Transforming the Process of Finding Shelter for Human Trafficking and Domestic Violence Survivors: Evaluating the Safe Shelter Collaborative Technology App

Background and Purpose: Locating emergency shelter for human trafficking and domestic violence survivors can be challenging. In addition to a critical bed shortage for designated shelter space, there are a number of systemic and technological barriers to securing appropriate and safe housing. This process can be time-consuming and frustrating for agencies that have residential facilities that are at capacity and for non-residential organizations advocating for emergency shelter. The Safe Shelter Collaborative (SSC) was developed to address the current barriers in securing emergency shelter for abuse survivors. It is a technology service/app that helps participating agencies identify emergency shelter in two ways: (1) locating potential beds that are currently available within their geographic network of participating organizations, and (2) providing a means to directly solicit donations from individual donors to cover the cost of a hotel placement for a survivor.  This presentation discusses both the challenges of evaluating an app and the findings from the program evaluation.

Methods: Based on administrative data, an exploratory evaluation of the Safe Shelter Collaborative was conducted using a post-test only design. Administrative data includes data collected through the technology applications each time the tools are used to find or fund a shelter or hotel bed.  This data includes which agency initiates the alert, the time and date of alert, demographics of the survivor through an online sharable intake assessment tool developed with agencies participating in the project, and time to first positive response. Administrative data to track hotel donations included date of request, number of donors, and amount of funds spent on hotel placements. Data were analyzed using excel functions as well as SOFA Statistics (Version 1.4.6) an online data analysis program.

Results: Based on 78 requests for emergency housing by agency users, the majority of survivors needing shelter were DV survivors. Of the women needing shelter, 27 had a total of 73 children amongst them. The more children accompanying a survivor, the less likely there was a successful placement. Sex trafficking survivors were more likely to be younger (18-24) than DV survivors and have no children.  Therefore, sex trafficking survivors were more likely to be successfully placed. Placements were found for 11 sex trafficking survivors as opposed to only 2 domestic violence survivors. Response times for finding a bed from geographic networks were fast with 50% of requests receiving a “maybe” within 5 minutes or less.  75% (n=252) of requests for hotel donations were filled. Total amount donated through the app for hotel rooms: $18,202.33. Missing outcome data pointed to opportunities for technology improvement.

Conclusions and Implications: The administrative data available directly through the technology application yielded information that assisted in the evaluation of the SSC. Significant time reductions in the process of finding suitable placements were reported saving valuable time for busy advocates. Implications for social work research and practice include demonstrating ways to evaluate programs through the administrate data collected through technology and discussing additional applications for ways this technology can assist social work practitioners in a variety of settings.