To help homeless, Turlock to start program that works in Modesto

By MICHAEL R. SHEA
mshea@modbee.com

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TURLOCK -- Slight of frame, George looks healthy except for his mouth.

It shows decades of homelessness: most of his teeth missing, lips floppy over barren gums, a few craggy teeth -- black-pocked spires faded from white to yellow.

George, 44, was born in Lodi. He started using meth at age 13 and spent most of his life running the streets of Modesto. Police have a picture of him strung-out, in handcuffs, sitting against a dirty wall, long hair in his face, smiling a wild-mouthed smile.

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Habitual Transient Offender Program
George's success is a product of a broad-based coalition of police, prosecutors and nonprofits.

The premise of the Habitual Transient Offender program is simple: It's more expensive to keep drug addicts and the mentally ill on the street than it is to get them help.

Before Modesto's HTO program got started two years ago, the coalition looked at the cost of homelessness to the community.

The coalition called Doctors Medical Center and asked for a breakdown of charges for two of their frequent visitors. In three years, one homeless man rang up $260,265 in charges, and another's bill was $406,941. Services included emergency room visits, heart surgery and a pacemaker, and 10 days in the hospital for a stab wound.

What was happening, Deputy District Attorney Jared Carillo said, was that a judge with a caseload of murders, rapes, assaults and drug dealings would have a public intoxication case float across his desk.

"The judge says, 'I give you time served if you plead guilty right now.' And they're free to go in 10 minutes," Carillo said.

Before long, the same homeless person -- who may have an alcohol or drug problem or both -- bumps into police again, who take him or her back to the emergency room and back to jail.

Police, prosecutors and judges realized it's cheaper and less time-consuming to pay for the offender to go through drug and alcohol rehab than it is to keep the revolving door open. For the hardest drug and alcohol cases, it takes a medical solution followed by a major lifestyle change.

In that sense, addiction is just like diabetes or hypertension or asthma, said Dr. Madelyn Schlaepfer, associate director of Behavioral Health and Recovery Services. It requires a medical fix followed by a lifelong treatment plan.

"Like diabetes, not everyone with a poor diet and weight gain becomes diabetic," she said. But someone with poor diet, weight gain and a (genetic) predisposition often does.

"The same parallel is there with addiction."

In the medical field, addiction often is compared to hypertension, asthma and diabetes, because all are chronic conditions. But with lifelong treatment, whether exercise for a heart condition or Narcotics Anonymous for a drug addict, health and recovery are possible.
PDF: Turlock City Council agenda memorandum on homelessness
Homelessness: continuing coverage

"That was me," George said. "It's not any more. Charles Manson is right there," he pointed at the picture, "not me."

George is sober, happy and healthy thanks to a Modesto police initiative that works with homeless alcoholics, addicts and the mentally ill instead of against them. That program, the Habitual Transient Offender program, is coming to Turlock. It's the city's first proactive plan in two years.

Since 2006, homelessness has been the most divisive issue in Turlock. Shouting matches, rivalries, college studies, promises, protests and numerous delays have come to define the issue.

The City Council will meet at 6 p.m. Tuesday with the homeless and other groups to discuss short- and long-term goals to fix the problem.

In searching for good ideas, Turlock needed only to look north at Modesto, which quietly has put in the buildings, programs and personnel to handle the most visible social ill in the United States. It's a system that's producing results such as George.

Glenn Hutsell is the president of the Stanislaus Housing and Support Services Collaborative, which writes the county's continuing-care plan -- which is necessary to secure homeless- related federal and state funding. Last year, the group brought in more than $2 million.

"For Modesto, I really think it's having the resources -- the Gospel Mission, a second (Salvation Army) shelter, the Respite Center. There's a range of tools available," Hutsell said. "Turlock is a smaller town, everything is more visible, and there are really no services. They're in the middle of asking what a city should be doing, what a city shouldn't be doing. In Modesto, the city was instrumental in getting everything started."

In the beginning ...

Before retail-laden McHenry Avenue and Vintage Faire Mall on Sisk Road, Yosemite Boulevard was Modesto's main commercial thoroughfare. As more people flooded the city, the older section fell into disrepair. Many businesses moved to McHenry, and later the area around the mall.

Yosemite Boulevard today acts as the dividing line between two areas: the low-income airport neighborhood and upper-middle class La Loma, with a handful of parks and riverfront acreage.

With the Modesto Gospel Mission on Yosemite, many homeless filtered from the mission through La Loma in the morning and stopped in parks and along the river. Nonhomeless sorts with dubious free-time activities seemed to show up, too.

The Gospel Mission and La Loma Neighborhood Association were not on good terms, until differences of opinion were put aside. Association President Michael Moradian toured the mission and asked it to partner with his group in keeping his neighborhood safe.

The neighborhood group now works closely with the mission and the Police Department and has hired a private security patrol to hold people caught doing something illegal until police can arrive. Moradian has contacted school officials and business owners, asking them to get involved. The association sends fliers and e-mails to residents and businesses, informing them of events and security issues and encouraging participation.