Oversight Board for the City of Riverside as Successor Agency to the Redevelopment Agency - Regular Meeting

Hola, familia. This is Chich Marin, and I wanted to let you know that I've been out gathering more pieces for the collection. El Mas Loco. Stop by and see what's new. Memberships are available. Come and meet me at the Cheech.

Meet me at the Cheech.

Hi. I'm Cheech Marine, and you're watching Riverside

noon. Thank you for being with us this afternoon for our committee meeting. We have our housing and homelessness committee meeting. We're gonna go ahead and kick off now at 03:30. We're gonna start off with public comment, open up the phone lines. We are live from what I see. For those who wanna call in and comment on any matters within the jurisdiction of the committee, you're invited to speak in person or call (951) 826-8686. Please follow the prompts to access your language of preference. Press 9 to be placed in the queue to speak. Individuals in the queue will be prompted to be on mute by pressing 6 when you are ready to speak.

If you are on Zoom, please select the raise hand function to request to speak, and an on screen message will prompt you to unmute yourself. We have one common card in the audience. Did you want to speak now, sir, or was it for the presentation later? Mr. Peter Lewis, did you want to speak now or for the presentation? Perfect. Please come on down. You have three minutes.

Yeah, just wanted to say I've been watching this committee for a few years now and seems like nothing really gets done. Not too much. And it seems like you're always picking the low hanging fruit. That is people, not people on the street, but people who with the especially with the merging with the housing department, people who are in need of a place to stay. I know one of your goals is to prevent homelessness, so there's somebody who already has a house. I have one question first. Have we gotten the results of the point in time count for this year?

So just if we can pause the time really quick.

What?

Thank you. I just want to let you know, sir, we have I'm gonna just we cannot respond during your public comments. So feel free to ask ask your questions. I'll make some notes. And then when we get when we have our director up, I can ask some questions and hopefully see if we can get you some Fine.

Well, it seems like there's a lot of strategies that are successful or some strategies that are successful. The housing first strategy by and large nationwide is a failure. And I'm assuming it sounds like we're still on course with that program. Imagine that's because of the state and money. I don't know why you guys I think our council should get involved with the assemblyman and the senators and send messages to the state saying this isn't working.

Of course, you're probably getting all your money, so you don't want to cut it out. Don't know if it's a losing proposition any way I look at it. And I don't know how many of you are familiar with Mobile Loaves and Fishes community neighborhood in Austin, actually outside in the county. That's a very successful homeless, actually community. Community First is what it's called.

And I don't know whether you've looked into that or something like that or maybe you can pass it off to something like Path of life is You get so muddled with all your non profits, you know. Everybody seems like they're tripping over each other and we're spending money on all of them. A lot of duplication of effort when I've been out there seen them. The homeless on the street seem to hate you all, hates the city. We send out, I think we're still sending out the PCED team in uniform, so there's the authority and the cops there to rouse them out of one place and move them someplace else.

And I think when you talk homeless and you're talking to the citizens and the business owners of Riverside, they're talking about the people on the street. They're not talking about somebody who maybe doesn't have the rent for next month or or is losing their their home, the landlord sold the property or something like that. You know, they're talking about finding a solution or a variety of solutions. I saw Desert Center out in the way out in the desert, thousand acres, $6,000,000. That's what it's sold for. You could have partnered with the county and put

you so much. You wanna stay for our meeting, we'll have a presentation and we have a discussion and I have some questions I can hopefully ask our director then and maybe get you at least one or two answers. Thank you, sir. Do we have I don't have any other public comment cards. Do we have any callers in the queue? No callers online? Okay, we're gonna go ahead and close public comment, and we're gonna come to our presentation have today. We have with us here Claire Jefferson Guildbuff, who is executive director of Family Promise of Riverside. They are dedicated to helping families at risk of or experiencing homelessness, and she's going to provide us with a ten minute presentation about the work that they do. Please come on up.

Okay, I haven't done this before. Is this the clicker, guys, to advance my slides? Yes. Is Let's button? Start Okay, woo hoo. Ready to go.

We're ready. Thank

you so much, esteemed members of the council for having us here. My name is Claire Jefferson Gleipa, proud executive director of Family Promise of Riverside, where we believe every child deserves a home. We are dedicated to helping families at risk of or experiencing homelessness. Our mission is to empower families to achieve sustainable independence through a community response. We strive to build a world ensuring that everyone has a place to call home, a reliable source of income, and an opportunity to create a brighter future.

