Through a collaborative effort between Community Connect, Today's Urban Renewal Network, Riverside Downtown Partnership, Arlington Business Partnership, Path of Life, and Riverside County Housing Authority and the City of Riverside, which is known as the Riverside Homeless Task, has produced the Riverside Homeless Reduction and Prevention Strategy Five-Year Plan that strives to help individuals and families move toward self-sufficiency. The City of Riverside has taken a pro-active approach to addressing homelessness in our community by partnering with a wide-range of non-profit organizations, social service agencies, faith-based institutions, and the community at-large.
More info...(Link Homeless_Reduction_and_Prevention_Strategy_Five-Year_Plan.pdf)
June 3, 2003
In early 2001, the City Council approved the formation of the City of Riverside Homeless Task Force Committee. The charge to the Task Force was to provide advice, guidance, and recommendations to the Mayor and City Council in order to achieve a greater level of effectiveness and programming to address the City's homeless situation. The Task Force consisted of leaders from government, community groups, homeless providers, as well as members from the faith-based community. In addition, the City provided a homeless program consultant to facilitate the efforts of the Task Force. The Task Force met monthly for two years to develop the plan.
During the 2009/10 program year, the Outreach Team engaged over 500 homeless individuals and worked with community partners to connect people to a range of assistance including shelter, housing, employment, benefits assistance, behavioral health services, medical services, transportation back to their hometown and other assistance they need.
Since its adoption, the City has actively pursued implementation of the 30 action-based strategies within the plan as well as other solution-based initiatives in collaboration with a broad range of community partners. Through this collaboration, the City of Riverside's Homeless Assistance and Prevention Strategy has been successful in assisting many individuals and families move toward housing stabilization.
Through collaboration, the City of Riverside's Homeless Assistance and Prevention Strategy has successfully assisted many individuals and families moving toward stable housing. The following is an update on the fiscal year 2011-12 accomplishments and some of the major initiatives currently underway.
On February 13, 2012, staff presented an update to the Community Services and Youth Committee on the City of Riverside's Homeless Assistance and Prevention Strategy accomplishments and milestones in 2011. Staff proposed to undertake the following activities to improve the City's Homeless Assistance and Prevention Strategy (Homeless Strategy) under the Homeless Action Plan and to address the City's current issues of the visibility of homeless individuals on our streets, prevention services for those in crisis, panhandling as well as public safety and quality of life concerns for the entire community.
Comprehensive Report
The 2011 County of Riverside Point-in-Time (PIT) Homeless Count was a community-wide effort. Conducted on January 24-25, 2011, the count and subsequent surveys provided information about the homeless population that is critical to program and service planning, helps to inform the allocation of resources for services to help the homeless, and offers a means of measuring the impact of homeless programs and services. In addition, it is required by the United States Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) as part of a national effort to enumerate the homeless population.
The "County of Riverside 10-Year Strategy to End Homelessness" is the result of the efforts of many representatives from public and private organizations including the following agencies who made up the "10 Year Plan Working Group". This report was prepared for the County of Riverside Department of Public Social Services and the Housing and Homeless Coalition for Riverside County by the Institute for Urban Research and Development.
ESG funds provide homeless services, emergency shelter, transitional housing for homeless or those in danger of becoming homeless. In addition, ESG funding will go to support program operations and essential services provided at the City's Year-Round Emergency Shelter.
