Bangor homelessness committee backs Project Hope funding split

[2:43] Teal Vasquez: Jason, can you hear us okay? Hello, I can hear you. I can't see you. We are having technical difficulties. We are trying to get the video up. Certainly, thank you. [2:58] Carolyn Fish: Yeah, it's just the video. Oh. [3:08] Teal Vasquez: It is 517 or 518 depending on which clock I look at, so we will call this meeting of the Advisory Committee on Homelessness to order. We do not currently have a quorum. So for tonight's meeting, to start off, we will get things started with some updates, which do not require a vote for those that are listening in or in the audience. Without a quorum, we cannot vote on anything or move anything forward. However, we will get the updates so that those are a matter of public record and can be reviewed for everybody. So with that, the first update that we have is on warming shelters, and I believe Bruce is going to be able to provide that update for us. So first, the floors are [3:56] Jason Goodrich: ascertained. Thank you very much. So I've talked to all four warming centers today. They all applied for the proposal RFP for Main Housing, waiting on the results to get that. I didn't talk to Boyd, but I talked to the other three today, and they're just waiting to see if they got funding for that. They're all looking at opening the doors around November 15th to the 30th, and they're getting staff and volunteers ready and getting some training for them. Do we [4:34] Teal Vasquez: have a timeline of when those decisions are made by the council? [4:38] Jason Goodrich: I looked into that today. I don't know if Jen has that more than I do, but I looked into that today because I knew that was going to be brought up, and I just couldn't find a date. I don't think they gave a specific date of when they were going to let people know. Yeah. [4:54] Teal Vasquez: Do you have any additional information on that? [4:56] Jason Goodrich: I don't think they gave a date. No. [4:58] Jen Gunderman: There's no additional information on when that funding will be released. Yeah. [5:04] Teal Vasquez: So from your perspective, assuming the funding comes through, how is Bangor positioned for a public formation? [5:12] Jason Goodrich: Well, I think that if the money comes through, I think that they have a really good setup with the three major warming centers and how they work together, and then Boyd with what he does with his extra beds in the shelter, and then the day shelter warming center has gotten their funds to be able to operate throughout the winter. So I think that it's going to look – I mean, I think we're in a good space to be able to put a lot of people up and off the streets that are maybe couch surfing or squatting or doing other – or living outside. So I think with the way that they operate together, if someone's not allowed at one warming center, they'll make a call to the other warming center to be able to make sure someone's safe and warm. [6:03] Carolyn Fish: So do we know how many heads? [6:09] Jason Goodrich: So the sanctuary takes around 45 people. The I talked to Leon today for the man the brick church. He can take up to 70 people, and then Terry said he would is to kind of take about 30. And then Boyd has extra five mats for warming for overnight warming center I think we're I think last year was around 125 was the most that we ended up housing throughout in warming centers and he's usually around 80 to 90 people I think was the kind of you know about what we did to the average yeah any [7:04] Teal Vasquez: Other questions with regards to the warming shelters Jason do you have any questions regarding the warming can you [7:14] Jason Goodrich: Hear me this is Greg this is Jason Goodrich someone asked us to identify ourselves when we speak so I'm going to do that a quick google search tells me that September 28th is when the contracts will come out the week of September 28th is when people will be notified of their contract award. We're looking at 150 beds, about 150 beds here in the region. A few months ago at a government ops meeting, Jen Gunderman mentioned that we had about 490 people on duplicated travel through those 150 beds? I'm wondering if this is what we're projecting this year, is somewhere around 450 people going through those 150 beds. [8:00] Jen Gunderman: Hi, Jason. This is Jen Gunderman. I'm not quite sure where that 450 number came from. I do know last year on our coldest days, we had about 120 people in warming shelters, and there was about another hundred people who are in our traditional emergency shelter between Bangor Area Homeless Shelter and Prebble Street so on the coldest night I think we had not including Shaw House we had about 220 people in a shelter bed right I was talking about the full year [8:33] Jason Goodrich: Deduplicated service the number of people you serve in a whole year throughout oh great point [8:39] Jen Gunderman: Okay, you may have then given the correct answer. I don't have that report in front of me right now, but I wouldn't be surprised if it was about that number. [8:47] Jason Goodrich: Yeah, we should be expecting to run about 400, 450 people through those 150 beds. Okay, that answers my question, thanks. [8:58] Teal Vasquez: Any additional questions? Right, we're moving on to the next update, syringe waste. And so I've asked Jen to share an update regarding that. Hi, Jen Gunderman. [9:26] Jen Gunderman: So I want to provide a little bit of an update on the overview because I know that syringe waste was part of the conversation last time. So I thought I would start and give kind of like a syringe waste 101. So to start off, just to understand the landscape of who picks up needles, where needles can be disposed. And I also want to say that this is kind of a bigger issue because we also recognize that there are plenty of people in the city who are taking medication that requires syringes and don't have a place to dispose of them and might have them in gallon buckets in their home but in terms of sort of our overall waste a couple ways that syringes are disposed one is through our syringe service providers are called SSPs real quick Sanctuary and Wabanaki they receive needles from many different sources Whether it's their own clients or not another entity that picks up syringes is the Street Plus program so that's the downtown district they have a very specific perimeter but they are actively looking for syringe waste they provide that number in their annual report each year and it's actually quite significant we also have the MOU or the memorandum of understanding with Wabanaki Public Health and Wellness this memorandum is that someone can put a report in for syringe waste and to be picked up Their MOU focuses specifically on public land and I'll describe why in just a few minutes and then we have our individual businesses residents and others that pick up syringes whether it's volunteers or you know there's been some people who kind of go around the community and pick up syringes the SSPs I just want to point out it's not just about that people bring syringes to them but both SSPs also usually do community cleanups where they go around to certain parts of the city and they're doing More and more of that. Just to give you a little bit sense of data with the memorandum of understanding that we had with Wabanaki, in 2025 they picked up 2,947 syringes where they got a request to go pick up a syringe. That was kind of 82 requests whether they called Wabanaki or they did the see click fix through the city. Could you repeat that number? Sure, 2,947 syringes this year. That number is down to 721 syringes yet. That has been through close to 100 requests now. One of the reasons why that could be down is because sometimes what happens is that they get a call to go pick up syringes say in the downtown area and Street Plus has already come through. They may have already cleaned it up so they're trying to you know work in coordination. Wabanaki through that MOU also empties all the syringe boxes throughout the city so we have a map where there are a number of syringe boxes throughout the city. Last year they collected 2,397 syringes in the boxes. This year, they've collected so far to date 2,299. There's a lot of fluctuation in which boxes have more syringes in it. Some of the boxes are smaller. We've got two of the boxes that are like mailbox size. The one that looks like a mailbox by the Co-Bridge is one that is [13:12] Teal Vasquez: often rightful did we add more syringe boxes year over year no so we 've actually taken out a few [13:21] Jen Gunderman: say for example there was actually a syringe box on Second Street and that was removed because of the YMCA construction and we had a box up at the encampment that one was removed and then we also had a box down by Dutton Plaza just temporarily while there was the encampment there through this contract at the last meeting I meet with Wabanaki every month about this contract we did recognize that there was based upon the data and what they were observing the