Coordinated Entry

The San Joaquin County Coordinated Entry System (CES) of the San Joaquin Continuum of Care (SJCoC) facilitates the coordination and management of resources and services for the homeless. The function of CES is to quickly and equitably connect the highest need, most vulnerable persons in San Joaquin County to available housing and supportive services, in order to rapidly resolve their housing crisis and make homelessness rare, brief, and non-recurring in our region. In San Joaquin County, Family Resource and Referral Center is the administrator of CES through their 211 San Joaquin program[1]. The SJCoC has adopted a “no wrong door”[2] approach to coordinated entry, in which a homeless family or individual can present at any homeless housing and service provider in the geographic area but is assessed using the same tool and methodology so that referrals are consistently completed across the SJCoC. This means that in San Joaquin County, CES is not focused on moving households from the streets into shelter but rather from shelter into permanent housing.

You can download a copy of the most recent revision to the SJCoC CES Policies and Procedures manual below[3].

CES Policies and Procedures

CES is a requirement for all US Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) Continuums of Care (CoC) as established by the HEARTH Act of 2009. It is designed to more effectively address the local response to homelessness by:

  • Helping people move through the system faster by matching individuals and families to the right programs
  • Reducing new entries into homelessness by offering prevention and diversion resources
  • and Improving data collection and quality by providing accurate information on what kind of assistance consumers need.

Coordinated Entry is intended to act as the referral point to various permanent housing programs. Those in need of services contact an Access Point, typically an emergency shelter or 211 SJ, to complete an assessment[4].The household will receive the same assessment regardless of which Access Point they engage. This assessment provides information on the household’s vulnerability and length of time experiencing homelessness, which is used to prioritize households for placement. After completing the assessment, the household is placed in a queue of households eligible to receive a referral into various housing programs. Once a housing program has an opening, the CES will provide the agency with a referral from the queue of those assessed, based upon the program’s eligibility criteria and the household’s vulnerability. Coordinated Entry prioritizes the most vulnerable households who also meet the eligibility requirements of available housing programs.

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