£175,000 put towards plan to end homelessness in Suffolk
A group of council and healthcare leaders want to end street-homelessness in the county by 2027
Funding of £175,000 has been secured as part of a bid to end homelessness in Suffolk in four years.
From this, £100,000 will be directed towards hiring two employees who will help care leavers to live independently.
The money was granted by the Suffolk Public Sector Leaders (SPSL) group to Suffolk Housing Board on Friday.
Both the SPSL and Suffolk Housing Board include representatives from Suffolk County Council, and the district and borough councils.
Cllr Beccy Hopfensperger, cabinet member for adult care at Suffolk County Council, said: “What’s important is that we don’t just deal with issues at crisis point, but we do preventative work and support people before they get there.
“The money for young people leaving local authority care will be put towards preparing them to live independent lives and helping them overcome things like not knowing how to read a meter or properly manage finances.
“We want to make sure people have had the support to enable them to live independently and maintain their tenancies.”
The proposal is to provide ‘independence training’ for care leavers and to include young people when drawing up the framework.
The £100,000 will go towards employing two people: a project manager to spend a year developing the plans at a cost of £60,000 and an independence personal adviser to deliver the plans at a cost of £40,000.
There are 512 care leavers in Suffolk. In the last 12 months, 60 have been evicted from their homes and put at risk of homelessness.
An officers’ report brought to the SPSL meeting states: “Trauma faced in their life makes care leavers some of the most vulnerable young people in our community.
“If we do not support them earlier and build their confidence to be able to live well independently, these young people will be homeless into adulthood.
“Not only is this detrimental to their life chances and wellbeing, but it continues to be a cost to the system via housing, mental health services, police etc.
“Care leavers can live chaotic lives before leaving care, therefore the transition to adulthood and independent can be very challenging and hard.”
During the Covid pandemic, anyone sleeping on the streets was rapidly housed under the ‘Everyone In’ initiative. In Suffolk, accommodation was found for 160 people in six weeks.
The mission statement of the Suffolk Housing Board includes an aim to end rough sleeping in Suffolk by 2027.
The final £75,000 from the SPSL funding will pay for external consultants to advise on best practice from other regions and consider potential solutions to homelessness.
This will be ‘phase one’ of developing an approach to rough sleeping.
Suzie Morley, chair of Suffolk Public Sector Leaders and leader of Mid Suffolk District Council, said before Friday’s meeting: “These are complicated challenges and there is no easy, quick fix.
“But taking a county-wide approach gives us the best chance to address them, using a broad focus on prevention and early intervention.
“We don’t want a single person to be living on the streets.”
The SPSL group comprises the leaders and chief executives of the county council, and district and borough councils – alongside county NHS and police representatives.