Domestic Violence and HUD

Ampersand from Alas, a Blog has some rather disturbing news about the status of selected domestic shelters nationwide. Apparently HUD was directed by Congress back in 2003 to start "collecting an array of data on homelessness, including unduplicated counts, use of services and the effectiveness of the local homeless assistance system." The data is to be put into an Annual Homeless Management Report



HUD, in turn, asked service providers, including homeless and domestic violence shelters, food banks, housing authorities and so forth, to input client information, including name, date of birth, social security number, and temporary residence, into the Homeless Management Information System (HMIS) – a computerized database to track homeless people. To prevent duplication, they encouraged data sharing between the providers.



The problem? The HMIS Data and Technical Standards Final Notice doesn't exempt domestic violence shelters from this data-gathering process. Many DV shelters require HUD assistance.



DV shelters have long operated under as strict a secrecy code as possible, in order to protect their residents and their volunteers. There are lots and lots of scary stalker-type people who would love to have the current address of their former partners, or the DV volunteer who assisted their partner to leave. For a DV shelter to feed the names and current addresses of their clients into a database to which thousands of people will have access is not exactly good policy. It potentially puts everyone at risk.



The point of the shelter is to be a safe haven for victims of violence. Stop Family Violence Now, The National Network to End Domestic Violence and the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence have more info.



Go to Alas for the full scoop.