Improving supportive housing through community input
Developing Firsthand Indicators of Wellbeing in Permanent Supportive Housing Resident Communities
Over the past three years, the Possibility Lab has been working alongside a diverse group of policymakers and community organizations to integrate residents’ voices into policy design, implementation, and evaluation, using a process we call the Firsthand Framework for Policy Innovation (Firsthand Framework). The Firsthand Framework’s methodology gathers rich, qualitative expertise from communities and uses it to generate quantitative “Firsthand Indicators,” which can then be used to identify, pilot, and evaluate reforms that authentically represent community perspectives and priorities.
In this project, the Possibility Lab team worked with the Terner Center for Housing and Innovation at UC Berkeley to collect 660 “Firsthand Indicators” of community wellbeing in five Bay Area affordable housing developments that contain permanent supportive housing (PSH) units. These indicators were drawn from ten focus groups that brought together building residents and provided an opportunity for them to co-create indicators of wellbeing that reflect their everyday lived experiences.
In the Firsthand Indicators data, we identified a variety of themes that paint a vivid and multi-dimensional picture of how residents experience community wellbeing in PSH properties in the Bay Area. In fact, our indicators reflect more than 40 key themes, organized into six overarching dimensions: Staff and Management, Community, Physical Environment, Safety and Security, Resident Services, and Individual Experiences.
The data provide valuable information for affordable housing developers as they seek to create healthy communities at their properties where residents can thrive. It also highlights the need for innovative data-driven approaches that allow developers to view their buildings through residents’ perspectives. In particular, the findings underscore the multidimensional and interconnected factors that influence the wellbeing of these diverse individuals and groups.
Our final report aims to provide developers with a survey tool built from the Firsthand Indicator data, which they and others can use to assess community wellbeing and track progress in creating healthy communities that meet residents’ needs. Through three broader town halls with PSH property residents, we selected a subset of indicators that encompass the six dimensions, were judged by residents as best representing their perceptions, and that can be well measured through surveys.
Over the past three years, the Possibility Lab has been working alongside a diverse group of policymakers and community organizations to integrate residents’ voices into policy design, implementation, and evaluation, using a process we call the Firsthand Framework for Policy Innovation (Firsthand Framework). The Firsthand Framework’s methodology gathers rich, qualitative expertise from communities and uses it to generate quantitative “Firsthand Indicators,” which can then be used to identify, pilot, and evaluate reforms that authentically represent community perspectives and priorities.
In this project, the Possibility Lab team worked with the Terner Center for Housing and Innovation at UC Berkeley to collect 660 “Firsthand Indicators” of community wellbeing in five Bay Area affordable housing developments that contain permanent supportive housing (PSH) units. These indicators were drawn from ten focus groups that brought together building residents and provided an opportunity for them to co-create indicators of wellbeing that reflect their everyday lived experiences.
In the Firsthand Indicators data, we identified a variety of themes that paint a vivid and multi-dimensional picture of how residents experience community wellbeing in PSH properties in the Bay Area. In fact, our indicators reflect more than 40 key themes, organized into six overarching dimensions: Staff and Management, Community, Physical Environment, Safety and Security, Resident Services, and Individual Experiences.
The data provide valuable information for affordable housing developers as they seek to create healthy communities at their properties where residents can thrive. It also highlights the need for innovative data-driven approaches that allow developers to view their buildings through residents’ perspectives. In particular, the findings underscore the multidimensional and interconnected factors that influence the wellbeing of these diverse individuals and groups.
Our final report aims to provide developers with a survey tool built from the Firsthand Indicator data, which they and others can use to assess community wellbeing and track progress in creating healthy communities that meet residents’ needs. Through three broader town halls with PSH property residents, we selected a subset of indicators that encompass the six dimensions, were judged by residents as best representing their perceptions, and that can be well measured through surveys.
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