CC Minutes - 07/13/05 WS - Laserfiche WebLink

Home Browse Search

Mr. Kelly asked for more information regarding the County's request for funding from the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD). Ms. Bettman asserted that one strategy she wanted to see in the plan would be a focus of State and federal money to help the homeless "instead of diverting it to capital projects or improving alleys." She averred that the latter had been "immortalized in the Consolidated Plan." Ms. Bettman conveyed her endorsement for training police officers in social service skills and suggested that this sort of training would be useful to parks employees. She did not believe the entire organization needed such training. Ms. Jones stated that there were two phases to that the training proposal: 1) that all City employees were ambassadors in the community they served and the more educated and sensitive to these sorts of issues in the community, the better prepared people would be as individuals to address them; and 2) the second piece of training would target only those employees who had direct contact with this population. She noted that library staff was also very interactive with the homeless population. Ms. Bettman liked the Safe Parks' Proposal. She said while it did not substitute for the patrols that were now keeping an eye on the parks, it augmented them by using a nominal amount of money to place people with a background in social services in the parks. Mayor Piercy thought the Safe Parks' Proposal was creative and humane and that it connected well with the work that the City was doing. She said when talking about what goal the council had, it would be good to connect it with something already in motion, such as community policing. She felt it made sense to make such a connection. She recommended meeting several goals at one time and declared this to be an opportunity to do so. Mayor Piercy noted that she and Mr. Kelly would be attending the Public Safety Discussion later in the day. Ms. Bettman suggested that the plan be more focused and that it be something that could be accomplished within two years. Ms. Bettman, seconded by Mr. Kelly, moved to direct the City Manager to bring back a re- fined and focused plan for addressing homelessness in Eugene based on feedback from pro- viders and stakeholders. Mr. Pap6 said he would like to see timelines with benchmarks incorporated into the plan. The motion passed unanimously, 8:0. Mayor Piercy thanked everyone for their work and adjourned the meeting at 1:13 p.m. Respectfully submitted, MINUTES--Eugene City Council July 13, 2005 Page 8 Work Session