Hastings County omits required outcomes in Belleville’s first federal Homelessness Report

The Community Homelessness Report (CHR) is the community’s self-assessment of their progress in implementing the federal government’s Reaching Home: Canada’s Homelessness Strategy, which started on April 1, 2019.

The City of Belleville is a Designated Reaching Home Community, and Hastings County is its Community Entity responsible for receiving and administering this funding in alignment with the Reaching Home directives and reporting progress.

Program requirements

All Community Entity’s for Designated Communities receiving funding, including Hastings County, must:

1. Submit an annual CHR beginning in June 2021
2. Transition to an outcomes-based approach including:
   • Coordinated Access (CA)
   • Homelessness Management Information System (HMIS)
   • A real-time, unique identifier list (i.e., a “By-Name List” or BNL)
3. Report on 5 Core Outcomes:
   • Reduction in overall homelessness
   • Fewer new inflows
   • Fewer returns to homelessness
   • Reduction in Indigenous homelessness
   • Reduction in chronic homelessness
4. Engage Indigenous partners meaningfully, including input on CHR, CA, and data use
5. Make CHRs publicly available

Hastings County’s first CHR (see below) had to cover fiscal years April 2019 through March 2021, covering the period between April 1, 2019, to March 31, 2021. This initial CHR cycle combined the first two years due to COVID‑19 disruptions.

Hastings County’s progress

Completed 5 of 18 minimum requirements after 3 years

As of 2022, 3 years after the start of Reaching Home, Hastings County reported meeting 5 and starting 13 of 18 the minimum requirements for Coordinated Access and an HMIS with the following progress:

• 33% Governance
• 50% HMIS
• 33% Access Points to Service
• 50% Triage and Assessment
• 0% Coordinated Access Resource Inventory
• 0% Vacancy Matching and Referral

Did not report community outcomes for 2021-22 as required

Hastings County confirmed it:

• Had a real-time, comprehensive list
• Could report annual outcome data (mandatory)
• Could report monthly outcome data (optional)

For 2021, data for the List was in Excel, but they confirmed it would be tracked in the community’s HMIS (either HIFIS or an existing, equivalent system) going forward. However, when it came time to report on the core outcomes, no data was provided except for chronic homelessness that they had in the By-Name list:

Although we have had a list since April 1, 2021 we are unable to report annual data at this time, but will do so in the future using HIFIS data. The number of people from our By-Name list BNL, were in fact chronically homeless.

Did not make Community Homelessness Report results publicly available, against Reaching Home directives

I had to request a copy of the 2021-22 Community Homelessness Report from the Clerk as a copy was not available on Hastings County’s website or found in their CivicWeb portal.