Thad
02-24-2011, 12:54 AM
Sonoma West Times & News
by Laura McCutcheon
Sonoma West Staff Writer
Published: Wednesday, February 23, 2011 3:10 PM PST
SEBASTOPOL — A small group of community members, including a couple transients and a few people representing the Sebastopol Christian Church have started meeting informally to discuss the community’s homeless population.
Sebastopol City Council member Kathleen Shaffer attended one of the recent meetings — tagged “fainting robins back into their nests” — on her own accord and not under the auspices of the City, after an acquaintance of hers had to move out of her home.
For privacy reasons Shaffer withheld the woman’s name, and the details on why she had to move, but did say the woman she is referring to is the one who created the meetings.
“I want to try to do something but we are a small community and there is no funding, and very limited services available,” Shaffer said, noting, however, there are small steps that can be taken to provide more help to the existing homeless population.
Shaffer, who plans to hold a separate, small informational meeting in March at the Sebastopol Senior Center, said she has talked to ministers from local churches to see what they might be able to do to help.
At her March meeting she plans to bring up the possibility of offering one free hot meal per week to the homeless population. (The Sebastopol Christian Church currently offers one free hot meal per month.)
“I would be very happy if we could figure out how to do one a week, but that will take work, and that will take outreach,” Shaffer said.
Shaffer and the others involved in the cause also want to find more funding for bus tickets, to enable homeless people to take the bus to one of the shelters in Santa Rosa, or to the shelter in Guerneville “so they have a warm bed at night,” she said, adding, “I don’t see a shelter happening in Sebastopol.”
The Guerneville shelter is currently located in St. Hubert’s Hall on Fourth Street behind the Guerneville fire station. It’s open from 4 to 8 p.m., daily, during the winter months and provides a hot meal and a warm place to sleep for up to 40 people a night. Community Housing Options West (CHOW), under the umbrella of West County Community Services, is the non-profit that runs the shelter inside a hall it leases from St. Elizabeth’s Catholic Church.
However, on March 1, the shelter will move to the Guerneville Veterans Memorial Hall, located on First and Church streets, because the church does not support sheltering people with substance abuse issues, according to West County Community Services Director Katrina Thurman.
“Our baseline approach is that during inclement weather, individuals facing freezing wet conditions should be able to access a shelter regardless of their substance abuse issues,” Thurman said.
Operations at the new location will continue through March 20, and then the winter shelter will close.
There are a few shelters in Santa Rosa, the largest being the Samuel L. Jones Hall, a 120-bed adult homeless shelter in southwest Santa Rosa that also provides food and clothing. COTS shelter, in Petaluma, provides nearly 350 beds per night and serves more than 124,000 meals a year. Both of these shelters provide additional types of support to the homeless, such as counseling, job placement services, medical referrals and more.
In Sebastopol, the focus, Shaffer said, is to be able to provide further assistance to the “existing” homeless population.
“The bottom line is it will be a small project,” she said.
Sebastopol Police Chief Jeff Weaver, who also attended one of the meetings addressing the local homeless population, said it’s important to strike a balance.
“On the one hand we want to help people who want the help out of their homelessness, but on the other hand there are people who are homeless due to their ongoing drug or alcohol use and it becomes very, very challenging to help them if they won’t or can’t stop their addictive behaviors,” he said.
Echoing Shaffer’s sentiments, Weaver said the hope is to help the homeless already living in Sebastopol, without drawing more homeless people in from other communities. This might include Shaffer’s suggestion of providing free transportation to and from shelters in neighboring towns, since camping out in city parks is against the law.
“You can’t camp in a city park; it’s against the law,” Weaver said. “However, the reality is a small number of people do and so to strike a balance between enforcing the law and really impacting these people’s homes, we’ve developed a procedure where if we find them we give them a 72 hour notice before we clear out their property,” the police chief said. “We might cite them, they know what the rules are, but in terms of physically seizing their stuff, especially if they aren’t there, we want to give them an opportunity to move,” he said. (Local transients have complained that county workers do not provide notice and have removed property without warning.)
According to the 2009 Sonoma County Homeless Count, 20 percent — or 658 homeless people — at that time were located in West County in the Sebastopol area and along the Russian River. Only 11 people were sheltered on that night in January when the count was taken. Since then, the total homeless population in West County has grown at least 10 percent and family homelessness has grown 20 percent.
Northern Sonoma County only had 13 percent of the homeless population when the survey was taken. This area also has more shelters, more transitional housing and more permanent supportive housing (affordable housing that has social services attached).
A total of 354 homeless youth under the age of 18 were also tallied in the 2009 Homeless Count. About 50 percent of youth who age out of foster care have historically become homeless. A majority of them say they are not getting enough to eat. And, most of them report they are homeless due to family conflict.
To retain $2.5 million in federal funding for Sonoma County homeless programs, the US Department of Housing and Urban Development requires a biennial homeless count. Results of the 2011 Homeless Count will be available in the spring.
At full scale, the goals of the county’s 10-year plan to end homelessness by decade’s end would take $20 million annually for crucial supportive services, rental subsidies and housing operating expenses. “Putting a roof over every head” by year 2017, as the plan calls for, would require $40 million in local tax funds and builder allotments as part of an overall need for $200 million in public-private investments.
Staff Writer Laura McCutcheon can be reached at [email protected].
