Housing Planning

This section of the website is dedicated to housing planning. This includes:

• County Housing Planning Documents

OMHSAS’ County Mental Health Plan Guidelines require each county mental health program to complete a Housing Plan. The documents within this section are provided to assist PA counties in planning for the housing needs of persons with mental illness and/or co-occurring substance use disorders.

• Individual Housing Planning Documents

In order to ensure a consumer driven County Housing Plan, OMHSAS requires the involvement of consumers throughout the planning process. The documents within this section include a template of an Individual Housing Needs Assessment tool, and sample Need Assessment tools from several Pennsylvania counties.

• OMHSAS Guiding Documents

Includes OMHSAS’ A Call For Change, which describes OMHSAS’ vision of a Recovery-Oriented Mental Health Service System, the OMHSAS Housing Work Group Report, as well as other guiding documents.

• Recovery-Oriented Documents

This includes documents related to creating a recovery-oriented service system that supports community-based housing.

• Research Articles

This section includes a collection of research articles including those that describe the benefits of supportive housing, provide educational information, and summarize model programs.

• Homeless Point-in-time Survey Results

This section includes data from the annual point-in-time count of the homeless that is conducted each January. Data is provided for Pennsylvania’s four regional Continuums of Care.