A Cohesive Set of Essential Services
The NetWork’s distinctive yet practical approach consists of the integration of five core elements:
- Immediate access to safe, affordable housing with a flexible (but time limited) rent subsidy calculated to match a participant’s financial and social needs;
- Behavioral health services, including supporting one’s recovery, managing relapse and providing access to mental health counseling and services;
- Primary health care emphasizing prevention and early intervention;
- Employment and education consisting of short term work and access to job training and placement for full time employment; and,
- Community building and renewal, including efforts to promote community and a sense of belonging, volunteer service, and re-engagement with family and friends.
Our approach also addresses a simple but often overlooked reality that high-risk men are typically isolated and, in many cases, rejected by their friends, family and community. Laws, regulations, personal histories, and public perceptions create a brutal reality that hinders a person’s ability to become productive and often encourages and reinforces one’s own negative attitudes and behaviors.
The NetWork builds a genuine community through a series of daily gatherings, rituals and routines that provide predictability and positive experiences for participants. This community experience is the spark that transforms the five core components into something unique. This innovative endeavor is designed to respond immediately to participants’ most basic needs: safe, decent affordable housing and income. Once the basic needs of shelter and work are met, the value and impact of other services accelerates. The core ingredients of The NetWork’s approach are also proven means for reducing recidivism and criminal activity. And in the future, we are willing to share some of the financial risk if these better results are not achieved.
Quite simply, we have emerging evidence that The NetWork is a proven means for reducing State spending, creating new jobs, and achieving much better results for an expensive group of high risk consumers of public services.