potential for putting two more syringe boxes down on the waterfront one on sort of each parking lot and I'm working with Parks and Rec to make that happen so that's kind of like what the data looks like oh sorry the last part is they also do sort of just regular canvassing as part of this MOU in 2025 they picked up about 70 needles through this sort of regular canvassing and where they picked up about 62. Those numbers don't count the needles that are dropped off to them by city departments public works, Parks and Rec, wastewater. We also bring our syringes to Wabanaki that are picked up in a few different ways. Some of the challenges that we have, for example, with this MOU, sort of public land versus commercial land versus private land. The MOU is actually specifically and historically was built for picking up syringes on public land. You start talking about private and commercial land, there's liability and privacy issues. So Wabanaki has been trying to really work within that to still support syringe cleanup and also provide some education. We also know that there is, as I mentioned, people who are storing syringes in their homes, whether it's, you know, through injection drug use or it's through, well, another type of injection drug is they're using diabetes medications or testosterone or weight loss medications, and there is no place for people to dispose that. We've done a little bit of research in this area where one of the options is they pay $65 for a small syringe disposal box that they can then fill up and mail. That's very expensive. And then the last thing that I would add is what leads to this is that there's mixed messaging about how to actually dispose of syringes. Right now, the public education, both at the state and federal level, is just put your syringes in a laundry detergent, label it, and put it out in the trash. The city of Bangor has an ordinance that you're not actually able to do that because our trash goes to the Hamden sorting facility, which does not want that being sorted because syringes fly in their sorting facility. So one of the things that has become clear to us that we want to work closely with the Hampton Disposal Facility to understand how we could do some education around not disposing syringes that way. The last thing that I'll just mention in terms of next steps, a few weeks ago I did meet with the SSPs, Street Plus, and some of our own departments to talk about how we can have sort of a better routine handle on sort of what's happening when people are observing with syringe waste, what people are doing, sort of looking at ways to sort of provide more information. I mentioned about the two new boxes that we're looking at going in and then just sort of collecting evidence-based ways of how syringe disposal could happen. There's been ideas of the redemption program or we've talked about sort of syringe take back day because what we wanna make sure that we do is that we help to support the many different types of people that may be having struggles with disposing their syringes. questions [17:17] Carolyn Fish: I think there's a lot of people in residential homes and commercial properties that aren't well. They don't know what to do. They kind of freak out when they have used needles. And I know we're getting emails every day. And myself as a realtor, I've had two homes broken into to discover needles that were used. And I called, you know, sanctuary, just thought they picked them up, but they then educated me that they don't because it's private property. And being in real estate and showing property and interfacing a lot with residential homeowners, there's more and more needles being discovered on their property. So when they call the PD or they call, you know, they call the needle sanctuaries, they're making an assumption that they're going to, you know, have this service provided and they're not. And they don't feel that they're qualified to pick these needles up, you know. I think there's a fear factor. So is there any idea of how we can reach the residents and the business owners who are experiencing this, you know, daily? That's a really [18:25] Jen Gunderman: great point. One of the things that with this MOU, like if someone contacts Wabanaki and asks, they will provide them education and even say we can provide you with some of the materials to be able to go pick up the syringes. But it's an absolute opportunity where we can be doing more around [18:41] Speaker F (unidentified): education. Am [18:47] Speaker G (unidentified): I understanding correctly that a person in that circumstance would receive education and materials and then could like provide those needles to Wabanaki for disposal, so they don't have to sneak them into the trash against the regulations? They can give any [19:09] Melissa Ann Rhodes: other questions? Just a comment. This is Melissa. So what would you like? Have they talked? I know you said something about the pickup. Like I know that you've got syringes with the [19:24] Jen Gunderman: day of that. You know, I'm so glad you said that because I, that's, I think it's a great idea and that's one of the things that we're starting. I'm going to be putting together sort of a list of what are some potential ways and what are some of the associated costs. And I think the syringe take back would be potentially very successful again, serving a whole bunch of different needs. [19:46] Melissa Ann Rhodes: Yeah, yes, for sure. I mean, I have tenants that call all the time, and it's like, how do I get rid of my diabetic needles? And I'm on GLP1, and how, you know, they're, they're collecting, and they don't know where to go, because we also get called about the medication, so we give them the effect, you know, the of dates and times. We look for future ones of the drug pickup, but they're also having troubles, you know, trying to call pharmacies to say, you know, can I bring them here? It would be nice to also maybe have drop boxes outside of pharmacies, like, you know, you have the Northern Light ones, so medically, medical needs, they can feel comfortable going to drop them off at somewhere like that. [20:21] Jen Gunderman: Absolutely, the challenge is that syringe disposal actually costs. Yeah, I don't have the numbers in [20:26] Melissa Ann Rhodes: front of me right now, but it's, it's not, yeah, they struggle, especially my tenants that have diabetes, they do struggle, and they do things like put them in the bottles or the Thai bottles or whatever, and you know, they know they're not supposed to, but at the same point, they also have children and, you know, all the things, so they're trying to be safe, and to order one of those, like I said, it's pricey, and then to exchange them, help, pricey. Well, yeah, I would like to see that job including that, Jason. [20:58] Teal Vasquez: Any questions from you, sir? No, I have no questions. All right, so if no other questions, we'll move on to the next item on the agenda, which is Project [21:13] Jen Gunderman: Hope. So, Jen, I will keep having food as well, so I will provide a little bit of historical context with Project Hope. So Project Hope is a program that's run out of the City of Portland in conjunction with. This program is specifically for people who are living outside and getting them to stable housing. And it's done through an evidence-based intervention of intensive case management. The operations of the program are somebody who's living outside and who has a level of readiness to want to be housed would work with a navigator case manager to, right from the beginning, to engage, to build a relationship, and then help bring that person into housing. And that's done in many different ways, and people experience, as you know, many, different challenges. So maybe that's helping with applications, or rental showings, or getting a birth certificate, or an ID, or getting resources for treatment, or recovery, or whatever that might look like for that person's journey. Helping to secure that housing, helping to secure the way to pay for that housing, and then staying with that person for at least six months. So that's what we've seen is like we've seen what we have in the system right now is many wonderful organizations who can only do up to a certain point and then need to sort of hand over to another person. Person. And while all the intentions are there to be supportive, that little bit of fracture sometimes can really break the support because the person hasn't built the relationship with the second person, or they feel like I'm in housing, I can handle it now, or for many different reasons. So this program would really provide that person to see a client through the whole process and then really help to provide that security. The other part of this is with intensive case management navigation is that the caseload is really small, so that means you know typically a case manager can have a fair number of people, you know a couple dozen or more on their caseload. Often that's driven by the services needing to be billable, and so in order to be able