[0:00] We will jump into the, well, first, confirming that we have quorum. Yes, sir Mr. Bailey, Mr. Herbert, here, Mr. Grant. Thank you. Thank you so much. Looking to the approval of minutes, September 18, 20, 25, if you got a chance, and Mr. Herbert, welcome to the ad hoc committee. This meeting almost a year ago, really put together the past with the HMA team in our wonderful direction.

[0:32] So is there a motion to approve the minutes?

[0:35] Was it October 18, 2025? Yes, sir, so moved.

[0:39] I'm going to second that.

[0:44] Hi.

[0:47] Today we're going to have some great committee discussion.

[0:49] This is all taken for information only. Is that correct? Director Hepers?

[0:53] That is correct.

[0:53] Fantastic. All right.

[0:55] Well, let's get into the item number two.

[0:57] The homeless services fiscal year 25 and 26 outcomes.

[1:01] This is coming to happen. Our director of homeless services. Absolutely. Good afternoon, everybody.

[1:07] Good afternoon. Today, I am reporting the fiscal year 25 homeless services

[1:12] response for the city of Columbia.

[1:16] And for fiscal year 25, we put 417 unique people across

[1:24] all programs. All programs are the Rapid Shelter Columbia, the Recovery Community Center,

[1:30] and street outreach. Since inception, we touched 848 people and asked from

[1:39] November 22. For this year, Rapid Shelter Columbia served 169 individuals. With

[1:50] 79 of those individuals being chronically unsheltered, which means those

[1:54] individuals were homeless for at least 12 consecutive months with a diagnosis.

[2:03] 138 of that 169 entered the shelter from literally being homeless, sleeping on

[2:09] the streets, in a place that's uninhabitable for humans, and for fiscal year

[2:16] 25 we permanently housed 29 individuals, which increased our aftercare case

[2:23] slow by 29. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Explain to what was the difference? Okay. Yes. Sorry.

[2:31] If you don't mind. Yes. So the homeless service response that has 417th

[2:37] on top, that's the fiscal year. Okay. And the one that has the 848th on top, that's

[2:43] since inception. Got you. So all the numbers are. Yeah. All the numbers on that

[2:49] That's the end of the year today.

[2:51] Thanks.

[2:52] You're welcome.

[2:56] It ended at $29, from the housing placements.

[2:58] Yes.

[2:59] And I was saying that increased our aftercare case managers

[3:01] low by 29 individuals, because every person that we house,

[3:06] we continue to case manage them.

[3:08] And so that looks different for everybody.

[3:10] Somebody may need once a week.

[3:13] Somebody may need once a month.

[3:15] And somebody may need every day.

[3:17] And I just would like to point that out,

[3:19] because it just shows the intensive case management work that goes into each

[3:23] person that we touch. Out of the 169 of the out of the 169 people that we

[3:31] served at Rapid Shell to Columbia, 130 individuals made a positive exit. And that

[3:37] doesn't always mean permanent housing. That means that we either reunited them

[3:41] with family or we sent them to a facility which was more appropriate for them.

[3:46] But then the communication monitoring still continues?

[3:51] Not if we read after the one after they're placed back with family or if they move along to the next housing level.

[3:58] For housing, yes, for family, we don't do that.

[4:02] But if they need us, they can call us but we don't plan that.

[4:07] So that was the rapid shelter Columbia.

[4:09] Anybody have any questions?

[4:12] No, ma'am.

[4:12] So I'm going to move on to the Recovery Community Center which started in October of 25 and since opening we touched no for fiscal year 25.

[4:27] We touched 182 individuals 56 individuals of that 182 they are actively engaged in recovery services.

[4:36] So that means we either sent them to a facility or they're participating in the program at the recovery community center.

[4:45] And of those 182 individuals, we have executed 160 services.

[4:54] That's recovery and supportive services.

[4:57] So maybe they came down there just looking for housing resources or they needed clothes,

[5:06] Those are the type of services.

[5:09] And there's not a overnight facility that is not an office.

[5:13] That's not receiving services during the day which means people are coming back consistently.

[5:17] Yes.

[5:17] So, those 56 individuals are coming back consistently.

[5:24] Participating in the program.

[5:26] In the program we offer them support meetings on site or they can participate in support meetings.

[5:35] within the community we have a form that they have and as they participate they

[5:41] get assigned off.

[5:44] And of those 182 individuals we touch, nine of those

[5:49] successfully transitioned into detox or a residential substance facility.

[5:59] We have

[5:59] any questions for the recovery community center. So you said I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm

[6:05] I'm sorry, Mr. Chair.

[6:06] I was just going to have Camicia save very quickly

[6:09] that since 2022 in the city of Columbia,

[6:13] embarked upon homeless services

[6:15] as a stand-alone department in our city

[6:20] and you were hired.

[6:22] I just wanted to make sure it was clear

[6:24] that you're explaining rapid shelter,

[6:26] which was really our first program that we started.

[6:29] But since then, now you've got the recovery community center.

[6:32] So to Mr. Brennan's point,

[6:33] just making that distinction for the listening public and those in attendance and then I know you're

[6:39] going to also talk about street outreach but you've grown right so it's your service delivery.

