This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2016, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.

Jamie (all client names have been changed to protect privacy), her face marked by the telltale signs of her addiction, is a wheelchair-bound woman with severe disabilities. She receives disability payments, but is unable to find and afford housing.

Holly is a 19-year-old woman whose relative serves as her pimp, selling her body for food, drugs or whatever basic needs are required to get through the day. Not surprisingly, Holly uses mind-altering substances to survive her day-to-day reality.

Jamie and Holly are just two of our homeless neighbors. Each with his or her own challenges. They could soon be joined by Michelle, a woman who will be released from prison with exactly $100 to her name, a requirement that she maintain sober living and the reality of needing at least $400 per month for rent if she wants to live in the only area of the state with all of the potential services she will need to remain out of prison.

Letters to the editor and opinion pieces about the homeless tend to focus on the negative impacts of funneling hundreds of desperately poor people to one area of a city. While such impacts are certainly part of the picture, the Salt Lake County Collective Impact on Homelessness process takes the conversation further by focusing on each individual who is living in poverty not as a problem to be solved but as a human being capable of being self-sufficient, with some assistance.

For more than a year, I have had the privilege of being part of Salt Lake County's Collective Impact on Homelessness Steering Committee — the group tasked with finding long-term, system-wide solutions to reduce homelessness. I am involved on behalf of the Catholic Diocese of Salt Lake City, which provides homeless services through Catholic Community Services at the Weigand Homeless Resource Center and St. Vincent de Paul Kitchen. More importantly, the diocese is involved because of the individuals we serve at Weigand, such as Jamie and Holly.

What the collective impact process recognizes is that, while many of our homeless neighbors have an immediate need for shelter, their ability to be housed long term depends in great measure on their ability to find stable employment, address chronic mental and physical health issues and avoid situations that tend to lead back into homelessness.

It is clear to everyone on the steering committee that there is no one solution for homelessness. The idea behind collective impact is to stop serving the needs of the homeless one service provider at a time and start building a better system that works seamlessly, addresses individual circumstances and helps prevent homelessness in the first place, as well as shutting the revolving door from jail or prison to the streets.

As the situations of Jamie, Holly and Michelle make clear, placing someone in housing is only the first step. Addressing traumatic experiences of abuse, drug addiction and health issues exacerbated by a life of hardship so that Jamie, Holly and Michelle can become self-sufficient requires thoughtful, coordinated and individualized care.

The steering committee is comprised of multiple stakeholders who review data, evaluate outcomes and revise strategies to address the realities of homelessness. This is an ongoing process, during which some of our homeless neighbors will continue to struggle to find all of the services they need to move out of homelessness. Many will also face the continuing challenges of public misperception, and some private and public actors will be unwilling to be part of the solution. But ultimately, the collective impact the diocese hopes for is significantly fewer people without a safe place to live, fewer people without access to the health care, employment and housing services they need to lead lives of dignity, and far more people engaged in seeing the homeless as individuals to serve rather than as nuisances to eradicate.

Jean Hill is government liaison for the Catholic Diocese of Salt Lake City.