APPENDIX B

Methodology and Interview Questions for Case Studies

The purpose of the case study research was to determine how to best manage assets, ensure quality service provision, and support people experiencing homelessness. In all locations, interviews were conducted with transit agency staff, their identified partners in homelessness work, and a few additional homeless service providers and advocates that the authors knew through their networks. In the transit agency staff interviews, the authors asked about experiences working with people experiencing homelessness, programs, and policies in relation to homelessness, relationships with partners, lessons they wanted to share with other transit agencies, and information and resources they need to better achieve their goals in serving housed and unhoused system users. The cases included:

• Primary data collection from interviews (about five to six per site), with a mix of:
  • Program point person/response point person
  • Enforcement
  • Operations
  • Interagency policy staff
  • Customer relations/engagement
  • Social service providers (including the continuum of care)
• Secondary data:
  • Completed internal relevant staff or customer surveys
  • Program documentation
  • Newspaper articles

During the interviews with the homeless service providers and advocates, the authors asked about their experiences working with the transit agency (formally or informally), what they wished transit agency staff knew about homelessness, and how transit agencies could respond differently to homelessness (if relevant). The authors were seeking out developed and undeveloped partnerships to ensure that different perspectives were brought into recommendations and to learn from service providers that might serve a population overlooked in current programming or responses. This may especially be the case in addressing racial equity. The authors were seeking to understand, from the homelessness service providers’ point of view, how transit agencies can support people experiencing homelessness, coordinate service provision, cultivate partnerships, and advance activities to prevent homelessness.

The authors also asked homeless service providers and advocates to share perspectives they have heard from their houseless clients. While asking for housed people to speak for unhoused people can be problematic, a number of homeless service providers and advocates have experienced homelessness or deep housing insecurity.

The team had hour-long interviews with transit agency and homeless services staff connected to transit agency programs responding to homelessness.

Transit Agency Staff Interview Questions

1. Tell us about your role in the agency.
2. Tell us about your role with the program.
3. How long have you been with the program?
4. Has your role changed?
5. Why was the program created? Who/which units pushed for the program? What were its early goals?
6. Who and which transit agency units and external partners were at the table to create the program?
7. What has been key in launching the program and keeping it going?
8. Have the goals of the program changed over time? What were the original ideas of what success would look like?
9. Presently, how do you define success? What would you describe as the successes? Would the answers to this question change based on someone’s position (probe: other agency staff, people experiencing homelessness, external partners)?
10. What have been some challenges in launching and implementing the program? Are these currently challenges?
11. What would others say the challenges are for this program (probe: internal/external)?
12. What else would be needed to make this program reach its full potential?
13. In the balance of work your agency does, where do you think the priority of this program should be?
14. What else could your agency be doing to respond to or prevent homelessness?

Homeless Service Staff Interview Questions

1. Tell us about your organization and your role.
2. Do you work with the transit agency? If so, how? If not, what do you know about the transit agency program in question?
3. Do you work with/on this program in particular? If yes, in what capacity? If no, how are you connected to it?
4. What are the goals of the program?
5. What do you think the strengths and weaknesses are of the program?
6. Which other partners participate in the program?
7. What have been your learning experiences working with transit agencies? What else would you want other transit partners to know about working with homeless service providers when launching and implementing a program? What would you want homeless service providers to know about working with transit agencies?
8. In a list of homeless services, where do you see this kind of program falling? What priority level should it get, and why?