07/19/2016

Blogging New Pay for Success Tools for You

At CSH, we know supportive housing and Pay for Success. We have twenty-five years of experience advancing supportive housing to improve lives of vulnerable individuals and have provided technical assistance to over twelve communities planning to implement a Pay for Success approach to create this housing.

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Building on our knowledge, the CSH Pay for Success (PFS) team is excited to announce the development of a new toolkit to assist communities considering the use of PFS to scale supportive housing. Using this blog, we will regularly release new tools to help you better understand PFS – fillable forms to guide your thinking, PowerPoints to engage your stakeholders, and informative papers written by ourselves and our partners.

We will provide an overview of the PFS feasibility process and supply the resources you need to begin evaluating whether this contracting and financing mechanism is appropriate for your community. We’ll also share the key ingredients communities moving forward with PFS have in common and ideas for how to strengthen these in your community where appropriate and practical.

If you are new to the world of Social Impact Bonds and PFS, here is a super brief summary of how it works: a community identifies a social issue and a solution; philanthropic and private investors provide the upfront capital needed to implement the solution; the paying entity (usually a local or state government) does not repay investors until agreed upon, measurable and beneficial outcomes have been achieved.

In supportive housing and social services in general, traditional contracts are focused on the achievement of activities like outreach or case management contacts. A PFS contract, on the other hand, pays for outcomes such as days in stable housing or reductions in jail bed days.

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You may have heard criticism about PFS being too complicated. We invite you to follow this blog as we break down misconceptions and highlight areas of promise to help you form your own opinions about PFS – whether you are an experienced provider looking to try something new or a government entity curious about the concept.

The four PFS team members here at CSH – Andy McMahon, Stephanie Mercier, Annie Bacci and Lauren Fulton – will draw on our experience supporting PFS feasibility and implementation to share lessons and suggestions with you.

Our aim is to use this blog to expand your PFS horizons through our observations, skills and new toolkit resources.

Coming up next: Are you ready for Pay for Success?

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