Oftentimes when we think about the unhoused population, we envision that chronically homeless individual, that person maybe sleeping on a park bench or maybe even pushing a shopping cart down the street. But in The United States today, more than two point five million children will experience homelessness in The United States. And last year, we saw an increase of 39.4%, of family homelessness by our HUD population, and that was an increase of 16% in 2023. Here, locally in Riverside, our two school districts, Alvard Unified School District and Riverside Unified School District, last school year identified more than 4,000 children that experienced housing security during the year. So oftentimes, the solutions that we think about are very much at an in line challenge.

And we would like for you to think about how we as a community can work together to address family homelessness, particularly because when we do survey those individuals who experience chronic homelessness, many of them close to ninety percent of those, have experienced homelessness when they were first youth. The impact on child homelessness is vast and long lasting. Children who experience homelessness are three times more likely to be engaged in a special education program, eight to nine times more likely to repeat a grade, forty two percent more likely to drop out of school, and forty seven percent more likely than their house counterparts to experience social anxiety, depression, withdrawal, and seven times more likely to attempt suicide sometime within their life. At Family Promise of Riverside, our goal is twofold, to get folks housed and to keep folks housed. We have a crazy idea that every person within the time that they're hanging out with us in shelter in ninety days should be able to find home.

And we do that every single day through exceptionally hard work, community partners, and, a little bit of faith. We provide housing through two programs. We have an emergency shelter program, which most of us know what emergency shelter is, and through our shelter diversion program. Many times, families might not always have to enter shelter. And if we can engage a family member and support them, we can prevent the trauma that children experience by supporting their grown ups to complete their housing puzzle while maybe hanging out with grandma or auntie or a family friend.

And then once our families are housed, we support them for two more years. About eighty nine percent of those folks that we work hard to get housed slide back to homelessness within the first two years. And so we're there for that first instance of possible housing insecurity to help maybe find a new job or help someone think through how to fund an unexpected experience, because our goal is for families to stay housed. We believe in the strength of our community. At Family Promise, we say folks become homeless not because they run out of money, but because they run out of people.

And it is our goal not just to care for those individuals who are experiencing homelessness, but to also activate our community, both in their heart center, but also with their hands and their finances, and maybe with a little bit of extra space in order to ensure that we meet the current needs of our families. We engage community by addressing through compassion the root causes of homelessness. Job insecurity, maybe the affordability crisis, maybe lack of childcare, all of these things can be ways in which families experience homelessness differently than our traditional chronically homeless individuals. We empower our families to build a connection. It's true it takes a village to raise a child.

How do we help our unhoused families regain access to that village here in our community. We also leverage existing resources. So one of the really creative ways that we engage in emergency shelter is utilizing unused or underutilized faith based space. We have the capacity with our own everyday resources to be able to house every person. It's about how in which we use those resources in order to engage folks in being able to stay safe and warm and cozy indoors.

And then creating solutions that develop a strong family, a holistic approach to make sure that kiddos get to school and engage in after school programs, and families can find employment that inspires them and engages them. We are so grateful to have a host of congregational partners, faith based institutions and belief groups who partner together in order to engage. And this is a list of over 20 communities that have come together to ensure that we're able to care to the most vulnerable in our community. And then lastly, as you think about how you can engage with us, we are excited to have a Facebook and Instagram where you can engage at Family Promise of Riverside. You can call us at this number.

This is our general lines. It's also the same number that you can give as you engage with families. My email is there. And if you would like to schedule a tour, please feel free at family f p riverside dot org.

Thank you so much. I appreciate that. We're gonna just go ahead and open up the phone lines to see if there's any callers or anyone else who wants to give a comment on the presentation. And then I will give it a quick moment, then I'll look to my colleagues, see if they have any questions or comments. I don't have any public comment cards for this. And I don't believe no callers on the line. Okay. Great. We're going ahead and close public comment. We'll come back to committee. Council member Robillard.

Thank you. Just wanted to thank you for the all the hard work that you've been doing in the in the community here, and it's great to hear the the update on all the progress you've made and just the extensive network of partners you have. And I think it's just a testament to how well you work with others and how you're, your what you're doing is successful because people wanna partner with you. So just thank you for that update. Thank you.

Thank you. Council member Mill.

Thank you. Thank you for the presentation. We my staff and I were out. We took a tour not

Yes. Thank you.

Couple months couple months back. So, this is kinda just a a refresher on what you what you told us when we were out there. But thanks thanks for coming by today and sharing this, with us, and thanks for what you do to help the community.

Thank you.

