Mary Ann Priester
Senior Management Analyst
Mecklenburg County Community Support Services
Last month we provided a list of books that provide innovative information and meaningful insights on both the causes of and solutions to housing instability and homelessness. These books provide foundational information that is necessary to understand the current landscape of housing instability and homelessness as well as what policy and practice strategies are needed to make homelessness rare, brief, and non-recurring locally and nationally.
In addition to this recommended Summer reading, the Charlotte-Mecklenburg State of Housing Instability and Homelessness report, integrated data reports, the Housing Data Snapshot, and the data and research featured in the Building Bridges blog, there are several podcasts that present emergent research, promising practices, and timely and relevant information related to housing and homelessness.
This blog post suggests four podcasts that highlight local and national strategies and recent research focused on housing instability and homelessness and provides a brief overview of each podcast and how the content can be used strengthen the systems in Charlotte-Mecklenburg.
The California Statewide Study of People Experiencing Homelessness (CASPEH) was conducted from October 2021-November 2022. It consisted of 3,200 surveys and 365 in-depth interviews with people experiencing homelessness. This podcast provides an easy-to-understand synopsis of the findings from the study and disproves many of the assumptions we make about homelessness. Findings from this study can and should be used to design effective programs and policies not only in the state of California but also locally and nationally.
This five-part documentary podcast examines the issue of homelessness. The series engages people who are experiencing homelessness as they navigate the homeless services system in Oakland, California. The host explores what is being done to help people exit homelessness to stable housing and components of the system including coordinated entry, housing first, by name lists, and housing programs. It provides important insights on what solutions work, how and why limited resources are prioritized, and the challenges people face while navigating complex, often fragmented and under-resourced, service systems.
Hosted by Shawn Liu, Director of Communications for the Department of Veterans Affairs’ Homeless Programs Office, the Ending Veteran Homelessness podcast highlights national VA strategies and how they are being implemented at the local level to ensure all veterans have a safe, decent, and affordable place to live. While the podcast focuses specifically on veteran homelessness, the strategies presented could be implemented across populations to better serve people experiencing homelessness and housing instability.
UCLA Housing Voice is a podcast series hosted by Shane Phillips, the housing initiative manager at the UCLA Lewis Center for Regional Policy Studies. The podcast seeks to decrease the time it takes for academic research to impact practice and features interviews with housing researchers to discuss their work and its practical applications. This regularly updated podcast features research on housing affordability, development, displacement, homelessness, equity, and housing policy both within the United States and internationally.
WHY IT MATTERS
These podcasts not only offer an engaging, on-the-go way to learn more about the causes, solutions, and experiences of homelessness. The content presented can also be used to inform solutions, strategies, and system level improvements in Mecklenburg County.
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