January HMIS News

Clarity Security Enhancement  Earlier this month Clarity released a software update that prevents any internet browser from saving your HMIS password for future logins. This is an important security provision that helps to protect sensitive data and is required for compliance with HUD’s baseline standards for security.

Change to DOB Elements on Profile Screen   You may have noticed that the order of the fields ‘Date of Birth’ and ‘Quality of DOB’ have been switched to improve the logic flow for the end user. Now, if the ‘Quality of DOB’ = ‘Data not collected’, ‘Client refused’, or ‘Client doesn’t know’, the ‘Date of Birth’ field will be hidden. Additionally, when ‘Quality of DOB’ is either of these three response options, ‘Age: ?’ will appear next to the ‘Quality of DOB’ field.

Checking Data Quality for PIT  It’s time for entering and reviewing sheltered PIT data for the night of 1/25 into 1/26/17. For Clarity users, we recommend running the “OUTS-106 Client Demographics” report. If it is run in the web based format, you can drill down on any given data point. This is helpful for data quality, especially for “data not collected,” etc.

FAQ on Disability Related Data Elements  Part of HUD’s Data Standards Tutorial Portal includes information on how to collect and answer the Disability questions in the HUD Assessment. This short FAQ is one of the resources, and staff who conduct intakes should find it helpful.