to billable, you know you need to you need to see sometimes a significant amount of people, but because this is funded through a grant, it sort of allows the case managers navigators to have smaller caseloads like so they can really have that one-to-one relationship building and not be sort of pulled in a bunch of different directions. The program would also include some discretionary funds. Obviously those funds would help with things like helping to set up a person's new apartment, maybe if there's an application fee or getting a birth certificate or transportation or a food package when they get moved in. So those funds would be available for those types of supportive work. The other part that the city of Portland has talked about is that the other benefit that isn't at first obvious but if you but you know thinking through it is the benefit of building a relationship with landlords, because what we have seen is when people are moved into housing and don't have that ongoing support, they really can sometimes have trouble with their landlords for a whole host of different reasons on both sides. And so what this does is when somebody gets housed and there's a navigator A manager that says I'm with this person, hey landlord, you can call and talk to me with all the right, you know, releases in place. I can help navigate what the troubles might be, because in our experience is that a landlord doesn't have somebody to evict them, right, and it's costly with time, finances, and all those pieces. So one of the benefits is that you now have this liaison working with the landlord, and that can help with our landlord relationships as well. Maine Housing is willing to put in 70%. They are looking for a 30% match. So I've been working to sort of work with the city counselors to figure out where that those city dollars could come from. We first proposed opiate settlement funds. Those opiate settlement funds would come from unspent funds from the intensive case management for the HIV, our HIV case management work. After completing the first year of HIV-intensive case management, we realized that we weren't going to spend all the money that was allocated. It took time to hire people. Some costs weren't as expensive as we thought. So projecting, we had about $126,000 of unspent funds from that program. So what we had first proposed is that those unspent funds be used as the a match, and then we also when that was city council wasn't quite sure if that was the right fit, the next thing that we were able to offer with help from robin is say we could actually use community development block grant funds to do half for two years, and then opiate settlement funds to do half, and that could come up with the match. So the last that was left is I proposed this to city council, and their recommendation was to take it back to you here at the advisory committee to get your feedback and thoughts. I know that you don't have a quorum tonight [26:50] Teal Vasquez: to actually we actually oh Dr Tony has joined, so we do not, right, I think what city council [26:57] Jen Gunderman: and counselor can help me with this, I think what city council or councils were looking for is your feedback and your recommendation for the program. Counselor Fish, do you have [27:09] Teal Vasquez: anything to add on council's expectation or what they I think Jen explained it well. I think we're [27:17] Carolyn Fish: Looking for some feedback. I can't speak for the whole council, but I believe what our concern was ongoing obligations that the city may face beyond, you know, a year or two. This is a pilot program, and you know, right now we just looking for a strategic plan from the homeless committee, and we don't know what that may ultimately come up with. We need a bigger set aside, a bigger amount of monies that have more effective overall impact on the homeless community. We don't want to prematurely make decisions that sort of, you know, a hundred thousand, a hundred thousand there. So we just have concerns about, you know, the idea. I think everybody who's receptive to the idea whether we replace 30 or 40 more people, it's 34 or we're helping each year, but when you look at the big picture of our future potential obligations on an annual basis, you know, I think it's, you know, is there a bigger number that could have a greater impact for a longer period of time opposed to what we obligate ourselves out itself now, you know, each year. Did I explain that right? I think yeah. Is there a deadline for [28:38] Teal Vasquez: accepting this main housing grant? Like do does the city need to make a decision this month to be able to accept those funds and they go away, or is there a timeline to allow committee and other entities to try and develop those plans to counselor's point to make sure that the [28:58] Jen Gunderman: recommendation with mean housing approached us back in, I think, July. The hope was that if this was something we were going to do, we're going to be able to get it going in time for the colder months to be able to start moving people into housing. I have communicated with them and they said that they are willing to kind of take it step by step with us. There isn't a deadline. So they're willing to kind of see what comes next for us. [29:28] Teal Vasquez: And then just to follow up, what does the ongoing commitment look like? Sure. [29:34] Jen Gunderman: So this is just one year of commitment for main housing. Again, looking at the city of Portland as what has happened, they are now headed into year three of this project with the city continuing to actually, the city of Portland to actually increasing their support. This year they're actually using some of their Opiate Settlement funds to hire housing retention specialists to actually help people stay because they have seen success. Their goal the first year was to engage with 90 individuals to enroll in the House 45. That is the same sort of goal that we were setting here in Bangor because it's going to be the same number in Tennessee. In terms of what's happening in the second year, it's a pilot, so we, you know, this is to see how it goes. This is kind of the nature of our work sometimes where we would only get one or a couple years of funding if we were not, if there was no funding going further after this year, what we would do, like we do in many of our situations, is we would make sure that people trans, would transfer over to a case manager if anything, someone could transfer over to one of our city employees doing housing retention or output work or homeless response coordinator. [31:04] Speaker G (unidentified): I'm just wondering if there's any data about the, it seems like one of the values of this program is lower eviction rates and I'm wondering if there's any data about the eviction rates, like if it's better than the typical data for recently housed people. That's a great question, again, [31:21] Jen Gunderman: looking at the city of Portland, I have to, I can get those numbers for you. I believe of the people that they've housed, degrees, the majority of them stayed housed in the time that they were there. So this isn't a pre-eviction prevention but more when someone gets housed they stay out. And so I can get the actual data for you but my understanding is probably at least 80 percent remained housed [31:46] Anthony T. Ng: was even past the six months that they were trying to support. This is Tony. Do you ask them, do you try to transition them out to like after so long, so many months, those years, you say hey let's move on to see if we can move you out to a different place and what's the success rate for that move out of their housing or move case management? All right, well I guess like it's a housing. And I apologize if I missed the first part of this. So is housing permanent for them when you move them into? Yes. Okay. Yes. So they sign one-year lease or whatever you want to call that? [32:25] Jen Gunderman: They sign a lease if that's what's required. Yes. Okay. Okay. [32:30] Anthony T. Ng: But do case management, do you move them along? Like how many of them require case management the whole time they're there? [32:37] Jen Gunderman: We can get those numbers typically in the work that we do. People who are coming from living outside and going into housing, case management is something [32:46] Anthony T. Ng: that's a part of their life for a while okay and sorry for one do you have like a criteria list like someone would meet before they can even be eligible for this they have to be living they have [33:01] Jen Gunderman: to be living outside and this is where it gets a bit subjective but oh i forgot an important piece of this. I'm sorry. The funding would include funding a program coordinator who would also do some of the case management navigator at the city of Bangor, but then it would also provide funding to the three ESHAP emergency shelters, including Pebble Street, Bangor Area Housing, Community Cares, that does Shaw House. Sorry, it's a very important piece of this. And so it would actually provide 3.5 