Housing Development

Missouri Department of Mental Health Housing Team

Technical Assistance From DMH Housing Unit Staff

The Missouri Department of Mental Health (DMH) Housing Unit is a resource for technical assistance for agencies seeking to develop affordable and/or supportive housing for people with and without disabilities anywhere within the State of Missouri.

If your agency is considering such a project, contact Liz Hagar-Mace, DMH Housing Director, as an initial step (see Liz Hagar-Mace's contact information here).

DMH Housing is primarily concerned with housing development for persons with disabilities in the State of Missouri. If your agency wants to create supportive housing for people who are homeless with disabilities and wishes to apply for funding through a Missouri Continuum of Care (CoC), DMH Housing can help with technical assistance no matter where your project is located within the state. We can provide advice on housing options, funding issues, and numerous other critical aspects of your project. If you're not sure which Continuum of Care to work with (or what a Continuum of Care is), see the section describing the Continuum of Care funding process.

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Housing Toolkit

The Housing Toolkit is an invaluable reference work on how to develop community-based supportive housing for people with disabilities. It is the result of recommendations made by the Transformation Housing Implementation Work Group and was created by Francie Broderick, who served for 22 years as the executive director for Places for People in St. Louis--a community agency that became a leader in Missouri in the development of supportive housing alternatives for homeless persons living with disabilities, including AIDs and addiction.

The Housing Toolkit was written primarily with community mental health centers in mind--those agencies, along with the Department of Mental Health itself, at the forefront of moving persons with disabilities from institutionalization into community living. The creation of new supportive housing--either through new bricks-and-mortar projects or through the rehabilitation of exisiting facilities--is an essential component of that process.

Download the Housing Toolkit (PDF 1.52 mb)

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Training Materials for Housing Quality Standards (HQS) Inspections

DMH HQS Training

HQS is a set of HUD-formulated minimum standards of quality and safety for rental units and is used by all Section 8 and Shelter Plus Care programs; DMH Housing also uses HQS in the Rental Assistance Program (RAP). Five of the six members of the DMH Housing Unit staff are certified Housing Quality Standards (HQS) inspectors. In 2008, DMH Housing put together a package of HQS-based training materials for housing inspectors, which are available below.

Any agency that must inspect rental properties for safety and quality may use these materials. Please note that these documents do not constitute an official HQS certification for anyone using them--they just cover the basics of HQS. Certification normally involves four full days of training and a comprehensive examination, and is periodically available from Public Housing Authorities or other entities that administer Section 8 programs.

A Good Place to Live

This HUD document provides a narrative summary and explanation of HQS standards for all areas of a rental unit. It includes drawings of rooms in a typical unit showing the areas on which to focus an inspection.

HQS Inspection Checklist

This HUD document is not the official HQS Inspection form used by certified inspectors, but does contain a useful checklist of all areas of concern in an HQS-based inspection.

HQS Inspection Quiz

This document contains a quiz, with answers and brief explanations, that is tied to the quiz slides in the Power Point presentation, below.

HQS Training Visual Presentation

This is a slide presentation to use in conjunction with this HQS training. It combines pictures from "A Good Place to Live," the HQS Inspection Checklist, and slides pertaining to the questions asked in the HQS Inspection Quiz. Choose a link below to download the file in Microsoft PowerPoint 97-2003 format, or as a PDF file (Adobe Acrobat file reader required--see link at bottom of this page to download Adobe Acrobat).

If your agency has any questions about how to use these documents, or about HQS in general, please contact Housing Director Liz Hagar-Mace at 573-522-6519, or email the Housing Unit.

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The Continuum of Care Funding Process for Homeless Assistance Funds

A Continuum of Care (CoC) is a community-based, long-range planning process that addresses the needs of homeless persons in order to help them reach maximum self-sufficiency. The CoC is developed through collaboration with a broad cross section of the community and is based on a thorough assessment of homeless needs and resources. The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) recommends the CoC model as a comprehensive and strategic approach to addressing homelessness.

