RRHD OMB Statement Part B_Revised 03-17-11

Rapid Re-housing for Homeless Families Demonstration Program Evaluation

Part B: Supporting Statement for Paperwork Reduction Act Submission

Contract No. C-CHI-00943

Task Order: CHI-T0002

FINAL

March 10, 2011

Revised:

Revised:

Prepared for

Anne Fletcher

U.S. Department of HUD

Office of Policy Development and

Research

451 Seventh Street SW Room 8140

Washington, DC 20410

Prepared by

Abt Associates Inc.

4550 Montgomery Avenue, Suite 800N

Bethesda, MD 20817

Table of Contents

Part B: Collection of Information Employing Statistical Methods 3

B.1 Identification of Appropriate Respondents 3

B.2 Administration of the Survey 3

B.3 Maximizing the Response Rate 3

B.4 Test of Procedures 5

B.5 Individuals Consulted on Statistical Aspects of the Design 5

Appendices attached as separate documents

Appendix A: Participation Agreement (Informed Consent Form) and Contact Information

Appendix B: Six-month Tracking Letter

Appendix C: Follow up Survey Instrument

Appendix D: Item-by-Item Justification for Follow-up Survey

Appendix E: 12-month Tracking Outreach Log

Part B: Collection of Information Employing Statistical Methods

B.1 Identification of Appropriate Respondents

The research design calls for assessing outcomes for clients served in all 23 demonstration sites. We propose to measure outcomes for:

• families targeted for 3 to 6 months of assistance who enroll between program inception (excluding those who exited more than 12 months prior to study data collection) and May 2011, and

• families targeted for 12 to 15 months of assistance who enroll between program inception and August 2010.

This cohort will allow us to conduct the study with between 1,000 and 1,200 families (depending on actual turnover and enrollment patterns) and within the timeframe of the existing contract (February 2010-August 2013). Once we know the exact timeframe of the follow-up data collection, we will determine whether it is feasible to locate and enroll participants who were served early in the RRHD program’s inception and have already completed the program. We will not enroll families who have already exited the program if we determine that we cannot locate a high proportion of families, as we do not want to bias our cohort with families who are more easily located and presumably more stably housed than those who cannot be found. If a large number of families have already exited, a decision to exclude them would reduce the size of the study cohort.

B.2 Administration of the Survey

The follow-up survey will be conducted with all RRHD participants in our study cohort who can be located 12 months after they exit the program. This data, in conjunction with the HMIS data, will be used to answer the research questions of the outcomes evaluation. The cohort does not represent a national sample; therefore, the research design does not employ stratification, sample selection, or estimation methods. This approach will adequately answer the research questions, as the research team will attempt to collect data from all participants who enroll in the RRHD program within the study period.

B.3 Maximizing the Response Rate

It will be essential to the success of the study to be able to locate and interview a high proportion of families in the study cohort approximately 12 months after RRHD program completion. We have set a goal of reaching at least 80 percent of the household heads enrolled in the study. The study includes multiple methods to ensure that every attempt is made to achieve this goal.

First, we will work with RRHD programs to collect extensive contact information for the RRHD participant, landlord, and family and friends so our survey team will have good information to use for tracking purposes. (Appendix A: Participation Agreement)

Six months after each family’s program completion, we will send a tracking letter asking them to update their contact information. We will also enclose a $2 stipend with the tracking letter to legitimize the effort and reinforce that we will provide them with a $25 stipend after they participate in the follow-up interview. (Appendix B: Six-Month Tracking Letter)

All participant phone numbers will be printed on a location sheet and sent to specially trained locators who will attempt every phone number on the script up to 10 times and use a custom script to help ascertain where the respondent is or may be living. If a new phone for the respondent is identified it is added to the tracking sheet and dialed. If a new address or city is found, locators call directory assistance to get the number. All contact attempts and information gleaned through the contact attempts will be recorded using the 12-month Tracking Outreach Log (Appendix E).

If the list of phone numbers we have available is not sufficient to locate the family, we will attempt to update and verify contact information using the following methods. First, we will use the Accurint Credit Information Bureau, which allows us to conduct searches using the social security number for last known addresses. The computerized credit bureau search can be most effective in locating study subjects who have moved out of state. These databases also generate telephone numbers for about 60 percent of the cases.

If we find that we are falling short of an 80 percent response rate based on the procedures listed above, we will conduct in-person field follow-up of non-respondents in up to 7 communities in order to meet the goal. We have identified the following RRHD sites in which we propose to conduct in-person field follow-up: all four Ohio sites, the two California sites, Phoenix and Denver. Together, they project to serve more than 55 percent of the annual RRHD cohort. We have selected these sites primarily based on the size of the sample served and the fact that they offer both program models or are in close proximity to a hybrid sites.

Field staff will locate the respondent in the field using standardized procedures for locating respondents and gaining their cooperation. Field training will ensure that field staff understand acceptable practices for addressing and working with respondents in person. Once a respondent is located and agrees to participate in the study, we will use cell phones to call into our telephone center. The telephone center will transfer the call to an interviewer trained on the study. Once the connection to the telephone interviewer is made, the field staff will then hand the cell phone to the respondent, who will then complete their interview with the telephone interviewer. Once the interview is completed, the locator will give the incentive payment to the respondent.

The combination of broad-reaching tracking activities and in-person tracking should be sufficient to achieve the minimum response goal of 80 percent since there will only be a period of 12 months between the program completion date and the date of the follow-up survey. Using many of the same locating methods, Abt Associates achieved an effective response rate of 78 percent in the HUD-sponsored Effects of Housing Choice Vouchers on Welfare Families study after a four to five year period of study enrollment with limited interim tracking activities. If we are not able to achieve a high-degree of responsiveness, we will still report limited descriptive and outcomes obtained during program enrollment, as gleaned from HMIS data on non-responders, and any additional information on housing status that we can surmise from the 12-month Tracking Outreach Log. We will limit more extensive outcomes analysis to those for whom we have complete baseline HMIS and follow-up data. We can also use the baseline HMIS data to describe differences between responders and non-responders, to provide context for the results.

B.4 Test of Procedures

Abt Associates will conduct a pretest of the follow-up survey instrument with no more than nine respondents. Pretest respondents will be selected from among families who have committed to participation in the study and are ready for the follow-up survey. The pretest will allow the Contractor to test the appropriateness of language level and word usage in the questionnaire and to confirm the estimates of interview length. Experienced interviewers will conduct the pretests. The Contractor will prepare a pretest report for HUD, describing the problems encountered and recommending solutions, as necessary, to shorten the instrument to conform to the planned length, simplify the language to ensure that respondents understand the questions, and modify question order or skip patterns to make sure that items flow smoothly and logically for respondents.

B.5 Individuals Consulted on Statistical Aspects of the Design

The individuals shown in Exhibit B.5 assisted HUD in the statistical design of the evaluation.

Exhibit B.5
Individuals Consulted on the Study Design

Name	Telephone Number	Role in Study
Dr. Dennis Culhane, University of Pennsylvania	215-746-3245	Principal Investigator
Dr. Jill Khadduri, Abt Associates	301-634-1745	Project Quality Advisor
Dr. Martha Burt	202-261-5551	Project Advisor

Abt Associates Inc., under a task order to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, Office of Policy Development and Research, will collect and analyze the information for the agency.