Item B: Update on Homeless Initiative Action Plan

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375 households receive preventative supportive services and case management in order to stabilize in permanent housing. b. Re-housing The speed with which a newly homeless person becomes re-housed can be instrumental in the long-term cost and impact. This funding enables quick re-housing of situationally homeless households by providing emergency payments to cover leasing and move-in costs (e.g. first and last month rent, security deposit). Once homelessness occurs a cascade of problems emerge and it becomes very costly (financially and emotionally) to become stably housed again. Proposed funding: $500,000 400 households receive emergency payments to prevent evictions and case management to support long-term success. II. TEMPORARY AND EMERGENCY SERVICES RESPONSES FOR PEOPLE IN CRISIS 12% - 20% OF THE TOTAL a. Emergency Shelter Respond to the critical need for emergency shelter for people who are currently homeless. A minority of members strongly expressed a position favoring a new, publicly funded, emergency shelter for adults. These members raised concerns that the Eugene Mission is unable or unwilling to serve important segments of the population, including people with physical and psychiatric disabilities and those unwilling to participate in the religious chapel requirements. The Eugene Mission is not always a safe place for those with a psychiatric disability and isn’t accessible for many people with mobility challenges. The argument in favor of a new shelter was countered by a viewpoint that emergency shelter is both expensive to operate and not cost effective in terms of long-term outcomes, when compared to other responses to homelessness. New emergency shelters are very difficult and expensive to site. For example, a special land use zone was created for the Eugene Mission when it relocated to its current location in 1967. Emergency shelters typically cannot expect any rental income, so they must have either a debt-free facility or a long-term funding stream to retire the debt. Either scenario presents an enormous challenge. A shelter that provides services ranging from meals, food, showers, job assistance, and case management is estimated to cost as little as $10,000 per year per bed for some populations and over $24,000 per bed for others – depending on a number of factors including the economy of scale and generally assuming a debt-free facility. The higher the degree of services, the more likely the possibility of positive outcomes – as measured by people obtaining and succeeding in housing. There is a continuum of services and options in the community. With increased case management, households could move directly from homelessness into permanent housing 18 Blue Ribbon Committee on Homelessness, Recommendation April 2, 2008 -- Page