Thank you both, and grateful to hear, know, it's great. Myself as well, I was able to come out so you have, you know, maybe, hopefully, in the future, whole whole council would be great to see, you know, to get a tour to learn. But I'm grateful that, you know, we have at least two different boat members of the committee to come out to see the space and to learn firsthand to see. And I think for myself, just to share, you know, when you get to the site visually and then you get get tours to see of the rooms that have, you know, brand new clothing and, you know, went from different ages, top from babies, you know, to adults. And, you know, those are the types of things that the small pieces that make people feel like they're seen as human beings and given that dignity and respect.

And so just to learn for it's one thing when you hear about what people are doing and then when you see firsthand what they're given, you know, mattresses. I mean, the the items that we know are essential for someone to be seen again as a whole human human being and just I I really appreciate what you do, what your sponsors, and the people who support you do. I had shared, and please continue to let us know what you have. Can you let us know what are ways that members of the community can support the work that you're doing? I understand you have different days where you put acts out to the community for items that you need. What do those look like, and where can people find more information?

Yeah. Absolutely. So every Wednesday, we, on our social media, post a Wish List Wednesday, and it's real time things that we need for families or to engage. Any member of a faith community or a group that works together that has unused or underutilized space, Our goal is that no kids sleep in cars, or worse. And we are seeing more and more families experiencing chronic homelessness, families sleeping in junkyards and other places that are just not meant for human habitation, particularly for little people at risk for lead poisoning and the worst.

So folks that are listening and might very well have a fellowship hall, or maybe a few Sunday school rooms, or maybe even other space that we could utilize to engage, to make sure that families get brought inside and get help. And then lastly, as always, The work that we do is certainly not cheap. And with the shift in possible future funding, the way in which we can engage families well is unfortunately possibly maybe going away. And so being able to activate our community to leverage their dollars to make sure families get inside quickly and cared for, we are always so very grateful for. And then lastly, I will just say for our hearts to be engaged.

Most of us when we look at the unhoused community, we feel uncomfortable. And that's a testament to our humanity. And I would encourage us when we feel uncomfortable to take an opportunity to make an action versus closing into ourselves or maybe working to look away to think about ways that we can engage with organizations like ourselves or even with the dais to be able to ensure that every member in our community has the opportunity to sleep inside and be safe.

Thank you. Thank you very much. We appreciate that, and very grateful for all the work that you do. And just thank you for kicking off and launching, and we'll be bringing other partners like yourself that are doing to what we had a member of the public speak. What is the work being done to help to prevent homelessness or catch people before they are in the streets, you know, and housed or, you know, getting to the point where they're in their cars? But how do we make sure that if they are already moving in that direction, we can capture them hopefully before they have to go into the shelters or what you know, and your you're really are holding that space to help us. As we know, we're at capacity in a lot of places. So very grateful for the work you're doing and your leadership, Claire. Thank you for being here today.

Thank you.

And we'll be I'm sure we'll be in contact again.

Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you so much. Now we're gonna move to our discussion calendar. I'll open up the public lines for comments, but we'll start off with our housing authority project updates. And we have Agrippina, who's gonna share those with us.

And could I ask just be well before we kick off? I know that a gentleman from who's in the audience had asked a question. Just curiosity, do we have the data for the point in town count that's yet? Or is it gonna come at a future meeting?

I have not seen it yet.

The county will be holding meetings with different cities starting in April to let us know what our point in time count number is and I believe sometime in late April or beginning May they'll release it to the public. Wonderful. Stay tuned. Maybe next month's meeting we'll have it.

Okay. Wonderful. There you go, sir. So hopefully maybe the next time you're with us, we'll have some more data. Thank you. Please feel free to get started.

Alright. Good afternoon, honorable members of the committee, staff, and everyone who came out today. I love it when people are actually here, because this is the part where we get to brag a little bit about what we've been working on, right? So currently we have five thirteen affordable housing units in the pipeline. These are in various stages of development.

And of those five thirteen, 174 are permanent supportive housing units. So these are gonna be units that have wraparound services included in them for those people who are going to have difficulties maintaining housing. So right now we have 122 of these units are estimated to be online, that means ready for people to be living in by the end of this year. And the other three ninety one are going to be coming in 2026, 2027 hopefully. In Ward 1 we have the Aspire.

This was the It's over on 3rd Street by the Starbucks. It has just opened. It is fully occupied. It is 32 units of permanent supportive housing for homeless youth. And we are very excited because this is one of the projects that was aimed specifically at homeless youth that has brought our effective homeless youth count to zero. And so when we're saying homeless youth, this is that transitional aged youth, teenagers, very young adults. You're thinking high school, college age kids. And since they are such a risk, this is the time we're gonna catch them. So we're so excited. This one is fully online, fully leased up.