case managers navigators as part of this project. [33:44] Anthony T. Ng: Because one of the things that would be nice, and I don't know if any tools like that exist out there, is if let's say I'm one of the candidates trying to get a place, there is almost like a questionnaire, something that you can complete that assess how ready I am to get into it. Because that will give you an idea how much services I need, because some people could be more independent than others you know and navigate through so it's like in psychiatry we have something called locus score that tells you hey what level of care do you need but if there's something like that effect that can say hey you know tony needs this but ben doesn't need this and therefore it makes it easier than just everybody getting the same thing at the same time [34:23] Jen Gunderman: yes thank you we do have a few different types of tools out there for assessing people's needs coming into case management or other programs. But thank you, that's a good reminder. [34:35] Teal Vasquez: Jason, I see your hand is up. I'm gonna get to you. Counselor Fish had her hand up a minute ago, but I see you, my friend, we will get to you. [34:44] Carolyn Fish: I think the other concern that Jen did just address with knowing that some of this monies would be going toward a case manager, I think that the council had the other concern concerned that with what the city provides now for our case management and our health community counseling resources that they may be spread too thin like what the time obligation would be and if one case manager would really be enough and what the ultimate impact might be for case management and other resources for time and energy that might be contributed to this program. And I know that Jen did say that we have one full time case management, but there was just concern centered around that as well. [35:36] Teal Vasquez: That's something as well. And then Jason. [35:38] Melissa Ann Rhodes: So this is Melissa Rhodes. This is something that I've been advocating for a long time. So I would be totally in favor of something like this. I've seen the total opposite with not having that type of support where people just don't stay housed. The case managers come and go, they don't stay and they can't refill those spots. It's not an intensive care, intensive work with them. So I think from what I do, seeing it day to day and reaching out to case management, reaching out to all the resources I can, having a smaller setting, a smaller worker, because a lot of the case workers I work with have many too much on their caseload so you call they just there's no time so I think this program gives us what we need to keep people housed I struggle every day to keep the people that we have housed that have come from unhoused to stay there and they just shut they there it's it's like they get housed it's over they're done shut the door I don't need your help anymore like you had said so to have the intensity that's there to make sure they at least get to that six months honestly I think that full first year would be amazing because six months is really still not really enough because I feel like we get to that six month mark as we really start to have a problem because they get too comfortable almost and then people start backing away and then here we are so yeah I mean any I think it's better than what we have now for sure yeah [37:14] Jen Gunderman: Yeah, I think if you're saying that, six month is, I'm sorry, that could be longer based on the needs that we see if someone's ready for traditional case management. Jason, go ahead, sir. [37:36] Teal Vasquez: Oh, we are unable to hear you, sir. [37:38] Jason Goodrich: Oh, I'm sorry, thank you. I have a follow-up question about the post-housing services and supports that people will get. In your memo, you mentioned that you will be housing people outside of Bangor as well as inside of Bangor. Is there a mileage limit on where you will be going? So how will you do a six month follow up with someone in Whittitt-Pitlock? [38:00] Jen Gunderman: That's a very good question. In terms of going outside of Bangor, that would, again, because we'd be working, you know, one-on-one with a person, there would have to be very particular reasons why they're living somewhere. One, we'd wanna make sure that they still have transportation and access to whatever services they need to go to. We also want to know that there are some people who come to Bangor because they had to leave their community because they couldn't navigate the housing services there. So if we're able to support someone in going back to a community that they have been a part of and help them get settled there and then make sure they can still access resources. So this is not about, hey, we have somebody and hey, you just happen to know that there's a rental unit in Patton, let's get them connected there. This is really about like, okay, what is a good fit for this person and let's make sure that they're still able to access the way that they can. We know that the city of Portland has absolutely gone outside of Portland and been able to successfully make sure that people are still connected to their cities. Will that six month follow-up be face-to-face? Oh yes, absolutely. Yeah, this is this is about a person, a case manager navigator staying with a person, visiting their apartment, you know, staying with them active [39:21] Jason Goodrich: in their life for that time period. I did 13 years of intensive case management with the office of mental health and substance abuse and I did it all in the city streets of Bangor. I look forward to the day when we have intensive case management with a lot with a high acuity and a low case load. We have some staff to be able to do that. Thank you for your for answering my questions. Thank you Dr. Tony sir sorry [39:50] Anthony T. Ng: to unclick myself. Do you have the number phone like the people who didn't last long or people end up leaving for whatever reason and do you have an idea what that reason is and things like that? [40:06] Jen Gunderman: I do not have that data from Coraline. [40:08] Anthony T. Ng: Yeah, you'll be curious to see how many of them successfully stay and how many people didn't make it. [40:19] Teal Vasquez: Other questions? [40:21] Speaker G (unidentified): I have a basic understanding of like the opioid settlement funds, but I actually don't really understand community development block grants. Is this is this magic money that grows on trees or what? I do understand is it's not something that is a part of our property taxes, right? So where does it come from? Yeah, so the community development block grant and Robin [40:46] Jen Gunderman: Can correct me where I go astray. I don't have to be dangerous. These are federal dollars. The one thing to keep in mind with this is that this funding, if funded through Community Development Block Grant, falls under the public service category. You can only spend a certain percentage of those funds on public service. So instead of saying all 126,000, because that would like move the city a little bit too closer to their cap, that 63 split might be something that's more manageable. And talking with Robin is that if 63,000 came from Community Development Block Grant, we could actually do that for two years. And so that would just, if the program's successful or it just needs some minor tweaks going to a second year, Main Housing still has the funding, you know, we would only need to look for that other 63. And in terms of the opiate settlement fund, you know, homelessness is both the cause and effect of opiate use disorder, and so it fits in and aligns with the approved uses, and it is what City of Portland is also using as part of their match. Thank you. Any [41:56] Teal Vasquez: additional information on those grants is [41:59] Robyn Stanicki: where it comes from? Yeah, so the city has a dedicated amount of CDBG funding, and since we no longer fund BCAT as part of that initiative, we did the first four years of BCAT, so that funding line has been extinguished, and so we have now this room inside that public services bucket that, you know, we can use to advance our goals. And specifically, the City Council approved our plan, which included the goal to decrease and prevent homelessness through a variety of different approaches, including an approach that this project would be attached to. Too. Yeah, so it would be eligible. And it would be a way to kind of distribute some of that financial burden, the risk, and then also the accountability, because HUD's involved, they can be very stringent too. And they can give us the technical support and all the support that their homeless team has as well. Questions? [43:09] Carolyn Fish: Can I just [43:16] Jen Gunderman: add one other piece to this that is also sort of really special about this funding is that while the funding would come to the City of Bangor, it would then be distributed to Bangor Area Homeless Shelter, Preble Street, and Community Care. And what I think is an added