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by Laura McCutcheon
Sonoma West Staff Writer
Published: Wednesday, February 23, 2011 3:10 PM PST
SEBASTOPOL — A small group of community members, including a couple transients and a few people representing the Sebastopol Christian Church have started meeting informally to discuss the community’s homeless population.
Sebastopol City Council member Kathleen Shaffer attended one of the recent meetings — tagged “fainting robins back into their nests” — on her own accord and not under the auspices of the City, after an acquaintance of hers had to move out of her home.
For privacy reasons Shaffer withheld the woman’s name, and the details on why she had to move, but did say the woman she is referring to is the one who created the meetings.
“I want to try to do something but we are a small community and there is no funding, and very limited services available,” Shaffer said, noting, however, there are small steps that can be taken to provide more help to the existing homeless population.
Shaffer, who plans to hold a separate, small informational meeting in March at the Sebastopol Senior Center, said she has talked to ministers from local churches to see what they might be able to do to help.
At her March meeting she plans to bring up the possibility of offering one free hot meal per week to the homeless population. (The Sebastopol Christian Church currently offers one free hot meal per month.)
“I would be very happy if we could figure out how to do one a week, but that will take work, and that will take outreach,” Shaffer said.
Shaffer and the others involved in the cause also want to find more funding for bus tickets, to enable homeless people to take the bus to one of the shelters in Santa Rosa, or to the shelter in Guerneville “so they have a warm bed at night,” she said, adding, “I don’t see a shelter happening in Sebastopol.”
The Guerneville shelter is currently located in St. Hubert’s Hall on Fourth Street behind the Guerneville fire station. It’s open from 4 to 8 p.m., daily, during the winter months and provides a hot meal and a warm place to sleep for up to 40 people a night. Community Housing Options West (CHOW), under the umbrella of West County Community Services, is the non-profit that runs the shelter inside a hall it leases from St. Elizabeth’s Catholic Church.
However, on March 1, the shelter will move to the Guerneville Veterans Memorial Hall, located on First and Church streets, because the church does not support sheltering people with substance abuse issues, according to West County Community Services Director Katrina Thurman.
“Our baseline approach is that during inclement weather, individuals facing freezing wet conditions should be able to access a shelter regardless of their substance abuse issues,” Thurman said.
Operations at the new location will continue through March 20, and then the winter shelter will close.
There are a few shelters in Santa Rosa, the largest being the Samuel L. Jones Hall, a 120-bed adult homeless shelter in southwest Santa Rosa that also provides food and clothing. COTS shelter, in Petaluma, provides nearly 350 beds per night and serves more than 124,000 meals a year. Both of these shelters provide additional types of support to the homeless, such as counseling, job placement services, medical referrals and more.
In Sebastopol, the focus, Shaffer said, is to be able to provide further assistance to the “existing” homeless population.
“The bottom line is it will be a small project,” she said.
Sebastopol Police Chief Jeff Weaver, who also attended one of the meetings addressing the local homeless population, said it’s important to strike a balance.
“On the one hand we want to help people who want the help out of their homelessness, but on the other hand there are people who are homeless due to their ongoing drug or alcohol use and it becomes very, very challenging to help them if they won’t or can’t stop their addictive behaviors,” he said.
Echoing Shaffer’s sentiments, Weaver said the hope is to help the homeless already living in Sebastopol, without drawing more homeless people in from other communities. This might include Shaffer’s suggestion of providing free transportation to and from shelters in neighboring towns, since camping out in city parks is against the law.
“You can’t camp in a city park; it’s against the law,” Weaver said. “However, the reality is a small number of people do and so to strike a balance between enforcing the law and really impacting these people’s homes, we’ve developed a procedure where if we find them we give them a 72 hour notice before we clear out their property,” the police chief said. “We might cite them, they know what the rules are, but in terms of physically seizing their stuff, especially if they aren’t there, we want to give them an opportunity to move,” he said. (Local transients have complained that county workers do not provide notice and have removed property without warning.)
According to the 2009 Sonoma County Homeless Count, 20 percent — or 658 homeless people — at that time were located in West County in the Sebastopol area and along the Russian River. Only 11 people were sheltered on that night in January when the count was taken. Since then, the total homeless population in West County has grown at least 10 percent and family homelessness has grown 20 percent.
Northern Sonoma County only had 13 percent of the homeless population when the survey was taken. This area also has more shelters, more transitional housing and more permanent supportive housing (affordable housing that has social services attached).
A total of 354 homeless youth under the age of 18 were also tallied in the 2009 Homeless Count. About 50 percent of youth who age out of foster care have historically become homeless. A majority of them say they are not getting enough to eat. And, most of them report they are homeless due to family conflict.
To retain $2.5 million in federal funding for Sonoma County homeless programs, the US Department of Housing and Urban Development requires a biennial homeless count. Results of the 2011 Homeless Count will be available in the spring.
At full scale, the goals of the county’s 10-year plan to end homelessness by decade’s end would take $20 million annually for crucial supportive services, rental subsidies and housing operating expenses. “Putting a roof over every head” by year 2017, as the plan calls for, would require $40 million in local tax funds and builder allotments as part of an overall need for $200 million in public-private investments.
Staff Writer Laura McCutcheon can be reached at [email protected].
Copyright © 2011 - Sonoma West
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