Report 2023-102.1 Recommendation 4 Responses

Report 2023-102.1: Homelessness in California: The State Must Do More to Assess the Cost‑Effectiveness of Its Homelessness Programs (Release Date: April 2024)

Recommendation #4 To: Interagency Council on Homelessness

To ensure that the State has consistent, accurate, and comparable data for all state-funded homelessness programs, by March 2025, Cal ICH should work with CoCs to implement standardized data requirements that programs must follow when entering information into HMIS. The requirements should establish expectations defining CoCs' responsibilities for ensuring data accuracy and reliability.

6-Month Agency Response

Because Cal ICH does not oversee CoCs, it would be inappropriate for it to set "policies" for them, as the CSA suggested in an email response to our 30-day update. We can, and have, incorporated language into our quarterly emails to CoC, outlining our expectations of data quality (including test entries, etc...). These emails go out to all CoC leads and ahead of the quarterly HMIS uploads. In addition, we have incorporated this as a standing item for discussion in our monthly HDIS Academy, which was relaunched in June 2024.

California State Auditor's Assessment of 6-Month Status: Fully Implemented

Cal ICH provided evidence that it outlined expectations for the CoCs regarding their responsibility for ensuring data accuracy and reliability.

60-Day Agency Response

As stated in our initial response to this recommendation, Cal ICH provided instructions for Continuums of Care (CoCs) to establish state funded programs in their respective Homeless Management Information Systems (HMIS) and begun receiving data project codes for state funded projects after the audit commenced.

Cal ICH will continue to work with and support CoCs to ensure data associated with state funded programs is accurate.

California State Auditor's Assessment of 60-Day Status: Pending

We look forward to reviewing Cal ICH's 6-month response to assess any expectations Cal ICH sets for CoCs regarding data accuracy and reliability.

All Recommendations in 2023-102.1

Agency responses received are posted verbatim.