benefit is that it would allow these organizations to be funded in the same way with the same goal. So that really allows an environment to foster collaboration. With the right releases in place, it also allows case managers to talk to each other when they experience some challenges with a client. Like, what have you done in this situation? Do you have a resource that we can leverage? What are your ideas? So it really provides support among case managers who are working on the same program together. I think sometimes we lose sight of how the workforce needs to, like, support each other and help work through some of the challenges. So [44:16] Teal Vasquez: Are these housing navigators and these roles this is going to fund, are they city employees or are they going to be employees of the recipient? They will be, there'll be one employee for the [44:29] Jen Gunderman: City of Bangor and then Bangor Area Homeless Shelter, Prebble Street, and Community Cares with each employer, but they'd all be working and we would be doing the memorandums of understanding and the contracts with those organizations. So we would be the entity holding up the questions. [44:51] Teal Vasquez: Okay, so council is looking for a recommendation from the committee. So I will open it to the floor. Does anyone have strong feelings? One way, another? [45:09] Jen Gunderman: Is Teal raising their hand? [45:11] Carolyn Fish: Can you hold that for a second? [45:12] Jen Gunderman: I think Teal needs to get moved over as a little panelist. [45:15] Teal Vasquez: Jason, we can't hear you again, Jason. [45:22] Jason Goodrich: They said that the committee is looking for recommendations. Are they looking for funding recommendations or support programmatically? So I believe they are looking for, and somebody [45:32] Teal Vasquez: Correct me wrong if you feel otherwise, they're looking for just the committee's recommendation based on this specific proposal that's in front of us. It's included in our packets. I think it's the first attachment in the packet regarding the $300,000 grant from Maine Housing and the $126,000 match from the City of Bangor, which the funds for the match would become split between opioid settlement funds and the CBBG grants. [46:04] Jason Goodrich: So it is a funding question as well as a programmatic question. I support the program wholeheartedly, but the funding we should certainly talk about. I think, I think I supported more with a share 63 than from the straight opioid settlement money. Jason, not just, not sure, I believe, and again correct me [46:27] Teal Vasquez: From the proposal is to split the 63, the seat, and the opioid settlement, correct, to make up the [46:37] Jen Gunderman: Full amount that was put in front of us. Thank [46:41] Speaker G (unidentified): You. Was, Teal, prison this hand, I just moved [46:46] Teal Vasquez: Teal over to panelists, so if you call on Teal, do you have something, my friend? No, I've, I've [46:54] Speaker F (unidentified): Mostly been trying to troubleshoot how to figure out how to get onto the right side of Zoom, but I think that some folks helped me out and I'm now where I'm supposed to be. So I'm just catching watching up because of my technical difficulties, but I'm here. Hello. All right, so I read. [47:12] Speaker G (unidentified): I'd like to make a motion, please. I'd like to buy a bell. I move that we recommend to the council acceptance of the proposal that splits funding between CDBG and opioid a settlement funds for the 30 match from the city for project help. Do [47:37] Teal Vasquez: we need further discussion before or does somebody want a second? So we have a second. So we will put this motion to vote in support of this proposal for 300 000 for main housing 126 000 match from Bangor split between the grant funds and the opioid settlement funds. Can I summarize that accurately? All right, so we'll start with the screen. Oh, did we lose Dr. Tony? Oh, he said it. Okay, so we will start with the screen. Jason. Yes. Dr. Tony. Yes. Teal. Aye. So that is, I'm bad at math right now. Six yeses. [48:34] Speaker G (unidentified): I don't know if you voted. [48:35] Teal Vasquez: Oh, yes. Thank you, Matt. So, absolutely. Thank you, Matt. All right. So the next item on our agenda is the discussion on the Bangor Opportunity Proposal, which was kicked from the last meeting. We had originally planned to have that conversation last meeting, but the other topics came up, took a little bit of extra time. So I'd like to open the floor for anyone to share their thoughts, keeping in mind that we have about an hour and 10 minutes left in the meeting, and we still have at least one other item that we really want to get to. So I'll open the floor. It [49:21] Jason Goodrich: seems to me like a collection of programs. When I read it, kind of comes together in the way I read it, that it's more of a collection of services and ideas than it is than it is one program or service. As I read through it, seems very like you could pick some of these and attach them to a day program as a program and they would work very well. You could take some of these and you could attach them to other services and they might work very well, but I don't see it as a as a general approach. I think it really seems to be in different parts. Thank [50:09] Teal Vasquez: you, Jason. Anybody else? You know, it's been a while since we probably looked at some of this. I [50:25] Speaker G (unidentified): Feel like it, I want to agree with what Jay said, that it's it's it's many parts, but I want to add I think that ultimately that strategic plan that's due nine months from now tick will be a set of parts that help form a plan, so like this is the closest of the three that we looked at to what I think our end product might look like for me. I think, you know, Carolyn's was much more about research and like, this is what I found as I talked to a lot of people, right? There's like 40 different people, which is really valuable, you know, and so that's part of our process. But it's not a plan by itself. It's like talking to a bunch of different people. That's part of research. And then I felt like Jonathan's was a lot of conversations that need to happen, right. And my gosh, you know, an accomplished consultant, suggesting the conversations that need to happen, you know, not a shock, right. And so that's also valuable. But in terms of what the final product of our group would look like, the structure of this is the closest to what I'm, I'm kind of picturing is something that names specific activities and then says we'll do this we recommend that you do this at this level with this amount with this purpose we don't need to you know have names and acronyms for everything but we do want to say these are the kinds of things that we want to see happen so that's for me like when I get kind of excited about what we Produce and on June 30th it at 11 59 pm you know I kind of picture something that looks structurally more like this [52:23] Melissa Ann Rhodes: Good feedback Ben, awesome, that's exactly what both Ben and Jason are saying [52:29] Speaker F (unidentified): Deal, I see your hand is raised, yeah, I think you know looking at the opportunity plan, you know obviously it is a compendium of a lot of different resources and a lot of different thoughts. I'm still of the mind, you know, especially that, you know, in our early sessions, we, our mandate was updated where we could give intermittent sort of point in time suggestions to the council to make improvements on homelessness. And I still feel, I think I said something similar to this after the feedback session, that there are things right now that we could pull out of the Opportunity Plan, things that we could pull out of the Fish Plan and all the other proposed plans that are low-hanging fruit, not in the regard that they're low quality or that they're unhelpful, but that they would require relatively little, that word is said, relatively little effort to implement, you know, in terms of the strategic capacity and the manpower, like the dashboard. There are ways that we could accommodate aspects of that plan right now. And, you know, as far as I can tell, make a meaningful, if piecemeal, difference. And I wonder if some of our stakeholders would feel more heard and more valued by this committee if we could weave that into our agenda sooner rather than later, you know, like the dashboard for instance seems like a freebie. And I get that people feel that it's sort of a astral goal and that it doesn't necessarily tackle things, but I think what it would do is create a sense of accountability and build trust, so that when people are looking at this committee and looking at the entire constellation of committees that the city has, that they're not feeling like there is no way to reach us, so that, you know, there is no way to hold us to account, you know. The dashboard would be, would be doing some of that and would be, you know, and a step in the right direction in terms of messaging. So I think, I think, you know, that is one thing