To: Honorable Mayor and Members of City Council
From: Lark Ferrell, Housing Mgr and Acting Community Development Dir
Prepared By: Lark Ferrell, Housing Mgr and Acting Community Development Dir
TITLE:
Title
Homeless System Redesign
LABEL
RECOMMENDED ACTION:
Recommendation
Receive report providing an update on the homeless system redesign
Body
DISCUSSION:
This item provides City Council with an update on the homeless system redesign since the last update provided in June 2018.
Background
The City of Napa (the “City”) and the County of Napa (the “County”) have historically partnered with each other to address the needs of homeless individuals and families. The City’s Police Department has taken the lead on homeless outreach and encampment clean-up activities while the County has funded specialty mental health services and drug and alcohol recovery services for vulnerable individuals and families. In recent years, the City and the County have each funded 50% of year-round shelter operating costs and the County has funded 100% of winter shelter operations.
In October 2015 the City and the County began a process of transforming the way systems respond to and address homelessness. The City and the County jointly hired consultants from the Corporation for Supportive Housing (CSH) and from the National Alliance to End Homelessness (NAEH) to examine and make recommendations for improving the shelter and homeless housing systems.
In March 2016, CSH and NAEH jointly issued a report recommending changes to align Napa’s homeless system with national best practices by redesigning community housing and homeless services systems to more quickly connect the most vulnerable with housing opportunities, align resources to maintain housing stability, and use the shelter system as a tool for quickly moving households out of homelessness. The report provided six overall strategies. These included:
1. Breaking Silos & Leveraging Resources: Integrate siloed community support services and funding and leverage additional resources for affordable housing.
2. Cutting Costs & Realigning Resources: Cut unnecessary system costs and adopt a systems approach to better align resources and serve the most vulnerable, high-need individuals.
3. Prioritizing Housing Resources: Target housing resources to “right size” interventions based on household need and ensure the most vulnerable households are prioritized.
4. Building Housing Capacity: Build a pipeline for housing and serve the right people in the right way.
5. Using Data: Centralize the tracking of homeless system outcomes, flow, data quality, inventory and demographics into an easy-to-digest format.
6. Identifying New Funding Opportunities: Secure new funding opportunities including Medi-Cal.
Since the report was issued, the City and County made significant progress on implementing many of the recommendations. Previous accomplishments from March 2016 through June 2018, when Council last received a formal update, include:
• The hiring of a Homeless Programs Coordinator jointly fund by the County and the City
• The formation of a Funders Collaborative with the goal of broadening the base of organizations involved in efforts to end homelessness. Members include representatives from the City, County, the Vintners, the Community Foundation, the Gasser Foundation, Partnership Health Plan, Queen of the Valley Community Benefits, law enforcement, etc.
• The issuance of a Request for Proposals resulting in contracting with Abode Services, a nationally known and respected housing and homeless services provider, to operate the community’s shelter system and homeless housing services.
• The reduction of barriers to shelter entry, so that services at the community’s shelters can be available to those in need.
• The creation of Napa’s Flexible Housing Subsidies Pool. This virtual pool of housing and support funds is key to effectively address the needs of homeless families and individuals.
• Additional funding sources have been secured, including the Whole Person Care Pilot, an $11.5 million multi-year grant which targets homeless and at-risk of becoming homeless Medi-Cal beneficiaries. This grant has provided considerable new funding to help expand outreach and case management and supportive services to help homeless clients become, and remain, housed.
• The City’s and County’s collaboration on the homeless system has been formalized through a Cooperative Joint Powers Homeless Services Agreement
• Abode Service’s outreach team’s continued collaboration with the Police Department’s outreach team to expand outreach and services to unsheltered homeless.
Update on Current Activities
Since the last Council update in June, there has been additional progress made on the homeless system. This includes the Winter Shelter re-opening on November 15 at the Napa Valley Expo. The Winter Shelter, which provides 50 beds, will remain open through April 15. This year, Abode plans to offer services to engage Winter Shelter guests.
Police Department’s Homeless Outreach team reports that complaints about homeless encampments were down this summer compared to previous summers. Five large camps and several smaller camps were cleaned up. Many of the chronically homeless displaced from these camps entered the shelter, while others were successfully housed into permanent housing through the combined efforts of the Police Department’s Homeless Outreach team and Abode’s outreach team.