[6:45] So we have grown when we first started what we had was Rapid Shelter Columbia the 50 pilots

[6:50] 40 for men 10 for women. Since then we have grown to the aftercare program because in our first year

[6:57] We learned that that aftercare piece is essential to keeping individuals

[7:01] housed.

[7:03] What we have learned throughout the years is that we can house a person and they

[7:07] walk away from the housing because they have created community where they are.

[7:11] So then they're feeling isolated and lonely and they go back to that.

[7:16] So aftercare is essential.

[7:18] So we have a case manager just for aftercare who does those things.

[7:22] We have also grown with the outreach I'll get into that in a second but we've also grown

[7:28] and outreach because we initially contracted that work with transitions but we have a different

[7:35] need level so we brought one position in-house and I'll segue into street outreach now.

[7:43] Let me ask you real quick Mrs. Patrick.

[7:45] It says barriers to treatment and transportation.

[7:50] Do we have a good work in creative relationship with the comment as far as daily passes for

[7:55] folks of say, for example, these 56 folks that are coming back every day with daily free

[8:02] ridership passes, help to continue to grow that number.

[8:06] So comment is a great partner of homeless services.

[8:09] is we currently have a stock pile of one-day passes,

[8:13] seven-day passes, and 31-day passes.

[8:16] It comes attached to criteria and expectations,

[8:19] but we do have that.

[8:21] So the one-day bus passes outreach has that in the program.

[8:26] But seven-day bus passes is for individuals

[8:28] who just got their employment.

[8:30] So then they need assistance until they get that first check.

[8:34] And the 31-day bus passes is the same

[8:36] for employment and permanent housing.

[8:39] Great, perfect, thank you.

[8:41] But for the, there is transportation is a barrier

[8:45] for all services across homeless services.

[8:49] You know, we have the Greyhound program

[8:50] where we could reunite individuals with their family,

[8:53] but Greyhound has relocated out of Columbia.

[8:58] So now we have created a lift program.

[9:02] and so that's funded through our second-sum rise program which is similar to

[9:08] Rapid Rehousing and so with that program we're able to provide a lift for

[9:15] somebody to make it down to Camden for the Greyhound or provide a lift to the

[9:20] facility if it's close enough. So we are trying innovative ways thinking

[9:26] outside the box and how we could meet the knees when it comes to barriers.

[9:30] That's great this the next one. I think it's so important to street outreach and how we can grow that yes

[9:35] I'm excited about street outreach

[9:38] Especially we brought on mr. Terrence and

[9:42] We started this position with him in November of 25 and since he started

[9:49] And this is does not have anything to do with our contract outreach. This is just the one person so he has touched 66 individuals

[10:00] He has served 60 households, which means that he is serving individuals who he's doing preventative work.

[10:13] 51 individuals contacted 37 individuals successfully engaged, which means he was able to meet the need with the resource they was looking for, doing intake for them, get that person inside the system

[10:29] so that they're placed on a housing list,

[10:32] the prioritization list.

[10:35] He has a 73% engagement rate,

[10:38] 34% of the 66th individual

[10:40] that he's been working with is chronically unsheltered,

[10:44] and I would like to highlight terrorists

[10:45] because United Way actually acknowledged him on last week

[10:51] for having the most intakes done in the system

[10:55] and having his vulnerable assessments done.

[10:58] And what that means is, once the vulnerable assessments are done, he is placed on those

[11:03] individuals are placed on the prioritization list, which means they can be housed.

[11:10] And so he had six individuals at the top of the list.

[11:14] And I just want to highlight that we have six people that are eligible to be housed, ready

[11:19] to be housed, but we don't have housing for them.

[11:23] And so he works with those individuals every day.

[11:26] Most of the individuals that Terence worked with,

[11:29] they can't do for themselves.

[11:32] They use adult diapers and all the things.

[11:35] And he comes in every morning.

[11:37] He walks them down either to transitions

[11:39] or can't think of the place right now, sorry.

[11:43] But he takes them down there.

[11:44] He gives them a shower.

[11:45] He has clean clothes for them.

[11:47] And then he feeds them.

[11:48] And these individuals are banned from most facilities because they cannot take care of themselves.

[11:56] So, he's doing all the things and I just want to give him a shout out.

[12:01] These folks that can't help themselves are sleeping on the street every night.

[12:04] And Mr. Sharon's comes and helps them every morning.

[12:08] Every morning.

[12:09] How many souls are we talking about here?

[12:12] So, all the top of my head is six men down here that he does this with daily.

[12:16] Thank you.

[12:18] You're welcome.

[12:20] Any questions in reference to fiscal year 25 homeless response system.

[12:26] If you could just touch base on this, this is kind of telling of what we're facing here as we try and help folks in the Midlands who we serve.

[12:36] Look at the gender race age.

[12:38] Absolutely.

[12:38] And the common disabling conditions.

[12:40] Absolutely. 72% of the individuals that we serve are males, 26 females, 1% is transgender.

[12:49] 72% is African-American, 27 is Caucasian, 1 is other.