If your agency wants to apply for HUD funding to build affordable housing with supportive services for homeless persons with disabilities, the agency must typically participate in its local Continuum of Care. Each CoC coordinates its own application process to HUD for all agencies within the CoC that are seeking HUD Homeless Assistance funds. Each CoC is also charged by HUD to develop a plan to end homelessness within the area covered by the CoC (see below for links to each Plan to End Homelessness).

Visual Aid: Visit the Missouri Association of Social Welfare's Web site to see a map showing all the CoCs in the State of Missouri and the counties that compose the scope of their activities.

The following table gives contact and other information about each Continuum of Care in Missouri:

Name of Continuum
of Care 		Agency in Charge Contact Web Site Plan to End Homelessness
Balance of State CoC Missouri Governor's Committee to End Homelessness Sandy Wilson, Chair, Missouri Interagency Council on Homelessness Missouri Interagency Council on Homelessness; also see MHDC's Web site for more information The Plan to End Homelessness in Missouri; covers entire state
Springfield/Greene-Webster-Christian Counties CoC Community Partnership Michelle Garand, Community Partnership Community Partnership  
Joplin/Jasper-Newton Counties CoC Joplin Homeless Coalition Katie Andrews, Chair, Joplin Homeless Coalition; Tammy Walker, primary CoC contact person Homeless Coalition of Southwest Missouri Joplin: Headed for Home
Kansas City/Independence/Lee's Summit/Jackson County CoC Homeless Services Coalition of Greater Kansas City Shelly Stroessner, Chair, Kansas City Continuum of Care Homeless Services Coalition of Greater Kansas City Ten-Year Plan to End Chronic Homelessness
St. Louis County CoC St. Louis County Dept. of Human Services

Lowry A. Finley, Director, Homeless Services, 314-615-4413

 St. Louis County Homeless Services Ten-Year Plan to End Chronic Homelessness
St. Louis City CoC City of St. Louis Dept. of Human Services Antoinette Hayes-Triplet, Director, Homeless Services, 314-612-5900 St. Louis Dept. of Human Services Ten-Year Plan to End Chronic Homelessness
St. Joseph/Andrew-Buchanan-DeKalb Counties CoC St. Joseph Homeless Coalition Jodi Bloemker, Chair, St. Joseph Homeless Coalition    
St. Charles-Lincoln-Warren Counties CoC Community Council of St. Charles Dottie Kastigar, Coordinator, Community Council of St. Charles Community Council of St. Charles  

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Regional Housing Meetings

Regional Housing Meetings Schedule

The Missouri Housing Development Commission (MHDC) and the Missouri Interagency Council on Homelessness (formerly the Governor's Committee to End Homelessness) jointly conduct quarterly meetings in ten non-metropolitan regions around Missouri to get local area agencies and governments involved in planning for their own affordable housing and homelessness needs.  Any agency or individual involved in providing housing, shelter and/or services for people experiencing homelessness, housing development and planning, or any activity that impacts local or regional housing needs, is welcome and urged to attend these meetings. The regional meetings provide a forum for discussion of housing issues such as affordable housing development, housing for persons with disabilities, NIMBY ("not in my backyard") issues, fair housing, and landlord-tenant law, to name a few.

For further information about future regional housing meetings and the Balance of State Continuum of Care generally, please contact Jenni Miller at MHDC at (816) 759-6614.

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Supportive Housing Development Toolkit

Corporation for Supportive Housing--click here to go there.

The Corporation for Supportive Housing's Supportive Housing Development Toolkit can be accessed here; a hyperlinked Table of Contents can also be accessed from the same site.

CSH's site states, "The purpose of this Toolkit is to provide organizations with access to tools, informational materials, and sample documents that can help them address key challenges in the planning, development, and on-going operation of permanent supportive housing projects. This Toolkit currently contains more than 150 informational pieces, tools, and sample documents."

The Toolkit is an extremely comprehensive collection of informational pieces on understanding supportive housing, financing and development, managing housing operations, and designing and running support services for clients. It includes everything from the broad beginnings of "Building a Development Team" to nuts-and-bolts issues of supportive services like "HIV Services and Supportive Housing".  For any agency considering developing its own Supportive Housing Program, the CSH Toolkit should prove to be invaluable.

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Links to Funding Sources

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