CORA – Community Overcoming Relationship Abuse July 2022 East Palo Alto Office
East Palo Alto CORA Partnership Report
July 2022
Request
Community Overcoming Relationship Abuse (CORA) seeks support for its East Palo Alto outreach, crisis intervention and family intervention services. This proposal puts forth a program that can be implemented for 12 months, 18 months or 2 years depending on funding level considered.
Proposed Funding Project Period
$75,064 12 months
$113,637 18 months
$152,210 24 months
Background and Need
In response to the strong demand from the City of East Palo Alto (EPA), Community Overcoming Relationship Abuse (CORA) launched the East Palo Alto Domestic Violence Community Advocacy Pilot Project (Project) in January 2017. Since the project launch, CORA has continuously offered EPA residents, including youth, with culturally-informed education, outreach, and advocacy focused on domestic violence.
With a CORA Community Coordinator physically located in EPA for 5 years, CORA has been able to build trust with local community leaders, local stakeholders, and most importantly, residents. Intensive outreach work by staff has included: door to door outreach in the community; participating in planning and production of community events with community partners; posting fliers/posters in laundromats, stores, and public buildings; meeting with community-based organizations and faith-based organizations. Primary collaborators include:
Ravenswood Family Health Clinic (RFHC), East Palo Alto Police Department (EPAPD), Planned Parenthood (RWC), Women, Infants & Children Program (WIC), Behavioral Health Recovery Services (BHRS), Foundation for a College Education (FCE), Family Resource Center (FRC in EPA), One East Palo Alto (OEPA) and its BHAGAT (Behavioral Health Advisory Group Ambassador Team). Just a few of the many faith-based organizations reached out to over the last five years include Apostolic Assembly of The Faith in Christ (EPA church of Christ), Iglesia Pan De Vida, Faith Missionary Baptist Church of Christ, Born Again Christian Center/Zion Missionary, Samoan First Assembly of God, St. John Baptist Church, Vietnamese Buddhist Church, Tongan Christian Assembly of God, and St. Mark African Methodist Episcopal Zion Church. This outreach has led to a reduction of barriers that historically existed to accessing services, including resistance to “outside” resources, lack of information about available services, proximity to and accessibility of services, etc.), thereby increasing service volume, and allowing for an even greater impact in the EPA community.
CORA – Community Overcoming Relationship Abuse July 2022 East Palo Alto Office
This vital program has been made possible by funds leveraged across multiple resources for sustainability. These resources include federal Victim of Crime Act (VOCA) funds through a partnership with San Mateo County District Attorney Victim Services, EPA Transiency Occupancy Tax (TOT) revenue and a generous anonymous donor connected to this work by former Chief of Police Albert Pardini. Since 2020 the program has been supported solely through the anonymous donor funding. This last month the anonymous donor indicated a commitment to provide funding for this program on an ongoing basis.
Target Population
Since the CORA EPA program’s inception, over 271 households have been served. About 54% of these households were monolingual Spanish speaking, 3% disclosed a head of household with a disability, and 32% had children. Among these households, 19 received emergency shelter or emergency hotel stays and 12 received housing assistance, including one family that received Emergency Housing Vouchers. Conservative estimates of the value of these contributions to clients in need through 12/31/21 is $191,985, of which $102,446 was provided in 2021 alone.
The value of the Emergency Housing Voucher is approximately $30,000 per year (plus rent increases) in perpetuity and is not included in this calculation. These needed resources were provided for residents of EPA at no cost to the City.
CORA has been successful in its outreach to the Latinx community. In order to better serve the Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander, Black and White residents of East Palo Alto CORA will direct its outreach to community agencies serving those populations. 0 10
20 30
40 50
60 70
80 90
African American/Black Latinx/Any Race Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander
White
2021 Services by CORA in EPA compared to 2020 Census
Census CORA
CORA – Community Overcoming Relationship Abuse July 2022 East Palo Alto Office
CORA East Palo Alto Model to Date
Through start-up funding from the City of EPA, CORA’s Project was able to bring access to our array of crisis intervention and advocacy services directly to EPA residents, within their city of residence. Funding made it possible for CORA to open an office near other key community resources and across the street from the Ravenswood Family Health Center, a highly utilized community center, thereby making CORA’s services more readily accessible to EPA residents than ever before.