[12:56] From the age categories, 2% of the individuals we serve are from 18 to 24.

[13:05] We serve 9% of 62 and over, 55 to 61 is 31%, which is our largest population.

[13:14] I fit in that population.

[13:17] And then 45 to 54, 26%.

[13:21] So this is a real vulnerable population outside of them being homeless because then we have

[13:29] the chronically unsheltered, which we know the definition of that.

[13:33] But now we have our senior population increase in

[13:38] the disabling conditions

[13:41] What so like what is a total I mean it's this obviously breaks down the well over a hundred percent so

[13:47] We're working with folks that have yes, so out of a hundred percent what percentage

[13:53] Don't have any of these conditions that are homeless. Does that make sense?

[13:58] That does make sense and I want to say zero. Does that make sense? Yeah, it does

[14:05] Because even if you don't have a mental diagnosis or a substance issue when you first become

[14:12] homeless, these things are coping mechanism.

[14:18] So if I'm struggling and I'm homeless on the street and I'm sleeping under the bridge

[14:22] and I'm a woman, then I make smoke some crack to be able to sleep under there.

[14:30] And then because that's why I'm doing it the cold, but now it becomes the habit.

[14:34] And so now I'm going to do any drug because crack too high and you know, I'm not that you know, but

[14:45] I'm familiar. Well, that's I mean, that's we're just to wrap your head around that a lot. I did have one question, Mr

[14:53] Yes, and going back to the Greyhound program

[14:58] Have we seen any

[15:00] Angers in the number of folks who are being blessed to us, since we don't have the Greyhound

[15:07] bus, because I know people we used to talk about getting lots of visitors, permanent visitors

[15:15] who get a one-way pass into Columbia. Are we still seeing them? Yes, we are still seeing

[15:21] that. And yes, the answer to that is yes. And I can't give you a number of how many people

[15:27] who were dropped off through Greyhound,

[15:30] but we do get people dropped off

[15:31] from different agencies from the jail

[15:34] that get dropped off downtown,

[15:36] and we're serving them.

[15:37] I don't have that number within right now,

[15:40] but I have asked my staff to start compiling it

[15:43] because we asked that question at the recovery center.

[15:46] And they're mostly local as in within the state

[15:49] or within state, yes.

[16:00] Okay, thank you.

[16:06] So that was a snapshot of the great work y'all are doing.

[16:09] and did you want to talk about what the next year holds?

[16:14] I do want to talk about what next year holds,

[16:15] but I skipped over something that I think is important.

[16:19] So we do the milkshake coordination with Christ Central

[16:23] and we've been doing that since 22.

[16:25] And in the beginning, it had a slow start,

[16:27] but it appears to be picking up.

[16:29] We had a group that was cooking on the corner.

[16:33] They now come in the Christ Central and they participate

[16:36] to pay in that and things have been going well.

[16:39] We most recently sat down with the downtown churches

[16:43] and had a discussion about what that would look like to partner.

[16:47] So everybody's to the table now, and they're willing to look at different ways to do things.

[16:53] So I am excited about that.

[16:55] And in addition to the recovery community center,

[16:59] we were trying to partner with the fire department

[17:03] to have like an urgent care down there.

[17:07] We didn't get that rolled out fully,

[17:09] but we do have a partnership with Prisma

[17:11] where they bring the mobile unit down

[17:13] and they're able to serve our residents down there.

[17:19] And you want me to call for that?

[17:21] Sure.

[17:22] I'm gonna step up to the mic, and maybe.

[17:25] And Tom, and that, well, Chief Holloway,

[17:28] I know you'll talk about the fire stands ready

[17:31] to implement this program, but the barrier as to what needs to happen in order to allow

[17:38] you all to do that.

[17:39] So we're fully invested in this mission for our homeless population.

[17:44] To most effectively serve the mission, we continue to recommend that the city of Columbia

[17:50] and Richland County work towards a DPH affiliation, Department of Public Health affiliation, which

[17:59] which would allow the EMTs in the fire department

[18:01] to work under the Richland County DPH license.

[18:07] This will not only just serve our homeless population,

[18:10] but it has several positive effects

[18:13] on our communities in general in both Richland

[18:15] and the city of Columbia.

[18:18] Most notably is advanced airway,

[18:21] so it would allow our crews who normally get on scene,

[18:26] significantly before the ambulance to secure advanced airways, which means

[18:33] start breathing for patients who are not able to breathe on their own. In this

[18:38] application, there are cities like Chicago, Atlanta, LA County that are

[18:45] currently using task force, where a social worker, a firefighter EMT, sometimes law

[18:52] enforcement will go out into a response vehicle and to extend the outreach that was just

[18:59] discussed, the Forest Service can be a big part of the medical aspect of that.

[19:04] But it really, right now, how the system operates, it would really require that the county

[19:09] and the city enter in a contract.

[19:11] The good news is our response partners in a neighboring county have already undertaken

[19:16] this task and are actually on their second revision of their contract.

[19:20] So, we have five years of data of how it's positively affected in the neighboring county.

[19:25] So, we know the outcome prior to the investment.

