What is Turlock’s next plan to reduce homelessness? Councilwomen propose these services
The Turlock City Council on Tuesday took a step toward planning long-term strategies to reduce homelessness, including potential contracts for health services.
Voting 5-0, the council approved a homeless committee report with recommendations Councilwomen Rebecka Monez and Pam Franco began working on eight months ago.
Monez, chair of the ad hoc committee, directed City Manager Reagan Wilson to return to the council with proposed spending based on the recommendations. The council could then vote on the expenditures, such as contracts with health care providers.
Recommendations with cost estimates include spending $400,000 for two full-time behavioral health workers assigned to west Turlock. The city could contract the First Behavioral Health Urgent Care Center for Spanish and English mental health services for both people experiencing homelessness and the wider community, the committee wrote. A contract would last a year, said Jeffrey Lewis, president and CEO of Legacy Health Endowment.
“For us to be able to effectively and compassionately help those that are suffering from homelessness, we absolutely have to address the underlying root cause,” Monez said. “We can’t just keep putting a Band-Aid on it and handing out a meal or handing out anything.”
Monez identified mental health illness and substance abuse as common causes of homelessness. In the 2020 Stanislaus County homeless count, 10% of 1,383 people surveyed said substance abuse or illness was why they lost housing.
The committee also recommended Turlock contract the Community Health Centers of America for mobile health services across the city. A $350,000 contract with the organization could additionally help prevent more people from becoming unhoused, the committee wrote.
Evaluations, panhandling discussed
To measure the results of city homeless efforts moving forward, the council also discussed paying for an evaluation every six months. An independent evaluator can assess the effects and help the city decide whether to continue funding, the committee said.
Legacy Health Endowment could provide the evaluation service, Lewis said. Councilwoman Nicole Larson recommended the city put out a request for proposals to review additional options.
“I have a fiscal responsibility to make sure I come back and explain what works,” Lewis said. “The academics that we work with are the ones who really build the research tool.”
One strategy the committee proposed without a cost estimate was adding signs to the discourage panhandling. At busy intersections and shopping centers, the city could add signs telling residents to donate to local nonprofits instead of directly to people asking for money. Cities that have run anti-panhandling signs programs include Fresno and Newport Beach, The Fresno Bee and Daily Pilot reported.
The city finance department could run a program for Turlock’s nonprofit service providers to receive donations, the committee wrote. Larson suggested staff also look into the costs of installing donation box slots for this purpose.
Farmers say encampment persists
Despite the city ending its homeless encampment emergency in July, two farmers during Tuesday’s meeting said a camp formed near Taylor Road around November. Some people living in the encampment are trespassing through orchards, leaving garbage on fields and cutting drip lines for water, the farmers said.
“I would hope that the city of Turlock would just hear us out, get us some help and get these people some help so they can better themselves as well,” Amber Young said. “But the RV camping that’s going around — not just in our backyard but in Turlock — it’s horrible.”
Unlike how the city put up a fence around the former encampment on West Main Street near Planet Fitness, Young said farmers cannot keep people off their property the same way.
Monez told the farmers the encampment lies in the California Department of Transportation’s right of way, not the city’s. Caltrans refused to clear it before the annual outdoor county homeless count scheduled Thursday, Feb. 24, Monez added.
The committee has a meeting with Caltrans on Monday, Franco said, and will report back.
Monez asked Wilson to return to the council with homelessness spending proposals to vote on at the next regular meeting on March 8, if possible.
