Objectives

The Canadian A Way Home Hub published in 2018, based on years of experience and research on homelessness among young people and young adults, 'The Roadmap for the Prevention of Youth Homelessness'. They define 6 levels of prevention with underlying action domains to prevent and end homelessness among young people and young adults: structural prevention, system prevention, early intervention, eviction prevention, housing stabilization and a Duty to Assist based on the rights approach.

Mind the Gap develops a Roadmap for Antwerp

We structure the objectives of Mind the Gap based on the 5 first levels of prevention. The Duty to assist is our driving force. You can find here: our roadmap.

Strengthening structural prevention: If we want to end homelessness among young adults, we must tackle underlying causes. We need to fight poverty, increase the availability of affordable housing, tackle inequality and discrimination, promote social inclusion, prevent negative child experiences, ... The Mind the Gap collective seeks cooperation with the various local and regional authorities to develop legislation and policies aimed at structural prevention.

Increasing continuity of care and accessibility of services: We want to support the transition out of care and detention systems so that a gradual and continuous transition to an independent life is guaranteed. The offer for young adults must be organised in such a way that the care matches the needs and strengths of the young adults. This means that we start from the aspirations and talents of the young adults and work out a tailor-made pathway together. This needs cooperation between the young adults, their network and/or family and the service providers. We want to create demand-driven, accessible, available, appropriate and affordable services and increase young people's satisfaction with the services and improve the outcomes of the services for young people .

Investing in early intervention and prevention: We organise targeted support for young people at risk of becoming homeless: we focus on strengthening family and other networks, focus on early intervention in collaboration with schools and youth work, and evaluate towards integrated services and systems where coordinated registration is a first important step.

Preventing eviction: We want to prevent eviction by informing and advising young adults and their surroundings and by setting up a targeted and timely crisis intervention. The actions that will contribute to the realisation of this objective are still being defined.

Housing Stabilisation: We want stable housing for all young adults with accessible support if appropriate. We develop and strengthen innovative forms of housing.  We create reception facilities, tailored to the needs of young adults.  Reception is always with a view to moving on to sustainable forms of housing, whether or not combined with an inter-sectoral support for the more complex living situations.  This is tailored to the young person and his network.