the individual,” said Jacob Sipe, Executive Director of IHCDA. “The strong relationships established with case managers and others in their community support network has yielded good results for both developing and meeting their short and long term goals.”
Click here for more information about the Indiana Housing First Program.