[19:30] So, there's a county next to us that is working with the county of the municipalities

[19:36] for a urgent response.

[19:40] Correct. So, in a neighboring county, the fire service in the EMS agency has a memorandum of understanding

[19:46] where the fire departments EMTs are working under the licensure of the EMS agency for the county.

[19:53] So what needs to progress for the city and the county that we're in to look at that data,

[20:01] understand and believe in that data so that we can move forward?

[20:05] My best recommendation at this point would be a work group at the council level.

[20:10] We've made the proposal in the past, but we haven't had much traction.

[20:13] Would

[20:19] that be something to do in the fire services committee or just an ad hoc council to council committee?

[20:29] I'm sure we could bring it up there. I mean that's we can try that because I know you're very involved with that.

[20:36] And then you're chairing this committee. Mr. Browin, what kind of data would we bring forward to show our colleagues?

[20:43] I think we, I think we have it and as well as the working group with Prisma because it really

[20:50] benefits everyone, you know, the less the, if this could be stood up and work, obviously

[20:57] that's the less visits and calls for service to the ER at Prisma.

[21:04] I know she, a whole group may want to speak to it from his perspective, but it's just really

[21:10] a win-win for all of us. So we've tried to initiate that conversation early on and it just

[21:20] needs to be revisited.

[21:21] Let's be sure we will work with you to follow up on that.

[21:24] Sure, I think that would make a lot of difference.

[21:30] Well, I want to swing in at, since Chief Halloween gave his overview as a substitution until we

[21:38] get that resolved, Prisma came on board, and they are providing the services, but she

[21:46] powerfully funded that. But they have a 79% rate likely EVA avoidable since they started

[21:58] on site. That would be on the second page of the Prisma page. I had it with it.

[22:20] So what

[22:23] is this what is this highlighting this is highlighting since they started working with us the visits

[22:31] They had 22 site days. They caught they may contact with 112 individuals with 33 clinical visits

[22:40] it's 42 BP screens and 18 access health referrals.

[22:45] The access health referrals is connecting them

[22:48] to primary care, but on that second page

[22:51] it shows you that 79% of those individuals

[22:56] was likely a deterrent to the evening.

[23:02] So if we had the relationship with the city and the county,

[23:08] I feel like those numbers would be stronger

[23:10] and we would be able to demonstrate how much we are saving the hospitals and the community

[23:16] if we had that program up. Repeat that one more time. Which part? 79% of the total.

[23:25] The 79% of the total was likely a ED deterrent, so they would not have went to the ED. 79% of the

[23:34] of 112 total contacts, just significant in the grand scheme of things.

[23:43] Seems like that number fully, fully, if the team was full, you could have a lot more contacts.

[23:55] And my last item to discuss is the documentary reviewing that we will have on Thursday,

[24:02] next week, September 17th at 5.30.

[24:05] The city of Columbia, the mayor, has brought this documentary for residents to view.

[24:12] The documentary has real live strategic techniques that other individuals are using in their

[24:20] community that have been successful.

[24:22] I think that this is a great opportunity for us to come together as a community, everyone,

[24:28] on, watch this documentary, see what can be duplicated in Columbia and we do this together.

[24:38] We will have a panel discussion afterwards and we'll have the discussion, we'll take

[24:46] questions, but we'll also have a call to action afterwards.

[24:50] We'll set up some committees of the things to do.

[24:53] Like if you are a builder, you want to be a part of it and you feel like you can contribute

[24:57] to that, we would like you on that committee. So I just think it's exciting and it's all

[25:04] aligning, in my opinion, with the data that the city has pulled together, what Richland

[25:10] County has pulled together, it all looks like it's given us a roadmap to where we need

[25:15] to go. And I would segue into Mr. Fish from HMA,

[25:24] what's up, how it points.

[25:25] And it reminds us, like, as to how we got to the point of having a consultant.

[25:32] How do we get here?

[25:34] How do we get here?

[25:35] So we contracted H&A about eight, nine months ago.

[25:40] It feels like ten years ago, no other than Patricia's, I love you.

[25:45] And they did a homelessness assessment.

[25:48] They spoke with providers.

[25:50] They talked to unsheltered neighbors.

[25:52] they did the research and they put it together for us.

[25:56] You see that in YouTube's packet,

[26:00] the first page is the roadmap.

[26:04] And I changed that up when we first started,

[26:07] remember I had the steps.

[26:09] So this changes a little bit and it gives us

[26:12] some practical realistic items and dates on them.

[26:16] And this is an independent lens into all services,

[26:20] all providers, healthcare opportunities, and ultimately some great outcomes that we can pursue.

[26:28] Yes.

[26:29] Fantastic.

[26:30] Well, then Ms. Wilson, if you want to add anything, if not, go to Trish and her team at HMA.

[26:40] Great.

[26:41] Thank you very much, folks.

[26:42] I'm going to share my screen.

[26:45] Hi, it's Apatli.

[26:51] Thank you, folks, for the time today.

[26:54] There's several slides here, so I'm going to zip through them a little bit quickly so that we can get to the meaty part of this.

