Homeless Program

HOMELESS STREET OUTREACH PROGRAM 

HOMELESS STREET OUTREACH PROGRAM
For assistance, call 951-826-2200

The City of Riverside Homeless Street Outreach Team is made up of four professional service providers who conduct daily mobile outreach and client service engagement for homeless individuals and families on the streets, in service venues, and other locations where they can be found in Riverside. The Street Outreach Team responds to the issues and concerns of people in need of assistance as well as local residents, businesses and others relative to homelessness in this community. Focused on the “hardest-to-reach” and “service-resistant” chronically homeless population, the Outreach Team works in partnership with city staff, local service providers, health professionals, law enforcement, and the community at-large to help people get off the streets and connected with the services they need to gain stable housing and achieve self-sufficiency. Local service professionals and community volunteers participate in “ride-alongs” throughout the week to assist the Outreach Team with engaging people in needed services. The Team recently partnered with local Physicians and the UCR Student Run Health Clinic to provide street-level health care engagement on a monthly basis.

During the 2008-09 program year, the Outreach Team encountered over 500 homeless individuals on the streets and other locations not meant for human habitation in the City of Riverside. Outreach staff works with community partners to get people connected to shelter, housing, employment, benefits assistance, medical and behavioral health services, transportation back to their hometown and other assistance they need. One of the highlights of this effort has been the application of a Housing First approach with over a dozen chronically homeless individuals who have been successfully assisted with exiting life on the streets and moved directly into housing coupled with aggressive case management. Some of the other outcomes include:

• 462 individuals agreed to receive assistance with supportive service connections;
• 281 individuals assisted with entering into emergency, transitional or other temporary housing;
• 96 individuals assisted with placement into permanent supportive or independent housing;
• 324 individuals assisted with connecting to public benefits and other social services;
• 61 clients assisted with employment services;
• 46 individuals assisted with reconnecting with family or friends;
• 29 clients assisted with transportation home to family outside of Riverside County;
• 97 individuals assisted with connecting to health care services;
• 157 clients assisted with connecting to mental health services;
• 79 individuals assisted with connecting to substance abuse treatment services.