CORA’s EPA office is staffed by a 1.0 FTE EPA Community Coordinator whose full-time role is to provide direct services to EPA residents impacted by domestic violence, in addition to contributing to and attending community meetings and fairs, and conducting outreach in the EPA community. The Community Coordinator is supported by the Manager of Housing and Advocacy, who provides direct supervision and assistance with outreach.
With an on-site Community Coordinator in EPA, CORA has been able to forge closer relationships with well-established and trusted stakeholders within the EPA community, thereby removing barriers to services for clients. For example, Ravenswood Family Health Center routinely refers clients to CORA, and is located directly across the street from CORA’s EPA office. As such, CORA’s EPA Community Coordinator can meet with a client at the Ravenswood Family Health Center or elsewhere within the community - as needed by the client. Additionally, CORA’s EPA Community Coordinator and Manager of Housing and Advocacy both continue to partner with the EPA Police Department and conduct regular outreach to community agencies, church groups, schools, and other resources serving survivors.
With the ability to meet with clients face-to-face in their home community, CORA has been able to build trust sooner with clients, resulting in clients being more forthcoming in disclosing the severity of their abuse. The majority of EPA clients – at least 70% – have disclosed facts of abuse that indicate a high risk for lethality. By comparison, when working with a similar number of clients by phone in CORA’s San Mateo office the year before her transfer to EPA, the same EPA Community Coordinator would hear from an average of one client per week with such a high lethality risk. While it is unclear whether this disparity is due to greater confidence in their relationship with the EPA Community Coordinator, or an actual higher incidence of lethality in EPA, what remains clear from our Project is that EPA residents confronted with domestic violence need crisis intervention and advocacy services that are physically based in EPA.
Program Adaptations During Shelter in Place
COVID shelter in place orders and managing the health of CORA staff, volunteers and clients had an impact on the EPA program. Specifically:
CORA – Community Overcoming Relationship Abuse July 2022 East Palo Alto Office
• Community outreach to new potential collaborators were limited as all gatherings were intermittently not allowed or restrained by the need for social distancing. This was particularly impactful as EPA is a door to door outreach community; Zoom and other like methods were not a substitute.
• Program staff were able maintain contact with primary collaborators during much of the shelter in place and social distancing periods via Zoom. • Mobile advocacy was curtailed -- especially for high risk cases, however the program was able to work with CORA’s legal team for some court cases. • Not all clients were able to access virtual (e.g., Zoom) sessions due to lack of safety in the home, discomfort and/or unfamiliarity with the technology, or lack of access to technology needed to conduct virtual meetings.
• Our emergency hoteling had to be extended to allow for testing clients for COVID prior to their entering our shelter and due to limiting emergency shelter capacity in order to ensure social distancing. This resulted in an increase of 780% in hoteling costs, agencywide.
Proposal for Contract Period
Based on the lessons learned over the last five years, CORA proposes the following:
OUTREACH Reconnecting with the community in person after two years of the pandemic is critical. A key element of the CORA EPA program’s success has been focused outreach conducted by the EPA team in the community.
With a two year pause on in-person outreach due to the need for social distancing, CORA will place an emphasis in the coming year on both reconnecting with established contacts and forging new contacts among those representing communities who are not currently being served at a level consistent with their community distribution. This proposal adds a .5FTE of staffing focused specifically on expanding our capacity to provide Community Outreach as well as the below described Prevention and Education.
PREVENTION &
EDUCATION
Violence is learned and can be unlearned. Using culturally-appropriate prevention and education, CORA intends to re-set the norm among those who accept violence as an expected part of a relationship. As youth are becoming young adults and emerging as new leaders in East Palo Alto, the time is now to re-set their expectations about what constitutes appropriate relationship behavior so they can be allies in the work to end domestic violence. As such, in the coming year CORA will be focusing more prevention and education work on: (a) the youth in the community and (b) specific communities that have been known to experience higher levels of domestic violence. Key to this work will be helping develop stronger perceived norms against dating/domestic violence, reducing CORA – Community Overcoming Relationship Abuse July 2022 East Palo Alto Office
CRISIS
INTERVENTION
ADVOCACY
gender stereotyping, increasing or developing conflict-management skills, improvement in prosocial skills, promoting help-seeking and increasing awareness of services related to healthy relationships and domestic violence.