[27:02] First of all, I'm going to give you the headlines right up front.

[27:07] You have a strong system of care that gets really good results.

[27:12] You just heard from Camicia the types of results that your services are delivering.

[27:17] It is constructed as I'm sure you well know by the lack of housing available to folks on the lack of exit strategies both affordable and supportive housing by the lack of behavioral health integration.

[27:33] You are not you are not alone in that it is not common for behavioral health to be integrated but it's happening more and more across the country.

[27:42] And by a need for, we believe, a stronger coordination across the system.

[27:51] There's a lot of good people out there doing a lot of good work,

[27:53] and we want to make sure that they're not doing it in silos.

[28:01] So, really briefly, and you'll be able to read these.

[28:04] I believe that you have a copy of these.

[28:06] We spoke to, as Commissioner noted, we spoke to over 150 people, we did a survey, we did

[28:12] some geographic mapping, we looked at data, we looked at reports, trying to come up with

[28:18] the information that we have with you here as outsiders looking in.

[28:23] And as outsiders looking in, I'm sure that there's a couple pieces that we may have missed

[28:27] that need further clarification.

[28:30] I want to stress that these are still draft findings.

[28:32] We have not finalized our report yet and so are open to recommendations, critiques, and

[28:40] things that we may have, don't have the full context on.

[28:46] You asked us to look at housing affordability, stability, and homelessness pressures.

[28:53] The majority of area renters are cost-pert.

[28:57] We looked at renters because they're a better indicator of who has the potential to become

[29:02] homeless in a community than people who own their housing.

[29:06] What you see from this graph rather is that there are more than half of the population,

[29:16] more than half the renters are cost burden, which means they're paying over 30% of their

[29:21] income for rent significantly there are a third of them are paying over 50% of their

[29:29] income for rent. That number 8900 is the number of folks that you that are one

[29:37] issue away from coming into your systems because 8900 households they're one

[29:44] job that's been lost a medical crisis a fire in their home so this is a number to

[29:51] pay attention to the show. The average renter wage is below every reported housing

[29:57] that means that the amount of...

[30:00] Money I need to make in order to afford a two-bedroom that those averages aren't aligned. So the average worker is not able to make the average rent for a two-bedroom based on income. And you see on the right, those are numbers who state. So it's a regional statewide issue as well as a issue local to Columbia. You see this graph before it shows

[30:29] that your homeless, the number of people experiencing homelessness in your community has been rising

[30:36] and has seen a dip in the last year. I think we can start to point at some of the services that you folks have put in place already.

[30:49] What I want to underscore here is that this is not, we cannot take broad, even though this is a, I'm giving you headlines today briefly,

[30:57] We cannot take like a broad swipe at this and say, oh, it's all about housing.

[31:03] Because when you get there at the individual level, the issues are what we would call staff.

[31:07] Their staff vulnerability is as you well know.

[31:11] People have, people are, are, look, lose their housing but also have a criminal justice,

[31:17] a probation meeting to get to and they have a child care and they have a doctor's appointment

[31:24] And all of those things wrapped together served to hold them in a place where they're not

[31:30] able to access and maintain viable housing.

[31:36] What we did, I want to just want to go back to that just for a second.

[31:41] What we did here over and over from folks is that it is not primarily a shelter problem.

[31:48] Over and over we heard from people that we didn't want that they were saying it's not about

[31:53] shelter since about how people flow in and out of the system.

[31:58] And then, lastly, I can't add much to what you heard from Camicia already.

[32:02] Your services are doing well, particularly outreach.

[32:07] It also helps us to look at the behavioral health needs and system capacity.

[32:12] The picture there is not pretty.

[32:15] In South Carolina, South Carolina is ranked 42 out of 51 for workforce availability for mental

[32:22] health workers, which means that, you know, at the very start, there's not staff for

[32:29] the services. There are two large, what I would call, safety-next mental health facilities

[32:35] and large substance use facilities. Those are not adequate to meet the needs of people

[32:43] who you folks are serving. And notably, I think, you know, we paid a lot of attention to medication

[32:49] for opioid use disorder like buprenorphine that people can get started and help

[32:55] them stay free of using that drug. They're daily caps for those services so you

[33:01] know if I if I wake up late one day and today is the day that I decide that I

[33:08] can do this but it's the afternoon I'm out of luck. There are some some behavioral

[33:14] our health services to build on a number of them.

[33:17] There are clinics, there are mobile crisis teams,

[33:21] there are a sort of community treatment,

[33:24] which is a mobile clinic teams to build on,

[33:27] but it's not enough right now.

[33:29] You have services to build on, but it's not enough.

[33:34] And we have some ideas about partnerships.

[33:36] You folks are doing well on partnerships.

[33:41] We think that there are ways that you can offer additional things like you do already.

[33:47] You can offer space in some cases, you can offer data, you can offer clinical training

[33:52] sites.

[33:55] Certainly, this is not an opportunity for Columbia to go on and go to clinic, but I think

[34:00] that in some of these partnerships, there are more non-financial pieces to capitalize

[34:07] and we may realize, and I encourage you to keep looking for those.

