ICA News -February 2025 - Iowa

PIT/HIC and New Portal

The Point In Time count occurred on January 29th, 2025. We want to extend a big thank you to everyone across the state who conducted surveys, entered data, coordinated volunteers, and handled all the tasks in between.

The deadline for submitting all Point in Time count and Housing Inventory Count data was February 12, 2025 at end of the day. We’re excited to announce that all CoC-funded projects up for renewal in 2026 completed their project-level data submissions on time! It’s not an easy task, so kudos to all that worked on that.

If your agency—or any other agency you know—has not yet entered their Point in Time or Housing Inventory Count (sheltered or unsheltered) data, we are still accepting late submissions. We would prefer to receive late data than have missing information.

In the coming weeks, the ICA HMIS team will be carefully reviewing the data and may reach out with questions or requests for corrections regarding the PIT or HIC data entries.

If you have any questions about the PIT or HIC, feel free to contact support@icalliances.org.

This year we also had an entirely new process for submitting sheltered PIT and HIC information through the pitportal.org. We also would love to get feedback about the new portal process at support@icalliances.org.

February Q & A 

Pit Update

PIT Report Common Errors

move in dates
duplicate entries
kids

New: Housing-Focused Street Outreach Framework

**Housing-Focused Street Outreach Framework**

The Alliance’s new Housing-Focused Street Outreach Framework offers essential guidance for designing and implementing programs that connect households directly to housing.

This framework can help CoC system leaders, outreach providers (including directors, managers, and frontline staff), funders, and advocates effectively address the needs of individuals and families experiencing unsheltered homelessness in various situations.

Core components of the Housing-Focused Street Outreach framework include:  

Data and Impact Analysis to Inform Decision-Making 
Strategic Collaboration and Partnerships 
Person-Centered Engagement 
Promotion of Community Health and Safety 
Housing-Focused Approach Anchored in Housing First

Many of these recommendations are broader than any singular street outreach team can implement alone, requiring CoC-level investments, planning, and policy change. The Framework can be used as a discussion tool for people to come together across roles and agencies to figure out how to implement and improve Housing-Focused Street Outreach in their community.

Follow link to complete article: Housing-Focused Street Outreach Framework

New User Training Process

Training Expectations & Objectives

HMIS data input is not your average data entry. It has a few very different aspects that make it much more challenging than one would expect. This new user training has between 6 to 8 hours of videos, multiple documents to review, and quizzes.

The student is expected to learn how to properly input and update client data in our HMIS so that they will later be able to report to funders, HUD, in the multitude and ever-changing ways that they require it. Final testing involves the students inputting practice clients into a mock Servicepoint system.

To complete this training, The student will need:

A computer
Internet Access
6 to 8 hours to get through the material
A week or two to successfully complete their test cases
Training Accounts are recycled after 30 days unless the student has asked for more time
Remember, though the class is self-paced, humans on our training team need time to check students work and respond. This can take 3 business days.
User Agreement Paperwork must also be completed to finish
Questions should go to service@icalliances.org
To get started complete the appropriate form below:
For HMIS training please complete this training request form
For DVIMS training please complete this training request form

How does training work?

In-Person Training

Monthly In-person New User Classes

The ICA Training Team is excited to announce the continuation of optional in-person HMIS New-User training. This is to fulfill the need for users who will benefit from learning the system with a more hands-on approach, while still using the online training videos as additional tools. Below are the current dates we have set up along with the locations in which the trainings are taking place. If you are the person at your agency that requests new user trainings, and think that you have staff that would benefit from an in-person training experience, please fill out the form below.

Please note that online training is still available as an option if this does not fit your staff’s needs. If it is decided that in-person training is the best option, each student only need to attend one session. Each attendee will need their own laptop. The classes fill up at 10 attendees each.

If we do not have at least 3 students signed up for an in-person class 48 hours before the class, the class will be canceled.

Current In Person Trainings:

Polk County Classes- The 2nd Thursday of every month in Des Moines