from the opportunity plan that, you know, I'm fully on board and rip roaring. I'm still rip roaring and ready to go on that. I don't know that 's where I'm at. Let me know how other folks feel. [55:09] Teal Vasquez: Thank you, Teal. I mean, I also would just like to point out that during these discussions, if there are things that we feel are actionable and really like there is absolutely no problem with somebody making a motion or to bring that up and say, hey, we should be making this recommendation. That's what we're here to do. So please, if there are things that you see in these plans that, to use your terminology, teal or low-hanging fruit, you feel like could be made actionable pretty quickly, make those motions. That's kind of what we're here to do. Though I would say that I think personally that building the bigger strategic plan and having those piecemeal pieces put into the larger plan is a better way to go, or this is not a dictatorship, so please make those motions if you feel strongly about something. [56:04] Speaker F (unidentified): Yeah, I'm happy to raise a motion right now. I introduce a motion to recommend to the city that we create a dashboard that notates what changes and what assets the city is currently employing to work on homelessness and also create some sort of accountability for the things that are already being involved by this committee. So, if anyone would second my motion. [56:44] Teal Vasquez: Do we have a second? Seeing none, the motion fails. Teal, I think you're on the right track. I think we need more direction, though. I think what that motion that was articulated was very broad. I think if we're going to make something like that we really want to be very deliberate and specific as to what the metrics are, what we're asking for, what we're recommending to the city, because broad strokes just are way too [57:23] Carolyn Fish: open to interpretation. Counselor Fish, and I think it's an excellent idea too, and I hope to see that and part of the strategic plan. I just think that if it was presented now we as a council would say, well, what would be, we need the strategic plan to know what should be on the dashboard. So I think that should definitely stay on the table and something that I hope we do see, and I know also one of the things we talked about earlier, I know we kept referring it to like a clearinghouse hub and we didn't want to use that with, you know, what we know of and commonly referred to as the hub. So I went back to the person after that meeting and talked and they call it a triage coordinator. So when these other communities outside the service community participate or they opt in and then there's that 24 7 person they manage, they, she also told me they have two full-time employees to take these 24-hour calls and then they do an assessment and they know who to call because they're familiar with all The resources, so I just wanted to take the opportunity, because I know that was talked about a lot, to try to have a 24-7 call, and depending on what the situation, they'll all vary, and they don't call it a hub. I was kind of referring to that, but they call it a triage coordinator, 24 response team. So, and I think that was something we talked about, is also potentially being something that probably needs more information, but that we could keep on the table perhaps. Absolutely. [59:04] Jason Goodrich: That makes a lot more sense to me when you say triage coordinator, as opposed to hub. That probably removes about 10 or 15% of the questions, or maybe even more than I had when I wrote back to you about what you had written. Because we have a hub and we have coordinated entry, but we don't have anyone triaging. We had triage in the past. And it worked well for Hope House, the people who had it, but I don't think it worked well as a systemic response because people didn't buy into it. It worked very well for Hope House. Hope House had kept their waitlist. They were able to triage people. But I would like to see that more of a systemic way across Bangor. And when responding to you, I was unsure of what you meant by hub. But if you mean triage coordination, that makes [59:57] Teal Vasquez: a lot of sense. Bruce, do you have color data? [1:00:03] Anthony T. Ng: Sorry. It's me. I have a question. So for the triage coordinator though, I like the idea, but I think we do need to be mindful that we set benchmark that this person can reach, because in a way, you know, again, you know, the first thing people say, oh, spending more money for something, and they need to know what's going to get for spending money on this position, so we gotta figure out what we can measure and say, hey, because of the money we spend, we save this because of what she did, but also something to affect, otherwise it's just going to see people just say you're just putting more money in for nothing, and without [1:00:45] Jason Goodrich: we're talking about input into the system and not throughput out of the system, so it would be easier to bring more people in, but we still don't have throughput out until there's housing and good housing and a lot of housing, we don't have a hundred percent throughput and [1:01:03] Anthony T. Ng: that could be a second stage thing, I mean, I don't know, so it doesn't have to be the first day, but something like if we expect this position to do this, then we need to be able to identify some benefit from this, thoughts [1:01:22] Teal Vasquez: comments, observations, counseling, I think along with housing at least [1:01:28] Carolyn Fish: From the emails we get daily and the interactions that, you know, what we're having from a lot of our residents, I think that rehabilitation and mental health, even if we have the housing, I think somehow the delivery of where these individuals are at the street and trying to deliver them the service that include rehabilitation and mental health services are, is significant as host from the emails that we're having. So I think housing is a significant part of it, but I think also we have to be mindful of the mental health resources that we lack and [1:02:12] Teal Vasquez: you look like you might have something. Oh, I just have incomplete [1:02:16] Speaker G (unidentified): understanding of how what the framework is of the mental health resources and i'm not disagreeing at all i literally just don't know what 's the distinction between lacking mental health resources to give people which is true and also folks who are were unready to accept those, accept treatment and accept resources and like what are the different parts to that problem? That's all I was thinking about. So if I had a troubled look on my face, that's all. No disagreement. Yeah, more mental health resources for sure. I just, I also wonder about that, you know, so that's the troubled look that I have. [1:03:06] Robyn Stanicki: Could I make a comment related to that, Ben? So one of the components, at least when you think about substance use disorder, for example, is the access to services at the right time. So someone is not going to be ready until they're ready. And so many programs specifically attach themselves to trying to anticipate that moment that a client is ready, whether they're, they're showing up because they want Suboxone in the minute because they have a clear minute. And then that next clear minute after that is when you could do some work. So the access to services that hinge on the availability of services, so that right moment is hit for them when they, whatever's going on with that particular client, that they're ready and something is available. It can be very difficult and challenging to coordinate that, but that's some of the major aims, at least in the, you know, in the field of substance use and the provision of services, is trying to time the access to the services when that client is ready. [1:04:15] Speaker G (unidentified): Do we lack that right now? [1:04:18] Robyn Stanicki: There's been a lot of effort. So I wish that Amy was here because she could speak a little bit about like the bridge program and some of the other ways that has evolved over the years. But specifically, it has been about trying to put those resources in an area so that the likelihood that a person ready has, you know, from decision to action, that is shortened as much as possible. [1:04:46] Anthony T. Ng: I think in a way, the mental health services needs to be almost like a fast food-ish thing. I have to say this. When they're in crisis, they need that services right then and there, not the system we built in that basically take them to so many hoops and by the time they get to actually the service stuff, it's actually way past. So it and the service needs to be actually mobile going to them, not them coming to us, because I think part of because we don't have enough of us, that's why they come to us, but the problem is that's not how they function. They work better with mobile services. I [1:05:24] Speaker G (unidentified): Did notice Project Angel in the opportunity plan that Justin Russell shared with us as an