x
Breaking News
More () »

Proposed budget would expand homelessness outreach

Rather than making unhoused people move from public areas, outreach specialists visit them multiple times to build trust and get them on the road to new homes.

SAN ANTONIO — A trauma-informed, social-service focused program aimed at supporting people experiencing homelessness could expand if a proposal in the City of San Antonio's current budget draft is approved.

The program would employ an outreach specialist in each council district, with an extra one downtown, to "connect the dots" between people experiencing homelessness and systems offering resources, with the goal of offering individualized support and, eventually, securing housing wherever possible.

District 1, the city's Department of Human Services and other partners tried out the approach this summer in the Dellview neighborhood and surrounding areas.

"The biggest thing is- if you want to have long term success – if you want to create a solution that isn’t just pushing someone off the street one day and they’re back the next – it needs to be taken on an individual basis," said Jaime Nicholson, an intern on the project who spent the past month getting to know unhoused people, and finding out what help they needed. "It needs to be understood. There needs to be empathy and humanity involved. Because without those elements, the person’s just going to be back where they were."

AN EXISTING PROBLEM MADE MORE PRESSING

For San Antonio- and many cities across the nation- homelessness is not a "new" issue, and governments, nonprofits, coalitions, and volunteers have been working to provide aid and to help people secure housing for years.

But the economic impacts of the pandemic underscored the thin margins many Americans are living on - and with fears of a potential spike in evictions, District 1 Councilman Roberto Treviño says it's critical to recognize almost anyone, under different circumstances, could find themselves unhoused. This approach- though practiced in part by some agencies already- formalizes an "individualized" approach to city outreach. 

"It’s a whole lot different," Treviño said. "As we’re seeing this issue happen all over the city, one of the things we didn’t want to do was simply push the problem elsewhere. 

So what we did in this approach was to deploy social services to go out and get to understand the people behind the crisis. So these are people who are in crisis- and understanding that we have resources- there’s been a lot of talk about how we have resources, they’ve just not been connected."

HOW IT WORKS

This summer, Councilman Treviño's office, the City of San Antonio's Department of Human Services, Our Lady of the Lake University, SAPD SAFFE officers, Haven for Hope, and the Solid Waste Management Department teamed up to outline long-term and short-term goals for the Dellview area and along the Vance Jackson corridor.

Department of Human Services Senior Management Analyst Joe VanKuiken and intern Jaime Nicholson of Our Lady of the Lake University visited areas where unhoused people were living to build relationships. 

"When we’re out there on the streets, we’re talking with people who are struggling with homelessness," VanKuiken said. "A lot of times, that takes some time. We’re building relationships, we’re garnering trust- and we’re trying to build that relationship so we can eventually have a dialogue about what their needs are- based on their experiences, based on the trauma they’ve experienced in the past, things they might be using to cope with that trauma- and sometimes they’re self-medicating due to mental health issues, so we’re just able to build that dialogue so eventually we can figure out what their needs are and get those needs met. Whether it’s shelter, detox, mental health services- sometimes it’s all of the above."

They brought water and masks and had conversations about what people were going through. Each person had different needs, so VanKuiken and Nicholson worked to understand them, and find ways to meet those needs.

"The biggest thing is understanding that each person is different, each story is different, each experience is different," Nicholson said. "When you apply a social services perspective, you look at the systems of everything. What got them there, where they are now, where they could be in the future- and you align all of the organizations and resources together as you work with each person individually."

Nicholson says often, someone is not ready for help right away- which is why facilitating a more long-term, relationship-building approach is necessary.

"We meet folks sometimes, they come up to us, they see us out there- they might see us out there two or three times, and then come up and ask us who we are and what we’re doing, and once we do that, people are sometimes ready for help, whatever that might be," Nicholson said. "Other folks, we’re out there talking to them, and maybe that client needs weeks, a month, maybe months – of us building that until they’re able to have enough trust to be able to let us help them."

WHAT THEY'VE LEARNED

Councilman Treviño says while out assisting VanKuiken and Nicholson, he saw the impact this approach -- which he says is much different than some that have been taken in the past -- can have.

"You get to know the different situations folks are in," Treviño said. "We also work with a lot of businesses up and down this corridor, because it’s going to take all of us working together. It’s a collaborative effort, and at the end of the day, it’s a lot of work. But it’s work that’s worthwhile. It’s work we should be doing- because it’s about people."

The effort focused on outreach to unhoused people, preventing crime in those areas, and waste management, as crews cleaned up trash and bulky items in areas where they were unsafe or unsanitary. The approach recognized that homelessness itself is not a criminal act. 

Treviño says they began in the Dellview neighborhood, along Vance Jackson and near his office purposefully. He asked Nicholson and VanKuiken to feel free to set up a "home base" in his field office- and let him know what they were seeing and learning, and what could be done better.

In a time when many people are having more trouble than normal making rent, a

"You simply cannot arrest the problem away." Councilman Treviño said. "I think a lot of people have depended on SAPD to call out to any number of things, and in this case, what we’re saying – is it’s not against the law to be homeless. We know it can be frustrating, but it’s not going to solve the problem- and police officers cannot arrest a person simply for being homeless."

VanKuiken and Nicholson say SAPD SAFFE officers have been on hand to help if needed, but so far they have not encountered any safety issues. Since the program began during the week of July 6, VanKuiken and Nicholson say 24 people have accepted resources and are on the road to, or are in, a new form of housing. 

"I think we’re tackling the healing component here," Treviño said. "We’re healing people, we’re asking them how they want to be helped- and we’re building trust. This, I think, has proven out in its results. The point is- we can do better. We can find a way to help people who are in crisis. And this is a model that has been proven to work."

He says while having individual outreach specialists is crucial - they must be supported by the rest of the community. 

"It does take all of us working together," Treviño said. "What this problem has done- it doesn’t put it on any own person. We’re proud of having an outreach coordinator in every district across the city- but it ultimately takes all of us working together with that outreach coordinator. This particular case, we worked in partnership with business owners, with the neighborhood, with SAPD, Haven for Hope, SAMMinistries, we have to start connecting the dots, and that’s what our outreach coordinator is going to do. We’re hoping to work with the county in partnership to expand these services."

WHAT'S NEXT

The city budget, if approved, would allocate money to fund the program in each council district, with an extra outreach specialist for the dowtown area. You can learn more about the budget process, and how to weigh in, here

Before You Leave, Check This Out