They did have an extra ask as they were finishing up their construction. There was a lot of cost overruns, extra materials costs, as you probably are well aware, insurance costs, things like that. So we're actually taking an amendment to council tomorrow for an additional PLHA funding for them to just help them get back into the black on that project, and then they could close it out.

If I could just ask, we know we just saw a presentation with over 4,000 youth that we know exist. So could you explain with that the number as you said that we've, you know, who was able to be moved into that space?

Oh, for this specific Did you wanna? This was

So it's a combination of your homeless youth that were placed in shelter so that were being case managed at the shelter by Path to Life. We have eight dedicated beds there. And then Operation Safe House is another youth shelter provider in the city. So we were able to temporarily place individuals within those shelters and then quickly get them placed into the Aspire that needed permanent supportive housing and the ones that didn't just that just need rapid rehousing were placed in our HAPT.

Wonderful, thank you.

Next is The Place. This is over at our Hewlett campus. This is going to be operated by the County University Health Systems Behavioral Health. So we're rehabilitating the city owned facility so that the county can come in and provide services there for us. So right now we are working on a lease amendment to give the county that actual authorization to be in there so we can get the rehabilitation done and then they can provide the services.

So that's what we're working on right now. I know that they are currently reviewing bids for the actual construction work. So we'll be hearing more about that coming very soon. Also at our Hewlett campus, the access center, we're having rehabilitation done to the interior space, the HVAC system. We have replaced the roof. I don't know if anyone had been out there. That roof was terribly leaky every time it rained. It might as well have been raining inside. So that's $178,000 in Measure Z funds and another $1,300,000 in CDBG were used for that. And further work, we're still waiting on a contractor's agreement.

We're just waiting for the PO to be issued so that they can get going. Mulberry Gardens, this is the old Cal Fire site right off of Mulberry. So right now the 59 units of senior housing are under construction and we are finalizing the construction financing for the next phase, which is 150 units of affordable family housing. So we just went and had a PIP agreement for $1,000,000 That's our Pro Housing Incentive Pilot Program. I know, we use a lot of acronyms here.

And that went on March 11. And then tomorrow oh no, not for this one we are going with ASIC. We have ASIC funds that are gonna be coming up and another home funding agreement that you'll be seeing very soon. Also in Ward 1, Path Of Life, they are updating their budget. We have been looking at this parcel on 14th Street for a long time, trying to figure out what to do over there.

Path of Life is looking at it. They're updating a budget and they're gonna come back to us with a proposal. In Ward 2 and University Avenue, the housing authority owns a duplex there that is not in good shape. We looked at it, it wasn't worth rehabilitating. So we need to get it demolished.

But the good news is once we demolish it, when we rebuild because of the new rules involving ADUs and junior ADUs, we can actually get three units out of it instead of the two that are currently there. So we have a contractor that has been selected and we are getting that ready to bring to council hopefully next month. Also in Ward 2, the Mission Insight oh, that's the wrong picture. So this is two sites that are kind of adjacent. One is owned by the housing authority and the other the successor agency.

And it is going to be developed into 74 units. 12 of those, the housing authority part, is going to be affordable housing. So this is going to be kind of a mixed income mixed use development. So right now we have been working with the developer to finalize the DDA. It's kind of two DDAs that need to like work in tangent together.

So once we get that finalized, we'll be bringing that to council for approval. Ward 2 again, Crest Community Church. This is there off of Mount Vernon. And they are building a transitional housing community basically, very similar to some other kind of tiny home communities that we've had. And it's going to be for families and transitional aged youth again.

We want to make sure we catch those kids before they kind of fall off. So right now, they are still looking for donors and trying to get their financing in place. And we are going to look at what kind of exemptions we can help them get when it comes to their development fees as they're doing affordable housing for the city. The Quality Inn motel conversion. This one is brought to us by the Riverside Housing Development Corporation.

So this is the Quality Inn on University. And the plan is to purchase it and convert it into 114 kind of like studios. We are looking to use some HHAP3 money for this. And we are planning to apply for HomeKey Plus. So you should be seeing a resolution for the application for HomeKey Plus coming up very soon.

Hopefully, fingers crossed, everyone, that we get some funding, and that'll help us get another 114 units. Sunrise at Bogart is also just about ready to get the ground. We have recently approved one of those PIP agreements for $1,400,000 And tomorrow we're going back to council with another agreement. This is for permanent local housing allocation monies for another $380,000 We also have two other agreements for home and local affordable housing trust fund money that we are looking to put some more funding into this. A lot of these projects do take a lot of money.

