LSNDC. It's a cryptic acronym. LSN wasn't available. Sounds like a cable news channel, doesn't it? LSNDC is the Louisiana Services Network Data Consortium. Does that explain it better?

Each region of Louisiana contains a group of non-profit agencies whose mission is to serve the homeless population of our state. These regions, and the coalitions of agencies are called continuums or continua. Since the care of the homeless is the priority of these continua, they are referred as CoCs, or Continuums of Care. Each CoC is funded, to some degree, by the U. S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, or HUD.

Following the hurricanes of 2005, the CoCs decided that there was strength in numbers. A steering committee was formed to guide the process of combining the information systems of nine CoCs into a single statewide database. This steering committee was comprised of representatives of each CoC, and the agency that administrates the HMIS, the Homeless Management Information System. HMIS is mandated by HUD to track the number of homeless served by the CoC, and the characteristics of these needy individuals and families.

After several years of planning, and searching for funding to accomplish this process, the initial migration of a single region to a central system was completed in March 2009. Fourteen months later, the last CoC's database was merged into the system and the LSNDC system was complete. There are now nearly 800 participating agencies and programs, with over 750 users inputting data, case managing the progress of thousands of homeless persons.