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Project HOME Tracks Progress of “Hub of Hope” Homeless Walk-In Center

June 5, 2014 Category: PeopleUncategorized

Photo via Project HOME website


Project HOME released its annual “Outcomes Report” on the Hub of Hope homeless walk-in center earlier this week  The center, located in the concourse beneath Two Penn Center, provides a central location for homeless services in Center City during the winter months.

The report showed that the total number of visits to the center in 2014 tripled from the previous year. There were also sizable increases in the number of unique visitors and the number of individuals placed in housing through the center.

project home 2014 report (1)

Project HOME, an advocacy and service nonprofit for the homeless, manages the Hub of Hope but has worked with various partners to help run it since its beginning. In 2012, the nonprofit partnered with the City of Philadelphia, the Mental Health Association of Southeastern Pennsylvania (MHA) and Public Health Management Corporation to create the center.

“I think a lot of agencies saw the need of the people gathered in the concourse during the winter months,” said Karen Orrick, project manager at Project HOME.

From year to year, the main changes to the center’s operations were to the hours that it opened. (See below graph for hours).

“The time of day we were open really changed who we were seeing,” Orrick said.

In 2013, for example, the 12-8 pm hours attracted more people who only recently became homeless and needed guidance in accessing other services, but  fewer long-term or chronic homeless.

The morning hours in 2012 and 2014 attracted more long-term homeless, due to the lack of other services available at that time. Orrick noted that the center targets long-term homeless because many have already tried various shelters and may need specialized help.

From our Partners

“The first year we were selective in only talking to long-term homeless,” Orrick said. “Everyone else we would refer elsewhere.”

Project HOME returned to this model in 2014 by sticking to morning and evening hours, while maintaining services for newer homeless individuals. The report also states that the center was designed to place “the longest stayers,” as in those living in the concourse for the longest time, in housing.

In 2014, 232 long-term individuals were placed in some kind of shelter or housing. Housing options included everything from market-rate apartments, transitional housing and permanent housing to safe havens, shelters and assessment centers.

“Despite the great work of the Hub of Hope winter initiative, sadly people remain living in the concourse and the streets of Philadelphia,” the report concluded.

“However, the project allows further assessment of applicable and practical resources, increased conversation and problem solving city wide, and realization that some people living on the streets are known and reached, but others still are waiting to be found.”

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Graph via Project Home Project Outcomes Report

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