And I wish we had one giant pot we could just fund things out of, but we're kind of shaking the couch cushions wherever we can. So that's why a lot of these projects look like they have a bunch of little pieces of funding. We need to kind of build a big pot in order to get them off the ground.

And then just quickly on to the Sunrise at Bogart, at the last minute they had approached the city because they still had a gap in their construction costs, they got the bids back and they were a little higher than anticipated. So they asked if the city would submit a joint application for HomeKey Plus, so that will be going to cancel tomorrow, you'll see that in front of you as well.

Yes, so this one is a little bit different because they already have, it's kind of already going. So the deadlines and the criteria for that home key money is a little bit more competitive. So hopefully this one needs a little bit of extra luck. The transformative climate communities grant, we have 1,000 trees planted. So we have met our goal.

We currently have 29 solar installations. So we're still working on identifying more qualified buildings that we can put those on. And also the xeriscape installations, we're almost halfway there. We have 14 completed of our 35. But we did have a new construction trainee cohort begin on February 3. And they should be graduating, I think, in April. And so that's another group of people that are going to have that extra training. And this presentation aligns with our community well-being strategic plan. And we recommend that the Housing and Homelessness Committee receive this update on our housing authority projects.

Thank you so much. Just gonna see we don't have any public comment cards. Do we have any callers online before we come back to committee? Just waiting to see. No callers. Okay. We're gonna go ahead and close public comment and come back. Councilmember Robillard.

Thank you. The solar panel program, you said you're looking for buildings to install solar sites? Yeah,

it's like you gotta be in the little area. You might have seen like the little signs with the little footprints.

Oh, okay. Yeah. So only on the East Side?

Yeah. So if you're in that little East Side community area with that that's kind of where

We'll still take the help if you know anyone.

Well, was gonna say Collins Aerospace has a million square feet under roof, but that wouldn't work.

I will though, say you make a great point where I was wondering in my head is, do we well, does businesses qualify or could be considered? Because we I know we're having challenges with the homeowners and

I think it's supposed to be for homeowners.

Okay.

The benefit of having cheap electricity.

Yeah. Yeah. Okay. But good. I I your mind was where I was already trying to go to is like Right. We need to start thinking outside the box if we can, if we're allowed to.

Yeah. Maybe we can just look at the the outreach that we're doing for that solar program and see how we can maybe do a little bit better

Yeah, on IT just got us the mailing information. So, SOPWA, I don't want get them confused, there's the SOPWA, is a zero landscape, and then there's the solar panel. One of them will do owner occupied, and another one will do owner occupied multi family. You just have to get the property owner sign off on it. So, we're making sure that we will send those mailers out within by next week. Okay.

That'll drive

up that interest. Yes. Thank you.

And then, yeah, just, you know, we're making a lot of progress on all this new housing being built. And I know it just takes a long time to put these things together. And so I know this report is based on just these types of housing opportunities, but, you know, we're continuing as it relates to the homeless population in general, getting the cost of housing down as low as possible, and it really comes to building more housing as fast as possible. And and so we are trying to do that in a bigger way just to to address some of the whoever's listening to this, we we are multiple angles, multiple routes dealing with the homeless, and this is just one of many that we are doing. But, that's all for me. Thank you.

Thank you. Vice chair Mill?

So my question would be, I see the funding mechanisms. You know, I I talked to to Jeff up stairs with the the grants. I are these things fully funded, or is this these these are a lot of these things were the grants change, the money that we're getting to to fund programs like this. Jeff gets to his desk first thing in the morning and the money's there. He goes to go to lunch and somebody in Washington has changed their mind and said, you don't have it.

Then he comes back from lunch and then the the money's decided that they're gonna put it back, and he's getting ready to go home at the end of the day, they tell him the money's not there. So it's I mean, it's just crazy times when it comes to that. So my question is when I look at, like, the funding, is this money we already have? Just like the HAT funding. I mean, the governor cut that out of the budget. So I mean, this funding that we hope will be there, or is it funding that we have

in hand? So the

home funds, the federal funds, we haven't. It's in the treasury in our financial system. So that has not been taken away, and we have a grant agreement with HUD to implement that. The permanent local housing allocation money and the PIP money that Agrippina had mentioned earlier is state money. We've already entered it in contract, and we'll have that money spent within the next month. So that will be gone. So we haven't heard any clawbacks happen. As long as we still have our federal and our state agreements, our standard agreements until we're told otherwise, we are still implementing those programs and getting those funds

out as

quick as possible.