[34:13] You do, we did a survey across providers, those who responded to us were very reflected

[34:22] that they had done a lot of trauma form training, which is good.

[34:26] It shows that the system is responsive to the needs of the people.

[34:30] We've also delivered you a refresher course that can be used, so you'll have that from us.

[34:37] We did some mapping and I want to spend just a minute on this and you'll see more in

[34:44] the report when we get to it and we'll send you, you'll have a website that you can play

[34:52] with once you get this but what you're seeing here is that this is all on using publicly

[34:59] available data at the census track level.

[35:03] So we mapped housing insecurity by census tract to, in this case, drug overdose deaths.

[35:12] And what you see is this maybe section shows where there's the highest correlation.

[35:19] The tan section is the next highest correlation.

[35:23] What was striking to us over and over is that these little circles are where the treatment

[35:32] and providers are. So that's where people need to go to get help for these issues.

[35:39] Yet many issues are happening outside of that nexus that happens to be Columbia.

[35:45] And I know that you weren't asking us necessarily for a regional perspective,

[35:52] but we thought this was important for you as you talk and think with your other municipal and county colleagues

[35:58] about where and how services might be located and delivered.

[36:03] And I'm going to skip through these others very quickly.

[36:06] This is for depression.

[36:07] You can see that the need kind of tips to that left hand side.

[36:15] And then the maybe piece for binge drinking is out to the east here.

[36:22] Again, not really clustered closely with those little circles

[36:26] where the service providers are.

[36:27] Okay,

[36:30] to the meat of this, yet another key findings, which we've kind of rolled up a

[36:36] little bit so that you don't have 37 of them to go through, homelessness in Colombia

[36:43] is complicated, their buyers are interconnected, while the overarching piece is the availability

[36:51] of housing, individuals come to this within a number of different needs.

[36:55] housing availability is way below demand.

[37:01] There are limited services, limited outcomes

[37:05] for your providers who are doing great work

[37:08] but they're constrained by too few housing options,

[37:11] too few treatment options.

[37:13] The behavioral health capacity is not at a place

[37:16] where it can manage the number of people who need services.

[37:21] the care coordination alone demands exceeds available capacity, the discharge planning and transitions from institutions like jail and hospitals are there, but they're not formalized.

[37:39] There's a lot of relationships in your system, which is terrific. It shows you have good stuff to work on.

[37:46] They're not formalized in a way that ensures that Trisha is going to move from jail to a shelter.

[37:54] If commercial isn't at work that day.

[37:57] So thinking about how do we formalize those systems of care.

[38:02] And then the last thing is observation around coordination.

[38:08] Like I just said, there's a lot of relationships.

[38:11] What we see across the country is that services work, you know, individualized to each

[38:18] locality when there is good coordination across the services, when all the pieces of the

[38:25] puzzle know what their role is and know how they need to be engaged.

[38:30] Some of this has to do with how you collect data and some of it has to do with how you

[38:35] and I'll talk a little bit about that in the recommendations.

[38:40] So first recommendation we have a little bit surprising since we made a big deal out of saying that services are going well,

[38:48] and you should just told us about how the incredible work that Terence is doing.

[38:54] We think you should add a couple more Terences.

[38:56] We think that we heard from our focus groups about the visibility and the people still

[39:06] living out on the streets.

[39:09] We think it's amazing that you are taking care of your city's most vulnerable this way

[39:14] and we think that there are opportunities to expand this.

[39:18] Formally, putting in more formal coordination between outreach and shelters, expanding those

[39:25] mobile services, maybe it's ours, shared partner protocols, but really beefing up that system

[39:31] is something that you do well, and I think that you can take it to the next level.

[39:35] Trish, I'm sorry, this is Teresa, the manager, and I hate to interrupt you, but I really must

[39:42] right there because what I don't want to leave the public to think that the city of Columbia

[39:50] a proper is in charge of even though like you're saying, we can convene maybe again and take

[39:58] ownership without reach. But the outreach we're doing is something we've stepped into doing.

[40:04] There are multitude of providers who have people who should be doing outreach. So I really want

[40:09] to have a little clarity around that statement that that is not for us to necessarily own that.

[40:16] I think that's the problem. We're sitting here demonstrating that just by us stepping into this with one person

[40:23] We've made an impact, but where is everybody else? And so I get I'm you know

[40:28] I have to speak to that because our police chief and our police officers are doing it themselves

[40:36] And that's part of the problem. We need more

[40:40] support in that regard from all of the other entities who

[40:45] supposedly also have outreach. And I just have to be clear about that because

[40:51] it's coming across a little bit. The way this is worded as if it is the city's

[40:57] responsibility only.

[41:02] If it sounds that way, I'm sorry. We were looking for, we

[41:08] were writing a response to the city. That said I think that we can easily say the

[41:16] community needs to expand mobile services. I think one of the things that you're talking

[41:22] about, and like I said, we'll talk a little bit more about, is the necessity for coordination

[41:31] across the entities that are doing those services. And I'm going to shift to six for just a

[41:40] second here, strongly that there are opportunities here for you all to be convening and collecting

[41:52] data in the same way, because some of your folks are collecting data differently because

[41:59] your funders asked you to collect it differently, right? But if you can come up with a few simple

[42:06] shared definitions and then move towards a regional citywide, however you want to define

[42:14] the parameters of a dashboard that actually shows people's results, you know, to your

[42:21] point, you know, that you have folks who you think should be doing this outreach as well.

