September 12, 2024
Year-end outcomes: JOHS houses and shelters thousands more people
With significant work still to come, the Joint Office shares progress in presentation to Board of County Commissioners
Sharing improved outcomes and accelerated investments in services, the Joint Office of Homeless Services on Tuesday, Sept. 10, briefed the Board of County Commissioners on its work serving thousands more people in housing and shelter this past fiscal year.
The department shared that in FY 2023-24, through the work of dozens of providers, it had:
- Supported nearly 5,500 people moving into homes and leaving homelessness — an increase of 28% over the previous year.
- Served 9,101 people in accessing a shelter bed, a 30% increase over the previous year.
- Served people of color, in housing and shelter, at or above goal rates for addressing disparities in homelessness.
- Exceeded its Metro-approved target spend of 75% of its Supportive Housing Services program budget — and spent every dollar collected by Metro this past fiscal year, and whittled down carryover funds left from previous years.
- Made progress in its 10-year goal for creating new supportive housing units, after three years of the Supportive Housing Services measure, and is on track to meet the goal in only five years.
“I’m proud to show the Joint Office showed strong gains in both performance and spending this past fiscal year, and we have made great strides in our urgency and accountability in relation to this work,” said Chair Jessica Vega Pederson. “What this really equates to is better support for people who are connected to our services. These are shelter beds for people. This is the opportunity to stay housed and safe. These are really good outcomes for community members who are part of the priority populations that we’re serving. And for many, this is a brand-new life.”
“By no means is this a victory lap. This is important work, and we take it very seriously,” said Joint Office director Dan Field. “We’re simply trying to acknowledge the distance we’ve traveled in building a sustainable homelessness response department, while still acknowledging the very serious work that lies ahead of us.”
The Joint Office shared several of its metrics for tracking performance, while explaining that dashboards tracking additional key performance indicators are just months from launching.
Across the system, 5,477 people who had been experiencing homelessness were placed in housing in FY 2024. That’s a 28% increase over the prior year, when 4,266 people were placed in housing.
For shelter outcomes, the Joint Office shared two separate data points. For all shelters who enter data into the region’s Homeless Management Information System (HMIS) — the vast majority of which are funded by the Joint Office — the total people served was 9,101.
Across all shelters, including ones that don’t enter data regularly into HMIS, the total served was 9,392. This is 125% of the Joint Office’s FY 2024 budget goal of sheltering 7,505 people that year.
Joint Office leadership also highlighted outcomes for people who identify as Black, Indigenous and other People of Color.
“As we all know, people of color are disproportionately represented in the folks experiencing homelessness,” said Anna Plumb, deputy director of the Joint Office. “It is an extreme value and focus of the Joint Office to reduce those disparities to serve people equitably.… One way to do that is to serve people at or above their proportion of the relevant population.”
In FY 2024, 58.3% of people placed in housing identified as BIPOC, a higher percentage than the overall population that identifies as BIPOC. For housing programs like rapid rehousing, people of color who were contacted had a retention rate of 90% one year after no longer receiving their rehousing rent assistance — which was higher than the overall rate of 87%.
The numbers follow a review of Joint Office housing data by the independently elected County Auditor’s Office, which found accurate and “excellent results” after the Joint Office worked proactively to address challenges in data reporting in previous years.
Presenters also highlighted work now under way this fiscal year, including the active launch of a Shelter Availability Tool pilot project, the formation of an Outreach and Engagement Strategy Group, and progress on updating shelter contracts to ensure they are adequately funding needed services.
Additionally, the department will launch new and improved dashboards in the coming months to better communicate about the work it’s doing to reduce homelessness in Multnomah County.
Year-end department finances
Presenters shared an update on the department’s finances. In FY 2023-24, the department spent $290 million, or about 82% of its $353 million total budget. That overall budget was far larger than normal because it includes significant carryover funding from previous fiscal years.
The vast majority of spending — $247 million — was on contractual services, meaning those dollars went directly to the frontline service providers who connect people with housing, shelter and other services.
The department also shared its progress on efficiently and effectively using its resources provided by the voter-approved Supportive Housing Services Measure. Over the previous two years, the Joint Office did not meet its ambitious spend-down goals for the measure. This year, however, the Joint Office spent more than 100% of its share of Supportive Housing Services revenues collected by Metro during Fiscal Year 2024 (not including carryover from previous fiscal years).
The Joint Office spent $143 million in Supportive Housing Services dollars last fiscal year, about 80% of its total Supportive Housing Services program budget — exceeding the 75% spending target the County agreed upon with Metro for the fiscal year.
Joint Office Director Dan Field said that while some people ask why the department didn’t spend every single dollar in its budget on ongoing programs this year, the department has to ensure it can sustain programs year over year once the carryover is spent down, which is expected to happen this fiscal year.
In fact, for FY 2025, presenters said they are facing a $35 million shortfall, because the amount of carryover was less than was forecast during the FY 2025 budget process, in part because of spending accelerating during FY 2024. Additionally, revenues from the Supportive Housing Services Measure will be less than Metro had forecast.
“We made a series of major system enhancements and improvements, all of which come with a significant cost. We made multi-year commitments in several key areas, most notably supportive housing and emergency shelter,” Field said. “We’re delivering on the promise of the measure by standing up those programs.… So the good news is, this is exactly what SHS dollars are designed to fund. The difficult news is that it’s expensive.”
Field said that Multnomah County would be looking for guidance from the Supportive Housing Services’ Tri-County Planning Body on adjusting the amount of carryover and tapping Metro-required reserve and contingency funding in order to fill the gap.
This is a shorter version of a story that first appeared on Multnomah County’s website.