Connection Piece
ROC Member: “Hey, I heard you got to meet our newest ROC member, and they were able to work on getting your birth certificate ordered.”
Client: “Yeah! They’re great! That gets me one step closer to housing. Which makes me nervous and excited at the same time.”
ROC Member: *Calls Housing Case Manager With Another Agency* “Hey man! So I was driving, and I just saw the client you were looking for. Here is where they are at if you want to come try to talk to them.”
Client: “Hey, do you know if my food stamp card has come in yet?”
ROC Member: “I have checked, and it hasn’t yet. I will keep checking, though.”
ROC Member: *Talking To A Case Manager Within Their Agency* “Hey, so I know it’s been a minute since we have chatted about this particular client, but do you possibly have any updates on their disability being approved?”
CM: “Oh, actually yes, I have! They have been approved, and it looks as if their first check has been sent already!”
ROC Member: “Fantastic! That’s huge!”
Housing Navigator: “Hey, so word is that your agency has a wheelchair-accessible van?”
ROC Member: “Yup!”
Housing Navigator: “Great! So I can house this client I have today, but I have no way of getting them there since they are in an electric wheelchair. Could you all help me get them there?”
ROC Member: “YUP!!”
ROC Member: “Here is the number to the person at the VA that is looking to help you get into housing since you are a veteran. We brought them out here to see you last week, but you weren’t here.”
Client: “Oh wow! Thank you! I will be sure to call them today! And yes, sorry I missed you all last week. If I am not here, I am downtown on the Southside.”
Connection is one of the three core values of the R.O.C., along with consistency and compassion. Connection has just as much to do with the relational connection we build and make with clients as it does with the connections we as ROC members are always working to create between our client’s needs and the resources available to meet those needs.
Connections are accomplished through underpromising and overdelivering.
Creating connection involves going above and beyond the expected.
Connection looks like educating clients on what resources are available and the processes in place to access them.
Connections help clients overcome the barriers to accessing the services and material goods that they need.
Much of the day-to-day work of doing homeless outreach can become mundane and repetitive. Organize supplies. Pack more supply bags. Drive for miles and miles. Fill up the gas tank for it to end up empty again. Walking for miles and miles. Up the hills. Down the hills. Walk down one side of the tracks, bridge, road, parking lot, or woods. Now walk to the other side. Check the same spots where no one has been staying for a long time. Mosquito bites on top of mosquito bites. Spiderwebsto the face on every trail. Continue to hear from others how those individuals that you have known but have not seen for a while have tragically died. Handing the same person their now 400th lifetime homeless outreach supply bag. Having the same conversations week after week. Getting told that no, there isn’t anything else that they could think of to ask for, or that they need the outreach workers to help with over and over and over and over again!
All of this is the foundation-building work. So that we can be there on the particular day when we go to the same camp we have been to for 5 times this month but come across someone we have never met there before. We get to introduce ourselves, assist them with some food, some blankets, and some hot coffee, inform them that we come through this particular area on Fridays, let them know what agencies we represent, learn that they have been experiencing homelessness for over two years now and have had to move to six different camps within that time frame, and then get the opportunity to ask them if there is anything else that we can possibly help them with? They tell us that they truly just need help with getting an ID and that once they have that, they want to get back to working. They continue to say that when they went to the Homeless Healthcare Center, they were told they didn’t help with that. ROC members who work for the Homeless Healthcare Center are then able to correct that misinformation and educate the client on how that agency actually can help them acquire their ID. They are then able to explain the full process of how all of that works and encourage the client to go there on Monday to start that process!
This is not an uncommon story that we come across; a bit of information leads to someone experiencing homelessness for 2 trauma-filled years that, with the correct information, could have been reduced to possibly only experiencing homelessness for 2 months! These are the instances of why we at the ROC are trying our best to serve as the connection piece in this puzzle of homelessness. We have found that so often the missing piece is simply still in the box, but no one has made the effort or taken the time to check.
#ROCAndRoll
#ROCRetrospective
#ConnectionPiece
