Almost 10 years ago, state researchers conducted a study looking at how many people in Washington state became homeless after leaving inpatient treatment for a mental health issue or substance use disorder.
The results were shocking. Nearly half the people discharged from a drug or alcohol treatment facility in 2010 were homeless or didn’t have stable housing within a year. For the people discharged from state psychiatric hospitals, it was 30%.
In the midst of an ever-growing homelessness crisis a decade later, there’s little to suggest that those gaps have much improved. But now, state officials are embarking on a project to better connect people leaving treatment with the limited housing options that await them outside.
…
Zoning restrictions also limited housing options, Dalton said, particularly for people on the sex offender registry.
…
A discharge planning toolkit, according to officials from the Washington State Health Care Authority, would be a way to both present a list of resources to people leaving behavioral health care facilities and train housing and homeless service providers on how to receive them.
What’s amazing is what they did NOT say: they did NOT explicitly rule out helping registrants! Wow!