Sheffield Place

Now in its 32th year of service and with the mission “to empower homeless mothers and their children to heal from their trauma and become self-sufficient,” Sheffield Place is the only residential treatment and supportive housing program in Kansas City that focuses exclusively on highly-traumatized, homeless mothers and their children. These families struggle with multiple barriers to success including mental health, addiction, domestic violence, low educational attainment, upbringing in foster care, and felony convictions, among others. The agency will serve more than 150 families in 2023 – up from just 20 families served as recently as 2010. The agency provides supportive housing, intensive mental health and addiction recovery services, case management, and life skills training. The program features an average length of stay of three months in the facility. Once families stabilize and transition to permanent housing in the community, they continue to receive case management and other services for as long as needed. Sheffield Place also owns and operates 10 houses in the neighborhood for client use.

The vision of Sheffield Place is to break the generational cycles of poverty, homelessness, addiction, and violence.

Goal One: Sheffield Place will continue to expand the capacity to serve more families.

Goal Two: Sheffield Place will ensure the effectiveness of services provided to increased numbers of clients.

Goal Three: Sheffield Place will ensure that the adminstrative and fundraising systems and processes are in place to facilitate continued expansion.

Sheffield Place provides leadership training opportunities for staff. The staff have participated in a low ropes adventure course that taught the importance of leadership, teamwork, and trust. In addition, the staff have an annual retreat that looks at personal and leadership development. The board and advisory council also hold an annual retreat that focuses on an evaluation of organizational progress, planning, and leadership.

As a learning organization, Sheffield Place has a deep commitment to using evidence-based and best-practice interventions. Lessons learned are then incorporated into the program design. Sheffield Place incorporated recent lessons learned into the program in the following ways: First, the agency identified the need to encourage stays in the residential program of 30 days or more. Families that remain in services 30 days or more experience far better outcomes than families that stay for shorter periods. In 2022, 42% of the families stayed less than 30 days; their average length of stay was 11 days. Fifty-eight percent of families stayed 30+ days; their average length of stay was 135 days. The goal is to increase the number of families that stay 30+ days. Toward that end, the agency revised the case management program in 2021 by implementing a tiered structure. Residents enter at level 1 and progress to level 3. Residents requiring additional assistance start at level 0 and receive individualized hands-on assistance. Progress is rewarded with added privileges. Refining the system to enhance client success was an important focus. Second, the agency took steps to instill greater connection among the clients to build community. Residents of the satellite facility received access to the main building so that they can interact with residents of the main facility, and the lobby was reconfigured as a living room for the clients. Third, and consistent with harm reduction and maintaining the connection with aftercare/outpatient clients, the agency recently suspended random drug testing for these clients. Random testing remains in place for clients in the residential and permanent housing programs. Testing in the aftercare/outpatient program reduced participation and deprived some women of the benefits of remaining engaged with Sheffield Place.