Yeah. Mike, always some, even with my own money, I'm I'm cheap. I mean, frugal. Frugal. And but, when I see I'm always worried that they're gonna come and try to try to take the take what's going on is crazy. So I I never I never underestimate what they're gonna try to do. So I'm like, if we can get the money spent before they can come take it back, as we we kind of

We're we're trying to spend it. We're trying.

You know, and I'm like, well, there's people like, let's spend it. But this at this point, it's like, you know, don't know what they're gonna do tomorrow. I mean, you wake up tomorrow, the rules the rules of the game change every day. And I'm I'm concerned that, you know, we we have some amazing projects coming. I just wanna make sure that, you know we come to these meetings, we come to the council, gentlemen, what are you guys doing? We we're basically we're making promises. Sometimes there are promises that, like, you know, we're writing checks that, you know, we may not be able to cash. So I wanna just make sure that that money is going to be there. And if not, let's get it spent.

No. And I can tell you the state is right there with us trying to get that PLHA and PIP money out the door.

So we're going very That's part of why we're trying to get all these agreements and get this money contracted and out the door. A lot of especially like the home money that we have, that's from prior year allocations. What happens with future year allocations, we don't know, but we haven't promised that money to anyone yet. So we're working with money that has been already previously allocated to us under previous budget cycles, so that money should

It should be there. But you never know. The rules change by the hour. But, you know, again, all I can say is I hopefully will we can find some sites for some senior affordable housing in Ward 5 so we can we can get that get that going. I had had a a meeting with, some folks from Mobile Home Park in Ward 5 this morning.

And I I talked about we need to get more senior housing in Ward 5. I mean, across the city, but, you know, I'm worried about I'm selfish, so I'm just looking out for my my folks. So but, you know, again, you know, hopefully, in coming presentations, we're gonna see more senior, affordable housing because it's desperately, desperately needed in our community.

Thank you, council member. And I'll say, you know, I've thank you so much. I I love when we get these updates because I do feel like it gives really good transparency for folks to see where things are in the pipeline, to know, right, where's funding gaps now so we could get things across the finish line. I you know, there's a handful of these that are now ward one that thank you for actually being kind, still keeping some ward two that I know, but almost like 75% now are in the new ward. But these are all, you know, big passion projects that the privilege we've been able to work on for a couple years now. With the grapevine, where are we? This is that's been a very long you know, are we nearing the DD being finalized? Will we get shovels in the ground this

summer? I I don't know that this summer we're gonna get we're we're still a little bit in the weeds in the DDA going back and forth between our internal team, our attorneys, and their team over with the Grapevine development. So I know there has been some back and forth. It's just a weird complicated kind of thing because we're trying to make sure that we are meeting all of the legal requirements that we need to meet for ourselves. And of course, they're trying themselves the flexibility.

So part of that is that we have the two parcels that are owned by two different departments within the city and making sure that they are doing something that's going to be a sustainable project, while also making sure that all of the departments and all of the parties involved are getting what they need out of it as well.

Okay, thank you. Well, excited to see. That's been a long one. I've been waiting to see get ready. I just wanted there to already be the, you know, literally, like, give me a shovel. Let's go dirt. Let's get it going. I know. So so thank you for the work on this. And I know I had one more question, but I know we have a couple communications. So I think there'll be room for me to come back if I remember. But thank you for your updates. And I will say that I would love and I can't wait for the day for there to be and hopefully an affordable housing project being going up in every ward across the city. That is my dream to see. And mixed use other housing styles as well.

To share for those of you that are here, thank you again for being here in the afternoon. I love seeing people in the chamber. So can we give a round of applause to our community who came here today? Thank you for joining us. We do have other great presentations coming down the pipeline that we're gonna be discussing, say parking sites and that are gonna be hopefully looking at other spaces as well in Ward 2 and in the city, but I just wanna just let invite you to know we'll have other great conversations coming for our next committee meeting as well. Thank you. We'll move now to communication updates. We have legislative update first. Michelle, are you doing these? Or no?

Somebody else? We okay. Know no legislative update today. But I will share just if I can to share to the gentleman who asked the question. We sometimes do have communication updates for any if there is some type of legislation that whether the city is gonna give letters of recommendation on or if there's bills we need to be aware of that Sacramento's working on.