[42:27] So you want to be looking at who's doing what, have that be available to everybody in a way

[42:34] that is not punitive, but it just helps us to identify where are things moving well so

[42:42] that we can amplify it and where are things not going well so that we can pull back

[42:48] and say, okay, here's what we need to be doing here.

[42:51] Right now, there is, you know, HUD collects data for our HUD funding services and some services

[42:58] that are part of the COC, but you don't have that for your whole range of services.

[43:04] And I think as you move forward into this new, if you really are on the cost of a new time,

[43:14] with this movie, this documentary is going to really take this offer as you have this report,

[43:20] the Rich and County report. As you move towards that, I can't underscore enough how important it is for you to be collecting data

[43:32] And showing that data doesn't have to be detailed, doesn't have to be, but that is the ongoing

[43:39] way.

[43:40] And see folks, you know, you know this, that is the way for folks to be bought into what's

[43:50] moving forward here.

[43:51] Let me ask you something, except for, do we have kind of the basics of that data for our

[43:58] services?

[43:59] I mean, what you provided here looks very dashboardy.

[44:03] We absolutely have it.

[44:04] So, what you're saying is it a function

[44:06] of expanding that to include all service providers

[44:10] into a dashboard format like that?

[44:13] Yes.

[44:14] Exactly.

[44:16] So, would that be HMI-S?

[44:19] Or no?

[44:20] It would be HMI-S.

[44:22] But not everybody is using HMI-S.

[44:29] There may be some folks who are doing work that you want to pull in who are outside that system.

[44:35] And you may not want to use those same HMIS definitions.

[44:39] It may be a good starting place because those are known to so many people already,

[44:44] but those may not be the definitions you want to use.

[44:47] And this is a chance for us for you to say,

[44:50] these are the three things that are important.

[44:53] These are the three things that we're going to measure,

[44:55] three things that the public is going to be able to see from us.

[44:58] And I think that's what we define.

[45:00] When we started this, we got in this game to fill the gap of services and to fill the need that wasn't being serviced out there. And I think I think that's kind of the starting definition point to whatever we build around and then bring people in other service providers to help fill that, right? Identifying the gap. Yes. And I think that's what this dashboard does. Rapid shelter, what was Rapid Shelter Form formed to do? Right. Take care of the chronically homeless, get them to that underserved population, get them to the level

[45:29] level, where other service providers can then take over.

[45:34] And then obviously the HOPE Center, I think we're going to see that grow a lot in the

[45:40] next 18 months as we bring partners on for more services on-site.

[45:44] So, anyways, just wanted to make that point.

[45:47] I feel like that's why we're all sitting around this table was to do exactly what you just

[45:52] pointed out, Trish.

[45:53] Yeah.

[45:56] Just moving back here real quick.

[46:01] We love co-location. You guys have done some of it.

[46:09] How do you make it the norm rather than just happening in a few places, right?

[46:17] And I think that comes back to the partnerships that we're talking about with your behavior of health providers,

[46:22] with your physical health care providers. You were just talking about it with the fire department here.

[46:28] But co-location of those services, especially because the homeless service providers already

[46:32] have their arms around individuals, every time you work for people out there, slip it,

[46:37] right?

[46:38] Every time you work for people out there, the notion that you're going to lose that.

[46:43] And I mean, that's been the notion of the services that you've stood up so far, is how

[46:48] do we put as many things in one place as possible?

[46:51] I think the degree to which you can expand that is great.

[46:54] And like I said, we have some real specific examples of what you might want to think about in there.

[47:03] The transition bridges are important formal discharge and release agreements across hospitals,

[47:10] as well as jails and standardizing those.

[47:13] Is there any good case studies out there, Trish, of regions that are doing this successfully,

[47:21] states that kind of make it law for the communication?

[47:25] Is there anything you can provide for us for this item?

[47:28] We can definitely get you MOUs for discharge planning in some of the pathways that they've set up.

[47:40] I feel like that would grab people at the start of their journey.

[47:48] I think that's the biggest thing is that the cracks that you just talked about falling through.

[47:52] It happens probably I don't a great percentage when they get dropped off at the common transit center

[47:58] You know where they can't they can't go to hope the hope center that night

[48:02] They can't go to transitions because they're not officially considered homeless, right?

[48:07] So I think that's the that's getting that understanding putting it public facing forward

[48:13] I think we go a long way with getting getting the percentages grabbing those earlier

[48:18] Yep. Absolutely.

[48:27] Housing. The sun is not quick. So that I know that there's public

[48:35] private conversations happening right now. We are excited at the Lexington County RFP

[48:43] that came out about, you know, trying to figure out land use. There is, you know, land

[48:52] learning agent tips and tricks that we can share with you, but I do think that

[48:59] expanding your housing stock has got to be a big priority.

