HF and PIEs – how do they work together?

NB: There is currently a very significant shift in US policy towards homelessness and homelessness services, as indicated by policy documents released in December 2022: 'Transforming Approaches to Shelter'.

This shift will require - and offers the opportunity for - a major overhaul of all discussions on the 'American PIE' sections of this site. Whilst this is being undertaken - and whilst US policy and practice evolved - much of the content of this site will need considerable re-drafting to bring out the opportunity that this creates.

The past ten years have seen a quiet transformation in homelessness services in the UK – and in the way their work is seen.

This transformation has been led by three main currents of thinking, two of which – Trauma Informed Care and Housing First – will be already familiar to a US and new world readership. The third goes by the name of Psychologically Informed Environments – usually shorted to its initials, PIEs.

In another page on this site (HERE) we have traced the history and the relationship between PIEs and TIC. But in short, we can see trauma as a particular focus within the overall PIEs framework; and in the UK, we find many services in practice finding the PIE framework the most effective way to operationalise and embed TIC into their work.

But how and where do PIEs and Housing First fit? This is a considerably more complex question - even if the conclusion in the end may be remarkably similar. In short, for those who do know both approaches there is a growing view that the most effective way to operationalise and embed HF in services is via the PIEs framework.

HF services can themselves use the PIEs approach and the specific frameworks - particularly PIEs 2.0 and the Pizazz - to develop their own work. But by adopting the PIEs approach, they can also find valuable common ground with other services in each locality that also use the same ideas.

An on-going exploration

For this complexity we need several pages of more detailed exploration. But these pages are all connected here by links; so you may start by going to whichever area is of most immediate interest to you.

The pages here discuss the differences between PIEs and HF over their approach to universalism in the model; the balance of principles and pragmatism; the role of prescriptiveness in services and in policy; the role of housing stock and the scope for community and group support; and all this in the context of the parallel history of these two developments, in the local contexts of the UK, Europe, the US and other nations in the 'new world *'.

Finally, we have the prospects for continuing this dialogue of development, to tease out further the usefulness of the PIEs approach here, via the proposed on-line working party - the 'Special Interest group'. Please note that this group is not currently active; but we hope to revive it for 2023.

PIElink pages on Housing First and PIEs

Housing First and PIEs - how do they work together? : HERE
HF and PIEs - where parallel lines meet? (the history) : HERE
Principles and pragmatism in HF and PIEs : HERE
Is Housing First itself a PIE approach? : HERE
Housing First and PIEs in Europe : HERE
Housing First in the 'new world' : HERE
Housing models, Housing First and PIEs in the US and the UK : HERE
Housing First, PIEs and the Pizazz (Special Interest Group) : HERE

Other related PIElink pages

Roll out and top-to-toe embedding : HERE

A single framework : HERE

What's the Big Idea? : HERE

'Recovery Housing' in the US and the UK : HERE

PIEs, 'scattered site' and 'networked' housing : HERE

Outreach, in-reach and pathways : HERE

Please also note the inverted commas around the phrase ' new world'. The Americas, Australia and other counties referred to here were not 'new' to the First Nation populations who were there long before the europeans came.

PIElink pages on Housing First and PIEs

Housing First and PIEs - how do they work together? : HERE

Is Housing First itself a PIE approach? : HERE

(Balancing) principles and pragmatism in PIEs and HF : HERE

Housing First and PIEs - where parallel lines meet? : HERE

Housing First, PIEs and the Pizazz (Special Interest Group) : HERE

Housing models, Housing First and PIEs in the US and the UK : HERE

Housing First and PIEs in Europe : HERE

Housing First in the 'new world' : HERE