We haven't had any of those updates come yet, but we certainly can have probably this next month now that we have members that have finally put their bills forward. But just to share that we do the city, not just the committee, but the council, we work with our team. And if there are bills that they feel that the council should be weighing in on, we usually will have the mayor send a letter on behalf of the city of Riverside, and we will make sure that we give input on state legislation that could impact the city. So she's online? Oh, wonderful. Never mind. I think Shakisha's online. Did you wanna provide an update to us?

Yes. I apologize, chair. That's okay. I am online today, to give a brief update. A lot of what you said is so untrue.

So I'll just say that there's a few items that I'd like to highlight. So assembly member Wiggs and senator, Cabozan jointly introduced affordable housing bond proposals. The legislation would place the bond measure on the June 2026 ballot to provide 10,000,000,000 to California's affordable housing programs. The bills, are AB seven thirty six and SB four seventeen, both aim to fund more than 35,000 new homes, preserve and rehabilitate tens of thousands of units, and expand homeownership opportunities for Californians. Secondly, there's AB three forty eight, which is the full service partnership.

This bill would establish criteria for an individual with a serious mental illness to be presumptively eligible for a full service partnership, including among other things, the person is transitioning to a community after six months or more in the state prisoner jail. Next, we have SB five sixty nine, which is related to homeless encampments in the Department of Transportation. This bill would require the Department of Transportation to coordinate with local governments to address and prevent homeless encampments located on the department's property and to establish a dedicated liaison office for this purpose. So these proposals and many more are moving through the legislature right now. We are likely to take a support position on, senator Blake Spears' bill, SB five six nine, as I know it's been a challenge for us working to get our homeless encampments cleaned up on Caltrans properties.

Thank you.

Thank you so much. We appreciate that. Oh, and then I see Michelle has to add something. Go ahead.

Just wanna add to the homeless encampment transportation bill, s b five Gail Hernandez from Public Works has been working with Caltrans to put a contract together that will allow us to address encampments on Caltrans properties so we can quickly respond to those because I know we're seeing a large increase over on the West end of town. We are baking headway, and they're also proposing to provide the city with a funding allocation. So stay tuned for a grant agreement or agreement to come forward to city council at a later date for review and approval.

Thank you so much. We yes. Mhmm. Mhmm.

So regarding that last last week when you guys had the the outreach out on Yes. Did you so what kind of coordination is done? Because the very next day, the CHP and Caltrans decided that was the day they were going to go and deal with the encampments in the very same area that you folks were. So if they had done it in coordination so what kind of coordination do we do with them? Do we reach out to Caltrans or or the CHP and say, hey, we're gonna be doing this in the area, so maybe we could, like, communicate?

Because what happened was then the next day when they moved all the folks, out of the Caltrans property, They were now out in this area same area where you were trying to outreach the folks to get them services. So if we coordinated it, maybe there was an opportunity. We coulda helped a whole lot more people.

So Yeah.

What what kind of, communication do we have when we do that?

I'm not sure the PCET coordination that occurred between our team and Caltrans, but we'll make sure in the future that that does occur. And once that agreement is in place, it will be us that's addressing the whole area, and there won't be this, we can't touch that area. We're just gonna only come to this point, we'll be able to address all of those areas.

Is there anything related to the railroads as well? Because I know railroads have their own right away that we're not allowed to touch.

Yeah, RPD did receive a grant from the railroads but it ended. And so I know they're trying to seek some additional funding. I'll provide you with an update at the next meeting on kind of if there's any headway there. And then we're also working on the flood control channel as well.

And also there is, you know, state owned buildings like the DMV's an example. One right across the street from my house is a homeless encampment every night. And CHP doesn't usually go there until 07:00 in the morning right before they open up, clear them out, and get them out of there. But they're there all night usually. And it's right adjacent to a railroad track. It's kind of a double whammy. That's the one on Brockton.

Brockton. Okay.

And if I could actually ask, we're all just asking about different properties now. I love but yes. Oh, okay. Yeah. That's true. Well, if we could have then when we get to the future items, I'm gonna put something then because we all have questions. But thank you for that, sick attorney, with us today. Okay. Thank you for that. We'll move to our next piece, our homeless housing assistance and prevention round six.

Okay. The California Department of Housing and Urban Development announced the availability of $760,000,000 in homeless housing assistance prevention program round six grant funding. The city of Riverside is anticipated to receive approximately 10,300,000.0 in HHAP funding. The county of Riverside is anticipated to receive 4,800,000.0 and Riverside County Continuum of Care is expected to receive 5,100,000.0. HHAP round six grant funds can be used to fund rental assistance programs, operating subsidies in new and existing affordable or supportive housing units serving people experiencing or at risk of experiencing homelessness, homeless prevention, navigation centers or access centers, motel vouchers, shelter operating expenses, street outreach, admin cost, and case management.