example of that, like they said 95 of the time in Cluster Mass somebody walks into the police station and is connected with recovery services like immediately, and my sense is from what I'm hearing, we're not ready to offer that because we don't have the services available in abundance enough that we could put the police in [1:05:58] Anthony T. Ng: That situation of having to get people there. Well, it's not the fact that you don't, I think there's some services, but the problem is still they can't get them in fast enough. So it's almost like, you know, it's it's almost flipped the opposite that, hey, you know, have a mobile van that sits at the corner of, you know, Main Street and, you know, something, and then basically they, that become the clinic they come to, and that moves around a little bit to different spots. That way you hit different people. I mean, the mobile outreach is probably more beneficial for some of these folks because we can get to them. I mean, a lot of them just, you know, they have to come certain hours of the day and, you know, so many places, only certain places they can hit. And many of them have multiple appointments. They can't hit multiple appointments at the same time. That's almost saying they'll have to fail. [1:06:47] Teal Vasquez: Teal, I see your hand is raised. [1:06:50] Speaker F (unidentified): Yeah, I just wanted to tag in and actually pretty much completely agree with Tony and that's one of the things that I thought that was interesting about that RFP the city issued a while ago concerning a day space is that it was hitched to this idea of transportation and that some of the funds would go towards either the organization that actually ends up taking the RFP on or someone that they're paying or giving part of the funds to maybe a partner organization like a church or another nonprofit, is that, you know, my experience from doing the outreach and the recovery coaching is that is squarely true. And even if you want to take advantage of government services like a main care ride, if you're on a bus line, your options are different. There are all of these things that are modifying your options. And the last person that is going to have the time or the access to a computer or the access to a phone to pore over those options and figure out what actually exists and is out there for them is someone who's unhoused on the streets or is someone who is going through active use. And so I think, you know, it's something that we should definitely keep in mind, especially when we're thinking aspirationally about projects like a hub, is it's great to have a triage coordinator, someone who understands the ecosystem very well,, but they're about as empowered as you or I right now sitting in this committee meeting without the ability to transport that individual. And so I think that if we were to take advantage of something like that down the road or form that as part of our strategic plan, that in addition to creating a hub and creating triage roles would be you know putting apart some sort of funds or some program or structure or there should be some transportation and resources for these individuals so they can get around and get where they need to go and I think it's one of those things that would save us a lot of time money and heartache as well Because a lot of times, transportation is, sort of like an early intervention, right? Where, you know, if someone has an escalating mental health crisis, a lot of times all they need to do is get to their recovery coach or get to their therapist or get to the, you know, speak to a crisis worker, before they are hospitalized, before they are overdosing. And if we could reach them in that moment of time where the acuity is dramatically reduced, introduced, that would be helpful. So I think that's just something to keep in mind. [1:10:06] David Bushey: Sure. I'd just like to add, I think Dr. Ng's point is something that, it's the dilemma that public safety deal with on a regular basis is the, like Robin had pointed out, it's when the hours that are outside of what typically people are available to assist, if those resources were are available, that would be an excellent thing to add to those resource cards that we had discussed as a committee a couple meetings ago. If those resources exist in those off hours when the person is experiencing crisis and needs help in the moment, we would be more than happy to add those resources and make sure our staff and I'm sure Bangor Fire would do the same with EMS to make sure that people are aware of those resources. It's a good discussion. I really appreciate what everyone is saying at the moment sir [1:10:59] Speaker F (unidentified): any [1:11:02] Teal Vasquez: other thoughts comments going once twice [1:11:15] Jen Gunderman: Alton I have a question for you so as your staff designee I'd like to be helpful and so I'm keeping track from these conversations some of the themes that are arising so that when you come to a point of starting to develop a strategic plan I can bring these back to remind you and I so I just want to make sure they've captured some of the themes from this conversation accurately if that's okay please so one of the themes that i heard is around accountability and transparency and one activity to get there could be a dashboard like activity i also heard a theme around triaging something that has evidence behind it and may have even been practiced locally in a smaller way Another theme around mobile services or bringing services to where people are at being an important component. And then the last sort of theme that I have here is balancing the low hanging fruit with the more involved solutions as part of your plan. Did I capture that accurately? Anything that I miss? [1:12:15] Teal Vasquez: I believe so. Does anyone disagree? [1:12:18] Jason Goodrich: I would like to add something to that list. I would like to see Bangor bolster and improve their family services around homelessness. I've said at our last meeting, and I'll continue, I hope, to be able to say that I would like there to be a time when Bangor says we don't have any homeless students. And I think that starts with family sheltering and family supports through Bangor. So, I would like to see that maybe on the list of things to talk about in the future. [1:12:57] Carolyn Fish: I think in the beginning, too, one of the things we established was very important. It was communication. How do we reach the public about a homeless community? Because without a lot of information and communication, there's a lot of myths out there. There. So I think that the better, maybe the dashboard would be an avenue for that. But the better communication we have for even the partners to be able to collaborate, communicate, and how we can educate and communicate with the public. So I think communication and it falls back to the family support, perhaps to what resources would be available for family support. So I know in the beginning, we started out with communication, and I had all of those asterisks are also, Jen, for what we talked about tonight, dashboard, mobile, outreach, and that VR show. So [1:14:00] Robyn Stanicki: Anything else? All righty. Alton, could I just make a quick comment just to clarify if this list is going to be sort of suggested components of what that plan was? Okay, I just wanted to clarify what that list you were creating. [1:14:18] Jen Gunderman: It was just themes from the conversation. [1:14:20] Robyn Stanicki: Okay, thanks. Let [1:14:27] Teal Vasquez: Me spin around a bit over the sequence. Anything else? All right, so moving on to the next agenda item, which is landscape for addressing homelessness. So this was included in our packets, it's page five. Chad Burst, do either of you want to come talk about this document that you guys have so wonderfully created? Bruce is not volunteering for anything tonight. [1:14:58] Jen Gunderman: This is a dangerous exercise, by the way. You start creating lists of things because the dangerous part about it is you always forget something and then someone gets angry with you that you forgot to tell. But this was really sort of Bruce and I put our heads together. I know that you have been having conversations around sort of like what are some of the assets and strengths and resources that are out there. What are some things that are in process and what are some of the challenges and gaps, challenges and gaps. This was just a place to help you with the conversation. This is not exhaustive, at all. This was just something that we put together from our perspective on what we've heard in the community. I knew that it's part of your strategic planning process, doing an environmental scan and mapping. What was your sort of some of the groundwork that you wanted to lay? So we thought that maybe this would be helpful as you, that can be a huge undertaking, and so maybe this could be something to help you lay a foundation for that work. So what we did is in the assets, resources, and strengths is really sort of list out some of those