Diversion & Prevention: Helping Our Families in Different Ways

A recent blog post was posted by Family Promise CEO, Claas Ehlers, on the expansion of and necessity for diversion programs and it left us thinking. Are our supporters aware that we at Family Promise of Orange County are often able to provide both diversion and prevention services to our families beyond our existing core programs?

In today's blog post, we will briefly discuss what diversion and prevention services are, how they are different, and how we utilize them.

Prevention services are aimed at making sure families don’t lose their current housing. This can be achieved by providing services such as rental assistance or landlord mediation.

Diversion services are to help families experiencing homelessness locate alternative housing solutions to avoid entering a shelter program. Diversion of shelter is about identifying the strengths of families to uncover an existing solution for shelter opportunity.

Family Promise of Orange County primarily helps families through our three core programs: Emergency Shelter, Transitional Housing, and Supportive Services. We regularly provide shelter and case management to families experiencing homelessness, as well as stabilization programs once they have secured housing to ensure they remain independent.

However, we are also able to provide Prevention and Diversion services to families who reach out to us in need of assistance. We provide families at risk of missing a rent payment with rental assistance so they avoid losing their home. We provide diversion services by working with families to locate temporary housing opportunities within their circle so that they do not have to enter the shelter system.

Although Diversion and Prevention are not core programs at Family Promise of Orange County, our work regularly entails generating solutions for our families that move beyond the shelter programs.