Day services, previously provided at the Hope Center, have now been fully transitioned to South Napa Shelter as of the end of August. More services, including housing focused services, are now being offered to clients. Because the system is now utilizing a coordinated entry system, the shelter is serving more high needs people than before. Many recent shelter guests, while not new to Napa or to homelessness, are new to the shelter and are being engaged in services for the first time.
Since Samaritan Family Shelter on Old Sonoma Road was closed due to mold last year, the community has not had a family shelter. To fill this void, Catholic Charities is in the process of converting Yellow House at Rainbow House into a family shelter. Yellow House previously served as transitional housing for single mothers and their children. Catholic Charities will manage the shelter with Abode providing services, including housing location, to the shelter’s families. The shelter will open after ADA improvements are completed. These improvements will be funded by a recent CDBG grant from the City.
Efforts have continued to expand the permanent supportive housing (PSH) inventory available in the community. Valley View Senior Homes in American Canyon, a 70-unit affordable rental project, is expected to be completed and ready for occupancy in early December. Staff from Abode, the Housing Authority, the County and the VA are actively working with Satellite Affordable Housing Associates, the project’s developer, to identify and qualify tenants for the project. The project will include 17 units for homeless veterans who are 55 or older and three units for homeless persons who are 55 or older. Stoddard West, a 50-unit affordable rental project on Soscol Avenue, is currently under construction and is expected to be ready for occupancy in August 2019. It will include one unit for a homeless household. The County has entered into a Memorandum of Understanding with Pacific West to include three units for homeless in the 20-unit Napa Courtyard project on Coombsville Road. Napa Courtyard is expected to be completed and ready for occupancy in July 2019. Burbank, Abode and Gasser Foundation are currently working on Heritage House, a proposed PSH project at the site of a former assisted living facility. It is currently going through environmental review.
Abode has been actively assisting homeless to find housing and remain housed. During the first three and a half months of the current fiscal year, Abode has successfully housed 41 households. Overall, since Abode began providing housing support to homeless in Napa in July 2017, Abode has assisted 177 households become housed. Many of these were either reunited with family or did not require on-going support. However, 56 households received on-going supportive services and rental assistance. Of these households, 95% remain in housing. Abode has also been actively helping homeless and at-risk of homeless Section 8 voucher holders locate housing. An agenda report on Abode’s success in housing these households is on the Housing Authority’s November 13 agenda.
The Housing Authority, Abode, and the County collaborated on a grant application for Section 8 mainstream vouchers from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. In September, the Housing Authority was notified it has been awarded 11 new vouchers under this program. These vouchers will be targeted to disabled households who are either homeless or at eminent risk of homelessness. Abode will provide housing location and supportive services to these households to ensure they are successfully housed.
Several new State funding opportunities, which would bring approximately $1.5 million in one-time funding into the community’s homeless system, have been announced. The Continuum of Care has held stakeholder meetings to collect input on how these funds should be utilized. Options being discussed include purchasing property for future supportive housing or providing rental subsidies to expand housing resources for the homeless.
Next Steps
The following are some of the next steps over the remainder of the fiscal year:
• The City, County, and community partners will continue to focus efforts on expanding the supply of permanent supportive housing. As these projects require significant rental subsidies and supportive services, this will require leveraging resources to maximize the number of units made available
• The City, County, Housing Authority, and other partners will also continue to collaboratively seek out new funding to bring new housing resources into the community to help provide housing resources to the homeless residents of the community.
• Abode will formally launch diversion and family reunification programs, so that people with other options do not have to enter the shelter system.
• Catholic Charities and Abode will move forward with the conversion of Yellow House to a shelter for families experiencing homelessness.
• The COC and County will apply for new State funding opportunities to enhance housing opportunities for the community’s homeless.
• Metrics to measure and evaluate on-going system performance will be developed and the results shared with community stakeholders.
FINANCIAL IMPACTS:
This agenda item is informational and does not result in a financial impact without future Council action.
CEQA:
The Community Development Director has determined that the Recommended Action described in this Agenda Report is not subject to California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA), pursuant to CEQA Guidelines Section 15060(c).
DOCUMENTS ATTACHED:
None
NOTIFICATION:
Napa County, Abode Services and Catholic Charities were notified of this agenda item.