The city, county, and COC must submit a joint application by August 29 to receive these funds. Housing and Human Services staff will be receiving input from the community on how we should be prioritizing our HHAP six funding. Staff will also be presenting on the HHAP at the April 16 Cities Nonprofit Collaboration Meeting and upcoming homeless sub regional collaboration meeting. Staff will also be receiving input from individuals with lived experience. And if you have any community groups that you would like us to present, just let us know and we'll make our service available.

Thank you. I was just gonna ask, how many meetings are you looking to maybe have for input where we could help you if there's whether it's in wards or with specific groups.

We're trying to focus on the service providers, people with lived experience, to tell us where those resources are most needed. Also where we might need to be able to tweak some programs to make them more effective, is where we want to hear that feedback from. So if there's certain groups that we might have missed, I know we're going to the nonprofit collaboration, we're going to the continuum of care. So if there's other groups that we might not be aware of, please let us know and we'll be more than willing to attend their meetings.

Thank you. I know we have some great friends and folks in the community that I think would love to participate, so make sure ambush Michelle, but make sure

you reach out before you

should leave. Thank you. Any other questions? Nope. Okay, great. Actually, one more question, Ms. Joseph. With that feedback, so as of right now, there is nothing guaranteed of where that funding's going. We're gonna get feedback before recommendations are made.

Correct. And if the committee wants, we can then bring those recommendations to this committee in July so that we can submit it within the application in August.

Yeah. That'd be wonderful.

Okay.

Thank you so much. Wonderful. The next item is outreach worker update.

We have three vacancies right now in our PCET outreach teams, and we're looking to hold those interviews next week. So stay tuned. Hopefully, we can get some great candidates and fill those teams so that we can be fully operational on our outreach side.

Any questions from the committee on that? Okay. Wonderful. Looking for now items for future housing homes committee. Council member?

I know that the with the local jail here, we have certain programs to offer rides to the recently incarcerated to get to back to where they came where their home is or their family. We can get an update on those program success rates and options for the future to, you know, make them more successful.

Thank you. That'd be great. I'd love to, like, add to that when we get that info back. What is also I actually just had a great morning this meeting with a union group, the ironworkers that actually specifically are trying to capture those folks that are getting being released, and they work with Starting Over Ink, but they were sharing too that they'd love to know how they could assure they could reach folks, whether to help to get them back to home to their a safe space, but also for job opportunities and, you know, for those that might be unhoused. And so I know we're always trying to figure out all angles. I'm trying to check off topic. Just asking for that piece, if we could also look at what does it look like connecting them with resources outside of their incarcerated services.

Absolutely. And I'll include my outcome of my previous meeting with the under sheriff.

Okay. I just thought I was wrong. Looking at you saying you're talking

too much you can't go.

Looking at us a little funny. And then from what you know, kind of we I think one area that would be really great to have for maybe another update, we all kind of asked about private business. So an update so that we could community could learn about what are efforts being done to address on private property. How do how what what does response look like? For my question, just to share another, I'd like to know is how are we providing support to businesses in the community that have encampments? And I understand we have limitations on our team to get on there. So what's being done and maybe what more can we do if we need to have maybe a workshop here. But maybe first an update, and then as a committee, we could decide if we wanna bring a workshop back. Okay. Thank you.

Oh, yep. Council member. Mhmm.

I'd like to have discussion or something regarding the Saint Michael's project. We need to, I don't know how we wanna talk about it, but I there are some grave concerns in in the area. I know you've met met with them, but, I know that there's a lot of community members that contact me regularly about it. And, you know, we just need to talk about things going forward there. So

Absolutely.

Thank you.

I'll talk about the three prong approach.

Well, we're gonna be busy the next couple months as you could hear. Lots of important conversations we'll be having. As you all can hear and as you all see, we know that the area of housing and homelessness is multifaceted and so there's a lot of layers. But we do have some exciting presentations coming down the pipeline, other great speakers that'll be coming and that are working in different places of the community, and our amazing team as well internally. I just really want thank my colleagues.

Thank you for all your help and support as we work to address many of these different layers. I hope, and I know it may not always seem like we're being super effective, but when we see what we saw earlier in some of the project updates, we all know that getting one person home is what makes a difference in a life. So every Humphrey family individually can reach helps. So thank you all for all the work that you're doing and looking forward to more discussions. I think that's it for today, so we're gonna go ahead and wrap up at 04:19. Thank you all for joining us, and we will hopefully see you next month. Take care.