Emergencies occur all hours of the day, any day of the week. The program office in East Palo Alto is open from 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m., Monday through Friday. During times when the office is not open, the hotline Advocates are ready to assist residents with crisis intervention, safety planning, advocacy and referrals to resources. As such, this proposal includes support for the toll free CORA crisis line.
Community members have come to trust the CPA Community
Coordinator to provide community resource navigation and advocacy.
This service includes connecting clients to county benefits, to local resources – such as food pantries and childcare services, and to CORA’s comprehensive legal, mental health and housing programs. This proposal includes leveraged funding for ongoing support for a full time Community Coordinator to continue to offer this critical intervention support.
THREE BUDGET PROPOSALS
The following three tables show a 12-month, an 18-month and a 24-month budget. Each proposal has the same line items but costs are configured differently for the first 12 months, the second 12 months and the hybrid of 18 months. CORA is asking for funding from City of East Palo Alto to directly support the staffing necessary for this expansion of the CORA EPA office with an Outreach Specialist. Additionally, CORA is seeking support for a quarter of one hotline staff member to ensure we have the capacity to continue full 24/7 hotline services access. CORA also seeks support for Data Systems and Volunteer Management to build our capacity as a community-based satellite office. Under Operating Expenses, CORA has delineated the costs both direct and indirect associated with running the office. This includes the support for our full time EPA Community Coordinator who provides case management and direct client intervention support services. The Other Funding CORA contributes to this project includes both the individual donor funding CORA receives for the EPA office as well as general foundation and government grant support CORA receives that can be leveraged.
For the second year of the program, the costs of COLA/ Merit increases are added in, however the one-time costs for the laptop are removed. For the 18-month configuration, the costs are built on the full 12-month items, plus 50% of the second-year costs. 12 MONTH PROPOSAL
PERSONNEL EXPENSES FTE REQUEST OTHER FUNDING TOTAL
EPA Community Coordinator 1.0 $ - $ 65,520 $ 65,520
Outreach Specialist 0.50 $ 23,400 $ - $ 23,400
CORA – Community Overcoming Relationship Abuse July 2022 East Palo Alto Office
Crisis Counselor 0.25 $ 11,700 $ - $ 11,700
Housing and Advocacy Manager 0.10 $ - $ 8,400 $ 8,400
Data Systems Coordinator 0.05 $ 3,276 $ - $ 3,276
Volunteer Manager 0.05 $ 3,750 $ - $ 3,750
SUBTOTAL WAGES $ 42,126 $ 73,920 $ 116,046
Fringe at 25% $ 10,532 $ 18,480 $ 29,012
TOTAL PERSONNEL EXPENSES $ 52,658 $ 92,400 $ 145,058
OPERATING EXPENSES
Mileage (25 miles per week @
$0.625/mile) $ 813 $ - $ 813
Marketing Materials $ 1,200 $ 1,200
Tabling swag $ - $ 1,200 $ 1,200
Community Events (BBQ's/day
in the park @3 each) $ 3,000 $ - $ 3,000
Cell Phone Service (2 @
