Covenant House New York (CHNY)

Crisis shelter - Covenant House New York (chny) provides services to youth experiencing homelessness who have nowhere else to turn. The chny crisis shelter is open 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year to any youth or young adult, age 16-21 who is experiencing homelessness. Chny also provides a 20-bed shelter for young female-identified adults, ages 21-24. Youth can stay in our crisis shelters for up to 60 days, or 120 days with an extension allowed by nys office of children and family services (ocfs). In fy2023, Covenant House New York provided shelter and supportive services to 1,096 youth between these two sites. With capacity 140 beds per night, chny's crisis shelters specialize in ensuring that at-risk young people receive basic needs while moving toward stability in a supportive setting that emphasizes warmth and compassion. Many people who come to our crisis shelter have experienced significant trauma, including abuse, trafficking, rejection from family of origin, etc. The focus of chny's crisis shelter is to ensure the provision of basic needs in the form of food, shelter, and clothing, along with appropriate support and wraparound services such as counseling, physical/mental health programming, legal services, education and employment services, and more. Parent/child program - Covenant House New York operates a residential continuum, including shelter, transitional, and permanent supportive housing, designed specifically for parenting youth & their dependent children. This program specializes in ensuring that these young families are receiving basic needs while moving toward stability in a supportive setting that emphasizes warmth and compassion. Many of the young parents who come to the program have experienced significant trauma, including domestic violence, abuse, trafficking, rejection, and addiction, and chny's focus is to ensure the provision of basic needs in the form of food, shelter, and clothing, along with other appropriate services such as counseling, parent training, physical/mental health, legal, vocational, and more. Our parent/child program also offers daycare and other services to ensure that the children are being nurtured in a loving and healthy manner. In fy2023, Covenant House New York provided shelter, housing, and supportive services to 99 parents/pregnant youth and 147 children.

Health clinic -chny operates a federally qualified health clinic (fqhc) through which it provides comprehensive health services. In fy2023, 948 homeless and/or runaway young people received care, and 4,372 medical visits were provided. The health clinic is staffed with medical and administrative professionals who are trained in trauma informed care. This includes a doctor and nurse practitioners who specialize in such discrete areas as family health, women's health, and psychiatric care. The health clinic also provides mental health services in order to ensure we help to meet the significant needs of our young people, many of whom have extensive histories of trauma. Collectively, health clinic staff ensure the delivery of high-quality health services in a compassionate atmosphere. The health clinic also works closely with specialists and hospitals in the community to ensure a seamless referral system when needed.

Rights of passage ("rop") transitional independent living - many people who benefit from chny's shelter program qualify for entry into our rights of passage (rop) program. Rop is a longer-term, 24-month program for youth and young adults, ages 16-21, and includes the same wraparound supports as our crisis shelter. Rop also provides permanent housing assistance and planning for youth while they reside in the program. Rop provided longer-term transitional independent living to 166 young people in fy2023. The primary goal of rop is to prepare and move young people toward independence and self-sufficiency. People residing in rop not only benefit from provision of basic needs in the form of housing, food, and clothing but also from vigorous, evidence-based supports designed to encourage development of essential life and employment skills. Rop helps each resident develop and implement a personal plan designed to ensure that he or she is achieving goals and moving toward higher levels of independence and self-sufficiency. In addition to rop, chny also operates a hud-funded transitional housing program. This program provides the same two-year housing and supports, but for young adults ages 18-24 years old. In fy2023, chny served 65 youth through this hud-funded program.

Rapid re-housing and permanent housing -chny has been operating family Covenant, a permanent housing program for families, since 2018. This program provides 30 apartment placements for young adults and their children, as well as evidence-based interventions that promote positive parenting models for young parents. In fy2023, 29 young adults and 45 children were served in this program. Chny also operates a hud-funded rapid re-housing program, which began operation in late 2019. This program provides apartment placements for 50 youth (and their children, if applicable), with the same wraparound and support services provided to our other permanent housing residents. In fy2023, chny provided housing and support services to 33 youth through this program.