[49:08] Kinesha talked about how those aftercare services in place, housing placement as

[49:15] the start is really has to be one of the thoughts around us, right? Some of that

[49:21] can happen with your behavioral health partners. There can be conversations with

[49:26] them about what can be what what what is available and and then you know kind of

[49:32] figure out where the gap is. I will say that we have seen communities who go

[49:38] after every single stamp slot and every single HUD grant which you know once you

[49:44] get them they're still not perfect they can be pains but going after all and those

[49:48] are the kinds of services that can help you keep people in. We did not see so many

[49:53] of those here and would really recommend that you lean into that grant availability.

[50:02] I think that your region is well positioned.

[50:06] You have framework, you have a framework to do it, and you know, the federal government

[50:14] is, we see, we write a lot of our agency, write a lot of grants, we see a lot of attention

[50:21] being paid to more of this other region in terms of giving federal grants. So I think

[50:30] you guys are well-positioned to do that and that can help with this piece of it.

[50:34] Lisa who would orchestrate that? The SAMHSA grant. Sure.

[50:39] The SAMHSA grant, I think, and tell me if I'm wrong, that would be done independently. It's not like

[50:44] the HUD grants where you have to go through the COC to get them. Those can be done. So that's

[50:49] something the municipality could take the lead on.

[50:52] Yes, absolutely.

[50:54] Absolutely.

[50:56] You know, you find a good writer and sick them on it.

[51:01] Thank you, May, do you provide that service?

[51:03] We do provide that service.

[51:06] We do, and I will say, because this is one of the areas

[51:09] I'm really proud of.

[51:10] We're really good at it.

[51:11] And it's like to what levels of funding

[51:12] are we talking about?

[51:13] We should, like do you have experience with the awards

[51:16] from those?

[51:17] I do not.

[51:17] Okay.

[51:20] Tristan, you explain to Councilman Brennan what those grants look like from SAMHSA.

[51:26] There's a big range of that.

[51:31] They can be, so recently there were a range of them for substance use provisions for substance

[51:41] use services.

[51:42] So if I were Columbia, what I would do is I would say, you know, we're going to co-locate

[51:50] services in these four areas and we're going to attach somebody to our outreach team to

[51:58] do, there's an evidence-based practice called screening, brief intervention, and referral

[52:05] to treatment that they would like.

[52:07] You know, we're going to do an evidence-based practice, we're going to do it in the field, we're

[52:11] going to hook people up to care. There are services like that that are available to families.

[52:19] There are services that are available specifically for homeless and housing sites for connecting

[52:26] people to care. Now SAMHSA is specifically around behavioral health services.

[52:40] On the

[52:41] support you to do landlord outreach.

[52:44] There are grants within the context

[52:47] of the Bureau of Justice Administration

[52:50] who could help train support, give additional personnel

[52:57] to law enforcement for dealing with things

[53:01] like street homelessness.

[53:02] So there's a range and I can,

[53:05] I'm gonna ask the potlite to make a note for me.

[53:08] I can give you kind of a sample of some of the types of grants that have gone out and

[53:15] these are not small, these are hundreds of thousands of dollars for communities.

[53:20] And if I'm not mistaken, Sam said does that grant.

[53:24] I want to state a bad word for the job tank.

[53:28] Yeah,

[53:35] thank you for providing that tradition of dance.

[53:39] Yeah. And then we just talked about the data structure, the coordination and data.

[53:46] The

[53:49] things I do want to say at that end of this here is that I feel really strongly that

[53:56] this was an assessment. You contacted with us for an assessment. I do think that there is work here,

[54:04] which will bring the community and even closer to prioritize this work, to do some strategic

[54:12] prioritization.

[54:14] And I've spoken to Kamisha a little bit about this, that the aftermath of the film might

[54:21] be the right space for that,

[54:24] you know, you can't boil the ocean, right?

[54:27] So kind of, you'll think about what makes sense logistically, but you also want to capitalize

[54:32] on that energy of your community. So thank you. Thank you, Trish.

[54:38] Councilman Harvard, if you have any questions? No, I did not. Thank you.

[54:43] Ms. Wilson, any questions, additions? No, thank you. Great job, then.

[54:49] Commissioner, thank you for putting together this wonderful team to report back on

[54:54] where we can go from here. So I think there's some great low-hanging fruit

[54:58] items that we could tackle in these six recommendations and look forward to working to do those.

[55:06] So, can we say anything else before we say thank you to the HMA team? I think you all

[55:11] are going to stay on for a minute because we have an executive session item. Is that correct?

[55:15] Yes.

[55:16] Perfect. All right. If there's no further questions or comments, Councilman Herbert, Mayor Protin,

[55:22] Herbert?

[55:24] Yes, I'd like to make a motion that we go into executive session for the receipt of legal

[55:28] advice relating to matters covered by attorney, client, privilege, pursuant to SCCO 3470 homeless

[55:36] services. There's a motion. I will second that. Ms. Hammond. Hi. Hi. Great. We are going into executive

[55:46] of session.

[55:47] Thank you, everybody.

Homeless Services Advisory Committee

Transcript