$30/month each) $ 720 $ - $ 720
Laptop, including Microsoft
Office (Year One only) $ 1,210 $ - $ 1,210
Staff Training $ 600 $ - $ 600
Advertising and Social Media $ 500 $ - $ 500
Program Supplies ($100 per
month, 12 months) $ 1,200 $ - $ 1,200
Facility Rental- annual $ - $ 6,000 $ 6,000
Subtotal $ 9,243 $ 7,200 $ 16,443
Indirect to cover administration
of the program $ 13,164 $ 24,900 $ 38,064
TOTAL OF OPERATING
EXPENSES $ 22,407 $ 32,100 $ 54,507
TOTAL PROGRAM EXPENSES
FOR YEAR 1 $ 75,064 $ 124,500.00 $ 199,564
18 MONTH PROPOSAL
PERSONNEL EXPENSES FTE REQUEST OTHER FUNDING TOTAL
EPA Community Coordinator 1.0 $ - $ 99,918 $ 99,918
Outreach Specialist 0.50 $ 35,685 $ - $ 35,685
Crisis Counselor 0.25 $ 17,843 $ - $ 17,843
Housing and Advocacy Manager 0.10 $ - $ 12,810 $ 12,810 Data Systems Coordinator 0.05 $ 4,996 $ - $ 4,996
Volunteer Manager 0.05 $ 5,719 $ - $ 5,719
SUBTOTAL WAGES $ 64,242 $ 112,728 $ 176,970
Fringe at 25% $ 16,061 $ 28,182 $ 44,243
CORA – Community Overcoming Relationship Abuse July 2022 East Palo Alto Office
TOTAL PERSONNEL EXPENSES $ 80,303 $ 140,910 $ 221,213
OPERATING EXPENSES
Mileage (15 miles per week @
$0.625/mile) $ 1,219 $ - $ 1,219
Marketing Materials $ 1,800 $ 1,800
Tabling swag $ - $ 1,200 $ 1,200
Community Events (BBQ's/day
in the park @3 each) $ 4,500 $ - $ 4,500
Cell Phone Service (2 @
$50/month) $ 1,080 $ - $ 1,080
Laptop, including Microsoft
Office (Year One only) $ 1,210 $ - $ 1,210
Staff Training $ 900 $ - $ 900
Advertising and Social Media $ 750 $ - $ 750
Program Supplies ($100 per
month, 12 months) $ 1,800 $ - $ 1,800
Facility Rental- annual $ - $ 6,000 $ 6,000
Subtotal $ 13,259 $ 7,200 $ 20,459
Indirect to cover administration $ 20,076 $ 37,028 $ 57,103
TOTAL OF OPERATING
EXPENSES $ 33,334 $ 44,228 $ 77,562
TOTAL PROGRAM EXPENSES
FOR YEAR 1 & 50% of YEAR 2 $ 113,637 $ 185,137.50 $ 298,775 24 MONTH PROPOSAL
PERSONNEL EXPENSES FTE REQUEST OTHER FUNDING TOTAL
EPA Community Coordinator 1.0 $ - $ 134,316 $ 134,316
Outreach Specialist 0.50 $ 47,970 $ - $ 47,970
Crisis Counselor 0.25 $ 23,985 $ - $ 23,985
Housing and Advocacy Manager 0.10 $ - $ 17,220 $ 17,220 Data Systems Coordinator 0.05 $ 6,716 $ - $ 6,716
Volunteer Manager 0.05 $ 7,688 $ - $ 7,688
SUBTOTAL WAGES $ 86,358 $ 151,536 $ 237,894
Fringe at 25% $ 21,590 $ 37,884 $ 59,474
TOTAL PERSONNEL EXPENSES $ 107,948 $ 189,420 $ 297,368
OPERATING EXPENSES
Mileage (15 miles per week @
$0.625/mile) $ 1,625 $ - $ 1,625
Marketing Materials $ 2,400 $ 2,400
Tabling swag $ - $ 1,200 $ 1,200
CORA – Community Overcoming Relationship Abuse July 2022 East Palo Alto Office
Community Events (BBQ's/day
in the park @3 each) $ 6,000 $ - $ 6,000
Cell Phone Service (2 @
$50/month) $ 1,440 $ - $ 1,440
Laptop, including Microsoft
Office (Year One only) $ 1,210 $ - $ 1,210
Staff Training $ 1,200 $ - $ 1,200
Advertising and Social Media $ 1,000 $ - $ 1,000
Program Supplies ($100 per
month) $ 2,400 $ - $ 2,400
Facility Rental- annual $ 12,000 $ 12,000
Subtotal $ 17,275 $ 13,200 $ 30,475
Indirect to cover administration $ 26,987 $ 50,655 $ 77,642
TOTAL OF OPERATING
EXPENSES $ 44,262 $ 63,855 $ 108,117
TOTAL PROGRAM EXPENSES
FOR YEAR 1 & 2 $ 152,210 $ 253,275.00 $ 405,485