Ashley Halladay-Schmandt, Director
Having worked within the coalition since 2013, I have seen what tremendous progress we have made as a system and am excited about what the future holds. I believe in continuous improvement and the idea that there is always room to grow, more to learn, and innovative solutions to some of our most complex problems.
I am driven by the uniquely collaborative work we do as a coalition. I have watched our coalition start as a group of siloed agencies competing over ideas, funding and services grow into a truly collaborative group of champions working toward the goal of ending homelessness in our communities. Together we have tackled huge initiatives like working to end youth and family homelessness, ending veteran homelessness across three of our counties, and building supportive housing units in a community with an extremely competitive rental market. We have the ability to do hard things, we have the ability to achieve great things and we can always do more. While focusing so hard for so long on the technical aspects of designing and implementing an effective homeless response system that operates from a housing first philosophy, some of our communities have felt left out of the process and can’t seem to find their role. Without the support of our communities and local leaders, our work will fall short. This work is too important and too critical to the individuals and families we have the privilege of serving to fall short.
In order to end homelessness we must further align the work we do with the communities that support us. We will continue work we have started with other systems of care to build better processes so that no one experiencing homelessness goes without some level of service. We know how to do this work, our systems are beginning alignment like never before and we are gaining the capacity to tackle more complex initiatives. We are finally in a place as a coalition to really move the needle on decreasing homelessness across the coalition. My experience working as a case manager within the homeless response system as well as my role as a team leader and chair of this coalition have led me to a place where I feel prepared and extremely excited to work alongside the members of the coalition to end homelessness.
In memory of Dave Ransom, former, Assistant Director of the NWCEH.
Dave Ransom (1962-2021)
Dave began working for the Coalition in 2014 as an SSVF Case Manager at Northwest Michigan Community Action Agency, tasked with housing homeless veterans and their families. Initially, he doubted the feasibility of effectively ending homelessness, but as he adopted a systems approach to accessing resources, the efficacy of simple principles like Housing First, Prioritization, and Collaboration became evident, making homelessness rare, brief, and one-time. Utilizing these principles, along with a belief in the power of data and system-wide service delivery, Dave and his team successfully identified, housed, and supported all veterans experiencing homelessness in Wexford and Missaukee counties by May 2018.
Dave took great pride in this accomplishment, and valued the lessons learned during this process even more. Dave discovered that veteran homelessness was not solely a veteran problem and couldn't be solved merely with a rapid rehousing program and some case management. Veteran homelessness was a community problem, necessitating the involvement of each community partner in achieving outcomes. He said it required a committed partnership not only with the homeless services delivery system but also with veteran service providers and all other available resources. Each partner had their own strengths and weaknesses, assets, and expertise that, when combined in a data-informed and intentional manner, could effectively end veteran homelessness. Dave believed that the same focused, measured, and intentional approach could also effectively end homelessness at large. While acknowledging that people will continue to enter homelessness, he believed that working together as a community could ensure that the experience is rare, brief, and one-time.
Dave was excited to bring his perspectives to this work in a more general and expanded manner. He believed that the solutions to homelessness lay within the data, and with increased use and understanding of the data already collected, answers could be found. Since homelessness is a community problem, he knew it would take the entire community to bring about the necessary changes. With commitment from community partners, combined with a focused, data-driven systems process, Dave was confident that homelessness within the NWCEH could be effectively ended, making it rare, brief, and one-time for everyone who experiences it. Dave was convinced that this was achievable!