LUCERNE >> This week’s Innovation Summit gave Clearlake officials some direction for their pilot program to reduce homelessness and aid those in need.
Project Restoration will feature 16 different focus areas designed to address a range of concerns that cause and continue homelessness, rather than simply treat the shelter issue. The program’s first three campaigns cover mental health and substance abuse, shelter and transportation.
Todd Metcalf, Behavioral Health Director for Lake County, hosted a gallery of various domains presented by different facilitators to talk about the focus areas. This helped the city narrow down the first three targets, as Innovation Summit attendees voted for the most critical points of focus.
Shelly Mascari, Director of Community Wellness from Adventist Health, who coordinated the event with her team, said the Summit will be a pivotal point in taking on the issue of the homelessness and will look to help create a collaborative effort between multiple organizations.
“What we come up with has so much depth and wellness. The solutions to our problems are almost infinite,” Mascari said.
Lauran Hardin from the Camden Coalition gave a keynote address “Changing the system for Vulnerable People” where she explained the importance of examining a person as a whole instead of directing attention to one issue. She pointed out the efficiencies gained through collaboration with other agencies, even those who are competitors.
Hardin has been running a program similar to the one that will be put in place in Clearlake and it has been considered effective. A project in Yuba County that has started to help get homeless off the streets also recorded successes. Eight-five percent of those they have helped did not go back to being homeless. The reduction in that county’s homeless population meant 200 tons of trash cleared from the streets.
Lake County will be following the pilot program and looking to do the same. Already county officials are seeking to collaborate with all agencies. Mascari said this will be done one patient at a time and she is looking to help up to 10 people in the year.
The program will be funded through the help of a grant Mascari received of $300,000.
“We are going to look at what we can do collectively. My personal goal is that we can support 500 people through this process,” Mascari said.
This project was brought to her by the Mayor of Clearlake, Russ Perdock. He said as the mayor he wanted to take the blinders off and get educated on the homeless issue. Once he had the idea he contacted Mascari and she then wrote a proposal to pilot a community-wide project.
“We haven’t got it all figured out, but we’re stepping in the right direction. It’s not about ‘if’ it’s about ‘how’ we are going to make this happen,” Mascari said.
Marylin Wakefield, Manager of Grants and Community Outreach at Adventist Health, who was also a part of the team who put the Summit together, talked about how many homeless people are in Lake County. She said after doing a survey and tracking down homeless, there were 401 adults and over 500 children that were considered homeless living in the area. Mascari’s target number would cut that figure dramatically.
“What we consider when counting for homeless is when someone does not have a place to stay overnight,” Wakefield said. “If someone is couch surfing or bunking with someone while looking for housing, they were not counted.”
She added that there are a lot of areas that need to be addressed and thinking on how the county can give the most impact over the next few years. Scott Rich from Symmetric Solutions talked about how much it cost to have someone living on the streets versus giving them housing.
From the trash, how many times a transient is arrested, medical issues and how often they end up in the hospital and other issues that come about can add up to costing a county over $62,000 annually. To give a person housing with services can cost only $11,000.
This was the cost difference for studies that were done in Shasta County Rich said. Currently, there is a process being done to see how much it cost to have a person on the street in Lake County. Tim Celli, the Clearlake Acting Chief of Police said if there were less homelessness in the county, it would free up the time of his officers and allow them to help in other areas the force is needed.
Although this pilot project is going to be in Clearlake, it is not just for the homeless in the city Mascari said. As it begins in the city, she hopes that it expands and can be in other places in Lake County.
The Innovation Summit was hosted by Marymount College’s Lake County campus in Lucerne.
