This book provides social workers, outreach clinicians, case managers, and concerned community members with a pretreatment guide for assisting homeless couples, youth, and single adults. Chapters explore policy and research accompanied by narratives that trace a person's journey from homelessness to housing and beyond. The inter-relationship between Homeless Outreach and Housing First is examined in detail to inform program development and hands on practice. Pretreatment Guide for Homeless Outreach & Housing First shares five detailed case studies from the field to elucidate effective ways of helping and to demonstrate how the most vulnerable among us can overcome trauma and homelessness.
Readers will:
Expand their assessment skills and discover new interventions for helping people who have experienced long-term or chronic homelessness. Understand and be able to integrate the stages of common language construction with their own practice. Learn about the positive measurable impact of a Housing First approach and its moral, fiscal, and quality of life implications. Understand how to better integrate program policy and supervision with Homeless Outreach & Housing First initiatives. Learn how to utilize a Pretreatment Approach with couples, youth, and unaccompanied adults experiencing untreated major mental illness and addiction.
"Jay S. Levy's book is essential reading to both people new to the movement to end homelessness and folks who have been in the trenches for many years. Learn how to do effective outreach with the chronic homeless population, and the ins and outs of the Housing First model. The personal stories and the success cases will give inspiration to work even harder to help both individuals and for ending homelessness in your community."
Michael Stoops, Director of Community Organizing
National Coalition for the Homeless, Washington, DC
Learn more at JaySLevy.com
Another empowering book from Loving Healing Press LovingHealing.com
Jay S. Levy has spent the last twenty-five years working with individuals who experience homelessness. He is the author of the newly published book Pretreatment Guide for Homeless Outreach & Housing First: Helping Couples, Youth, and Unaccompanied Adults, as well as the highly acclaimed book Homeless Narratives & Pretreatment Pathways: From Words to Housing. Jay has also published a monograph and several journal articles on Homelessness issues. He has helped to develop new Housing First programs such as the Regional Engagement and Assessment for Chronically Homeless Housing First program (REACH). This was adopted by the Western Massachusetts Regional Network as an innovative approach toward reducing chronic homelessness and has also been integrated into the Pioneer Valley's 10-Year Plan to End Chronic Homelessness.
Jay received his MSW degree in clinical social work from Columbia University in 1988. He has achieved formal recognition from the Commonwealth of MA Department of Mental Health for his ongoing efforts to help under-served homeless individuals through his direct service, clinical supervision of staff, and program development. Jay is currently employed by Eliot CHS-Homeless Services as a Regional Manager for the statewide SAMHSA-PATH Homeless Outreach Program and Eliot's Western MA Housing First Program.
Jay lives in Western MA with his wife Louise and his two children, Talia and Sara. He is also an avid stargazer. If you have any questions or thoughts that you would like to share with Jay, you can e-mail him at jlevy@eliotchs.org