buckets that are available in the Bangor area in but and process these. Are the things that are currently unknown. There's steps that have been taken to around these projects or activities, but there isn't any final say at this time. And then the challenges and the gaps were again from the perspective of Jen and Bruce, what we saw through our work. [1:16:47] Teal Vasquez: What questions, comments, thoughts does anyone have? So while you all ponder, I will just say that I found this incredibly helpful. We've talked multiple times about having like a roadmap or a path or a web, or we've used a lot of different terms, but when I saw this document, I felt like this was incredibly helpful to help kind of put everything into one very quick kind of quick reference sheet for us to look at as we're talking about the strategic plan, as we're talking about the issues that the strategic plan needs to help solve. It's all kind of spelled out here with the things, not exhaustive, but a lot of the things that. Are happening currently, so I would love to hear what other people feel about this document. [1:17:44] Carolyn Fish: Counselor. I thought this was great. It was even as a counselor to see it like this. I know what we have in process obviously, but when you see it all broken out into the assets and resources, and then I think about conversations we've had with us counselors and just, you know, I'm just gonna have an example, and this doesn't mean we're going to do it right. But we've just asked each other sometimes times and workshop, for instance, the street plus money that it is out of a TIF out of downtown. But could that money be more effectively applied to something else? And we don't know. We're not saying that. I mean, it has its place, and it seems to be going well. But when we see that $350,000 or so, we just ask ourselves, is there a more effective or a better way? So I think when we look at the resources, we've created them as an in-time situation and things that have worked well. But sometimes when we get together and we talk at council, when something comes up for an agenda or it's due up again to be funded, we always ask ourselves, is this the most effective use of these funds? So to have them out here and now know that we're going to have a strategic plan and look at our strengths and weaknesses, it'll be a good time to look at those resources to see maybe where they can be rearranged or those funds applied to something else may be more effective for the plan that we come up with. So this was great. Thank you guys for doing this. Even for the council, this would be great for all the councils to have as well. [1:19:32] Anthony T. Ng: This is Tony. You know, looking at this, first of all, I really appreciate you taking time to do this, so that's wonderful. I would say from a lay perspective, when you don't know the landscape, you take one look at this, you think there's a lot of stuff out there, so why are we putting more money into this thing? Because they don't know the capability of each of these programs, they don't know the capacity of each programs, and they don't know the work they do. So I think it's important that once we get this to start giving a more realistic picture of what people can see with these agencies, because yes, it looks like a lot, but it's not a lot because the limitations they have or what kind of clients they can only serve. So I think if we can as a deeper dive for some, you know, as part of education for our own knowledge as well too, because even looking at this, I mean, for example, without going to details, you would not be able to tell, oh shoot, I just lost it, sorry, I couldn't, you would not be able to say, you know, how much Theresa Place can handle, how much Water Works and handle, I wouldn't know the difference in terms of like the exact number, so [1:20:52] Jason Goodrich: you've done a good jobs on the challenges and gaps, Bruce, [1:21:00] Jen Gunderman: has been working in this field for many years, that great insight, and this is also we've heard from others and [1:21:11] Melissa Ann Rhodes: I'd just like to add that I, on the challenges and gaps, I mean, this is amazing, this is really good, but I do see, you know, just whether we want to say it's to this or side note, but you know, I worked in mental health group homes for many years and managed many, and the amount of those group homes for mental health challenges that are closing and closed, and you know, I lost my position due to a hundred thousand dollar cut that we saved the PD honestly from going in many times to because we were at the Hospitals for 36 hours with our, you know, the people suffering, and then, you know, right before losing that position, dropping someone no longer qualified for a gas score for, and lived in a bedroom in this house for 21 years, and having to drop them off at the shelter, knowing they're schizophrenic, and they're not going to know if they're being handed a candy or fentanyl, you know, it becomes very scary, and you worry because this has been their routine, their meds are handed to them, they've gone grocery. They're learning the skills to be independent, but now you have those, as soon as those that starts to trickle, and you know, there's not even mention any more group homes, right, like the benefit of that group home, really the staffing, they do a tremendous job, and they work extremely hard, but they also keep people off the street, and they keep making sure their mental health is going to the psychiatrist, is going to the med management, and getting the care that they need, so you don't see them, so what's. Happened, you know, the mental health group homes closed, and what do we see, an increase in crime rate, we see an increase in homelessness, because they don't know how to take care of themselves at this point, and now all those services that were consistently given to them no longer are given to them, and the meds that they consistently needed for their mental health are no longer given to them, and now they're taking whatever they can get, and trying to band-aid whatever's going on with them mentally. Which is, in it's, it's really, it's, it's really bad, it's, it was, I felt, you, oh, we've always had the struggles, but I felt definitely more controlled, and I've seen, you know, since being out of that, and in one of, now I still see them closing, I still talk to those people, and fighting to keep them open. But I go by, and I see people that I house that were in our group homes, that it makes me heartbroken to see on the street, because I know that they don't have the first idea right now how to take care of themselves. So just to blurb, like, I just don't see it. You know, when you, I wouldn't make sure that's happening. Yeah, you just don't see that anymore on there. And it really, you know, people look at group homes in all different ways, but I was inside it, and know how hard people work to not involve the police, not in, and deal with things on happening, and transport the difficult people to those appointments, and crisis intervention was 24 7. You know, we would take somebody to the ER at 2 a.m., meet crisis services there, and stay there till, there till we figure it out. People were able to go in for a med holiday and get the help they needed. So just something, thing I see as far as a challenge. Yeah, now we're about to see changes in Medicaid, yeah, for [1:24:23] Teal Vasquez: sure. Anything else? So that was the last item on the agenda for tonight's meeting. So I will open the floor. Does anyone have anything additional that needs to be discussed prior to our next meeting? And while you ponder that, I do want to point out that our next meeting is October 13th, not October 6th. I know we've been under the impression it was every other week, but it is the second and fourth Tuesdays of the month. So make sure nobody shows up here next, me too. So I'm glad Jen clarified that for me so it is October [1:25:15] Anthony T. Ng: 13th. So that's the day I used to do my medical board meeting, so I may be late [1:25:21] Teal Vasquez: coming from Augusta. So okay, anything else that we need to talk about before we adjourn this meeting [1:25:30] Jason Goodrich: how are Tuesdays working for everyone? Has everyone had been accessible on Tuesdays [1:25:37] Anthony T. Ng: has it worked for everyone? As long as we could make the video portion available, because it's just hard, you know. I think that makes my life at least just more flexible, because otherwise I'll be running all over town. So that's really been helpful. I [1:25:57] Teal Vasquez: think it seems to be working well. We tend to have at least a forum, so awesome. Well, with that- [1:26:04] Anthony T. Ng: Ben,, one more thing. I wanna thank the folks in the city because I know we're meeting whatever time, but you folks are also spending time getting the data and being present for the meeting. So I want to just acknowledge that, you know, you guys are making your piece of sacrifices as well, so. So we [1:26:22] Teal Vasquez: do greatly appreciate it.