November 2021 HMIS Agency Admin Eblast

Good Afternoon Everyone,

We are providing this HMIS Agency Admin Eblast in lieu of this month’s Agency Admin meeting which had been canceled. In terms of getting credit for attendance, we will use the distribution of today’s eblast as your proof of participation. In other words, you will all be marked down as ‘attending' the November 2021 meeting by way of this eblast.

System Updates

Issue with the Closed services Patch-

In the past week, we have received a number of helpdesk tickets on services that were closed which were opened in mid-July or so. This has particularly affected shelters with longer stayers. Upon looking further into the issue, MCAH discovered the problem was the result of an incorrect draft of the close services patch which was attached to a case at WellSky. Instead of closing services which had been open for one year or more, the draft document called for services to be closed that were open for 90 days or more. Therefore, this will affect clients who have services or shelter stays which had been opened prior to approximately August 1^st where the client was still engaged in services. If you come across clients who were closed and should not have been contact the help desk.

ServicePoint/Community Services WellSky Rebranding-

Wellsky has officially changed the name from ServicePoint to Community Services. For the next month or so we will refer to ServicePoint as ServicePoint/Community Services, eventually phasing out the term ServicePoint for Community Services.

2022 HUD Data Standards-

The 2022 HUD Data Standards went into effect on 10/1/2021. ServicePoint/Community Services was upgraded to 5.14.1 on 10/16/2021 and included updates regarding updates to the SSVF questions, ESG CAPER/CoC APR, PATH and logic of a few data elements.
Data elements on assessment forms have also been updated to align with these standards. Make sure that you are using the latest forms in your collection process. https://www.handetroit.org/assessments.

Q3 Auditing Excercise

The Q3 Housing Move-in Date Audit Exercise is well underway. This exercise is completed for all RRH & PSH providers on a quarterly basis. It helps to ensure accurate reporting of the total clients housed during the last quarter as well as the average length of time to housing. The information obtained during the exercise is also used to update the quarterly bed and unit inventory information in HMIS for all RRH projects. We would like to thank those providers that successfully completed the exercise and submitted their HMD Audit reports (with comments included) by the November 11^th deadline.

Unsheltered Point-in-Time Count Reminder

Planning for the Unsheltered PIT has begun. The scheduled date is January 26th, 2022. The planning team is meeting weekly and Tamara Gaines is the coordinator and primary contact person. Be on the lookout for more information on:

How to sign up for PIT count teams
Known locations
Etc.

RRH Workgroup updates

Emergency Housing Voucher (EHV) Updates

Kudos to our RRH provider for assisting 72 households with getting EHV! Well done! The next goal is to be at 110 people with EHV by December 31. Please continue to work with the EHV service providers to give and get updates on clients.

CAM Updates

CAM is continuing to assess and navigate AG4 clients for resources, specifically Homeless Preference HCV
CAM has new/updated operating hours, effective November 15^th:

Southwest Solutions Housing Resource Center

Individuals, Families, and Youth

1600 Porter

Families & Youth

9am-6pm M, T, Th, & F

11am-5pm Wed.

DDOT Route 1, Trumball/Porter Stop

Healthcare for Homeless Veterans (VA)

4646 John R. st, Red Tower 2nd floor,

Veterans

8am-4:30 M, T, Th, & F

11am-4:30pm Wed.

DDOT Route 4, Woodward/Adams stop

CAM Phone Line—313.305.0311

All household types

9am-6pm M, T, Th, & F

11am-5pm Wed.

HMIS Updates

Longitudinal Systems Analysis (LSA)
Data clean-up for the LSA is under way
Please continue to update your Housing Move-in Dates (HMD)!
All RRH providers need to run their Discharge Destination reports from 10/1/2020 – 9/30/2021 to isolate and review and/or update any “Don’t Know” & “Other” destinations. Please put in a help desk request if you have any questions.
HMIS ESG-CV Incentives Job Aid
If your agency has provided or will be providing incentives you need to submit a Help Desk ticket to get the service added to your Service Quick List. This data entry needs to be RETROACTIVE for all clients that you have served with an ESG Incentive. Use workflow below.

Job Aid ESG CV Incentive Service Transaction Workflow

Longitudal System Analysis: ES/TH

HMIS Longitudinal System Analysis work for Shelters and Transitional Housing

The LSA is upon us and the HMIS team will be reaching out to you if there are any updates or work that needs to be done on the providers side. We will be in contact if certain errors need to be fixed and we will need to respond within a timely manner so we do not get behind on submitting. In the months to come, please be on the look out for any emails that the HMIS team at HAND sends to you.
Shelters and Transitional Housing please run a client location error report for 10/1/2020-9/30/2021 and fix the clients that don't show MI 501 as the location and a Discharge destination report for 10/1/2020- 9/30/2021 and review and/or update any “Don’t Know” & “Other” destinations. Please put in a help desk request if you have any questions.

Training and Resources

MCAH recently released their new Module Course Guide document, which is now available in the HMIS Learning Center under the "Training and Certification" tab. This document provides a description, overview, and learning objectives for modules available on the Learning Center. This guide will be updated regularly as new modules are added. If you have questions about this, please reach out to the MCAH help desk.

HMIS Learning Center- License recapture:

MCAH is hitting their license cap for the HMIS learning center and has started to implement a license recapture process for users that have not logged in prior to 2020. This process will “unregister” these inactive users from all courses and effectively remove their course information from the Learning Center. However, MCAH has exported 2018 and 2019 course information to keep on hand should any future questions or verification be needed. This provides us with all user course results (complete/incomplete status and completion date) for these calendar years.

They have already addressed those who have not logged in since 2018, and are planning to address 2019 users later this week.

This process does not delete user accounts; those will be retained, but the old course information will no longer display within the Learning Center’s gradebook area.

Again, this only applies to accounts that have not logged in prior to 2020. If a user logged in to do anything within the Learning Center (download documents, review a Lunch and Learn session, etc) within the last, approximately, two years their account will in no way be affected.

Housekeeping

When submitting Merge Requests to the HelpDesk, please make sure the last 4 of the SSN are the same on all profiles. If they are not, you will need to verify what the correct number is. The same goes for the spelling of all names, DOB and Veteran Status.

Enter the number you want to maintain in column A. This is typically the lowest/oldest number and will be used when merging all other profiles. Also, make note of whether or not the file is Restricted/Locked by the color of the lock in the upper right corner of the profile.

Your observation of the record is recorded in Column C.

Any documents uploaded to the HelpDesk MUST be password protected if it contains any client data, (name, DOB, or SSN).

HMIS Site