DATE: January 5, 2021

TO: Mayor Quinton Lucas, City Manager Brian Platt, All City Councilmembers

FROM: John A. Wood, Director, Neighborhoods and Housing Services Department

SUBJECT: Services and Support for our Unhoused Population

The City’s response to shelter and housing concerns for our unhoused population (prevention & intervention) involves several key strategies outlined below. The Neighborhoods and Housing Services Department collaborates regularly with other City Departments including Parks and Recreation, Health, and Police, as well as many community groups and organizations to provide a variety of services and support to our unhoused population in the Kansas City area. We are continuously looking for ways to improve and expand our reach and impact and welcome any suggestions and feedback on the below initiatives and also for any possible new initiatives.

1. Financial support of agencies and other community partners
   Through our Housing and Community Development Division of the Neighborhood and Housing Services Department the City funds approximately a dozen non-profit organizations through our annual Community Development Block Grant/HOME Action Plan. Our regular annual action plan provides $1.5 million toward these services. Our partner agencies provide a variety of services and programs, such as rapid re-Housing, rental and utility assistance, case management to individuals and families, and emergency shelter, among other services. Additionally, since COVID-19, the City has received additional Emergency Solutions Grant (ESG) funding from Dept. of HUD of about $7.0 million to enhance the capacity of our providers preventing homelessness and providing shelter, for a total of $8.5 million in the current budget year for services for the unhoused community in Kansas City, Missouri.
   
   
   1. Benilde Hall $42,000.00
   2. Serve the World Charities $103,384.00
   3. Metro Lutheran Ministry $150,000.00
   4. Guadalupe Center $113,190.00
   5. Save, Inc. $163,500.00
   6. Journey to New Life $234,000.00
   7. Hope Faith $127,000.00
   8. Synergy Services $113,444.00
   9. Rose Brook Center $208,000.00
   10. Care Beyond the Boulevard $46,900.00
   11. reStart, Inc. $210,000.00
   12. KC Anti-Violence Program $50,000.00
   13. Greater Kansas City Housing Information Center $75,000.00
   14. St. Michaels Veterans Center $107,002.00
   15. Community LINC $490,000.00
   16. Journey to a New Life $519,000.00
   17. Community Assistance Council $153,000.00
   18. Metropolitan Lutheran Ministry $150,000.00
   19. reStart, Inc. $72,000.00
   20. Life in Full Transformation $200,000.00
   21. Greater KC Housing Information Center $188,000.00
   22. reDiscover $142,000.00
   23. Mattie Rhodes $245,000.00
   24. Veterans Community Project $173,000.00
   25. SAVE, Inc. $322,000.00
   26. Hope Faith $315,000.00
   27. Westside Housing Organization $55,000.00
   28. The Whole Person $100,000.00
       
       
2. Clean-ups/Transient Camps
   Upon neighborhood or community request, the Kansas City Police Department in coordination with the Solid Waste Division, and occasionally the Kansas City Health Department, informs residents of informal encampments that for public health and safety reasons they should move to shelter services or other locations. KCPD enforces removal of items over a period of several weeks and allows for clearance of items only after individuals are expected to have left the area. Prior to actual removal of items (by Solid Waste) a follow-up visit with KCPD is conducted 48 hours prior to clean-up activity. KCPD coordinates with various social service providers (City Union Mission, ReStart, etc.) and requests that they provide staff to accompany KCPD to the sites. The City’s care partners for unhoused communities offer relocation assistance for our unhoused population. Thus, there are a minimum of two contacts made with those living at any camps prior to any cleanup being conducted. No individual is moved without the opportunity to retain their personal belongings, usually with notice several weeks in advance.
   
   With Solid Waste, we are proposing two additional measures:
   1. Develop a program to provide trash bags (specific color TBD) to social service organizations to provide to transient camps to address any encampment area. These bags can be collected upon request, and would ensure that no personal items are collected.
   2. Suspend transient camp cleanups during cold weather months (October 1-March 31) each year, unless at the direction of City Manager or Director.
      
      
3. Community Outreach & Partnership: Cold Weather Initiative
   The initiative will support families with children to be housed in a safe place during the coldest months of the year. In addition, houseless women will also be able to be housed. This will be a temporary shelter to provide a needed solution to shelter; and a safe and warm family sanctuary in the winter months.
   
   Families that are housed at the Cold Weather Initiative location will be provided services which include mental health, permanent housing assistance, food security assistance, medical assistance, and transportation. This will be a great resource for families during this pandemic that have lost their rental units or homes due to loss of job because of the pandemic. It is important that we begin to rapidly rehouse these families and provide them with a secure place to live during their challenges. These families will be offered help with food, health support, employment, housing and other basic needs and opportunities.
   
   Partners include:
   • Hope Faith (Service Provider)
   • Greater KC Coalition to End Homelessness
   • International Health Organization
   
   Time of Operations: January 2021 through May 2021 (six-month term)
   Security Twenty-Four-hour security for the Site
   Financing Source: Emergency Solutions Grant-COVID; Coronavirus Relief Funding
   
   
4. Housing Solutions Summit
   The City is a key partner with the Housing Solutions Summit and leaders at all levels of Missouri government taking place later this month which seeks to create sustainable solutions through collaborative efforts to provide housing for people who are unhoused. This includes:
   • Identifying barriers to housing access and develop solutions to overcome them
   • Developing policy recommendations at all levels of government
   • Developing accountability measures at all levels from residents to service providers to government
   • Respecting and preserving our diversity, maintaining a high regard for cultural, social and ethnic identities