City Council
July 19, 2022
RECOMMENDATION
AGENDA REPORT
Staff Recommends That The City Council Adopt The Following:
Resolution
1. Accepting, Appropriating, And Authorizing Agreements For Receipt Of Grant Funds From The Corporation For National And Community Services (CNCS-AmeriCorps Seniors) For Fiscal Year (FY) 2022-23 In Amounts Not To Exceed $337,220 For The Senior Companion Program And $38,821 For The Foster Grandparent Program; And
2. Authorizing A Contribution From The General Purpose Fund For Central Services Overhead Charges In The Estimated Amount Of $39,076 For FY 2022-23; And
3. Authorizing The City Administrator To Accept And Appropriate Additional Grant Funds From CNCS That Become Available For The Same Purposes Within FY 2022-
23. EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
The adoption of the proposed resolution will provide low-income seniors, ages 55 and above, with stipend volunteer opportunities to support other seniors and adults with disabilities who are frail, monolingual and socially isolated with companionship, transportation and access to community resources as the COVID-pandemic continues to impact vulnerable Oakland residents. The grant funding will also provide senior volunteer opportunities to support lower income children and youth with mentoring and reading assistance.
The renewal grants are estimated at: $337,220 for Senior Companions and $38,821 for Foster Grandparents for a total of $376,041. Fifty-one (51) Senior Companion volunteers will provide over 50,000 hours of service. Six (6) Foster Grandparent volunteers will provide over 6,000 hours of service. Both grants are funded by the AmeriCorps. The Senior Companions Program TO: Edward D. Reiskin FROM: Estelle Clemons
City Administrator Interim Director, Human
Services
SUBJECT: Senior Companion Program/Foster
Grandparent Program (SCP/FGP)
Renewal Grant Applications
DATE: June 22, 2022
City Administrator Approval Date: Jul 12, 2022
Edward D. Reiskin, City Administrator
Subject: SCP/FGP Renewal Grant Applications
Date: June 22, 2022
City Council
July 19, 2022
(SCP) and Foster Grandparent Program (FGP) provide needed support to both seniors and youth in the community and offers an opportunity for elders to be involved and engaged in these fulfilling volunteer activities.
BACKGROUND / LEGISLATIVE HISTORY
Fiscal year (FY) 2022-23 will be the forty-fifth year that the City has sponsored the Senior Companion and Foster Grandparent programs. The program is authorized under the Domestic Volunteer Act of 1973 and federal funding comes from the AmeriCorps Seniors Program.
Federal Regulations Code 45, Parts 2510, 2522, 2551, and 2552, establishes that criminal background checks are mandated for all volunteers and staff. City Council Resolution No. 85366 C.M.S. also authorizes the City Administrator to conduct and document a National Service Criminal History Check for program participants; a review that includes Department of Justice and Federal Bureau of Investigation criminal history checks for volunteers and staff who work with vulnerable populations, including participants under the age of 17, persons age 60 and older, and individuals with disabilities.
ANALYSIS AND POLICY ALTERNATIVES
Aging Services provides holistic community safety through interventions that prevent the institutionalization and isolation of older adults. AmeriCorps participants experience cultural security from services and activities that result in empowerment, independence, and the ability to live self-directed lives.
Senior Companion volunteers support independent living by assisting frail, monolingual and socially isolated elders to access doctor appointments and grocery shopping, while also providing social companionship. Foster Grandparents provide mentoring and academic tutoring to Pre-K and K-12 children and youth who benefit from added support and connection to an additional caring adult.
Both programs serve a dual function in that the elderly clients and youth benefit from the assistance and the volunteers gain a sense of accomplishment, civic responsibility and community connectivity. The City’s Taxi Up & Go program effectively extends the reach of SCP through a partnership with Rides for Seniors & Persons with Disabilities, which gives paratransit vouchers to SCP clients and their caregivers. Alameda County Measure B/BB supports two (2) additional volunteers in the Taxi-Up & GO project.
The COVID pandemic resulted in some adjustments to the SCP and FGP programs to ensure the safety of clients and volunteers. Direct one-on-one services were reduced in order to limit the potential for COVID infection, and volunteers focused on assisting clients with appointments and shopping, but not accompanying them to physician offices or grocery stores. In FY 2022 SCP volunteers continued to pick-up and drop-off food to program clients, coordinate taxi rides with family caregivers and assist adult/elderly residents in accessing transportation to medical appointments and grocery shopping. In 2022-23 the project will support more than 51 SCP volunteers and 6 FGP volunteers with taxi scrip to assist their clients and family members.
Edward D. Reiskin, City Administrator
Subject: SCP/FGP Renewal Grant Applications
Date: June 22, 2022
City Council
July 19, 2022
During the 2022/23 fiscal year, provided the COVID social distancing restrictions continue to be relaxed, SCP and FGP volunteers will begin to provide more direct support, accompanying program participants to appointments, assisting with shopping and entering residences as necessary.
The City of Oakland’s SCP and FGP must meet the following guidelines and performance objectives as required by all grantees funded by the AmeriCorps Seniors:
• Be at least 55 years old;
• Obtain and retain liability and accident coverage.
• Undergo Department of Justice and Federal Bureau of Investigation background checks. • Complete forty hours of pre-service training.
• Qualify as low-income.
Once certified, SCP and FGP participants must volunteer 15 to 20 hours weekly and may serve up to 1,044 hours annually. All volunteers are required to be certified annually to start or maintain their participation. The Senior Companions assist clients who are frail, monolingual adults and/or elderly, Foster Grandparents tutor and mentor children and youth. The City of Oakland General Purpose Fund supports staff, volunteers, and community recognition activities.
FISCAL IMPACT
The grant monies provide for the volunteer support expenditures including fingerprinting, stipends, liability insurance, appreciation and recognition of volunteers, uniform identification badges and other allowable expenses. There are no income requirements for the clients served by the volunteers. According to AmeriCorps Seniors program requirements, 80 percent of the grant funds go directly to support low-income eligible volunteers. Grant funds are contingent upon the number of volunteer placements and annual hours of service.
These funds will be delineated in the Senior Companion and Foster Grandparent project cost centers for Fiscal Year (FY) 2022-2023 as follows:
• Grant funds from the AmeriCorps in the amount of $337,220 in the Federal Action Agency Fund (2120), Senior Companion Program Organization (75241), and FY22-23 SCP/Federal Project (1005615).
• Grant funds from the AmeriCorps in the amount of $38,821 in the Federal Action Agency Fund (2120), Senior Companion Program Organization (75241), and FGP/Federal Project (1005619).
• The General Purpose funds will provide $140,601 in Fund (1010) to subsidize the total costs for these two programs. For the Federal Match, $32,540 will go to SCP FY2023 Match (1005617) for fundraising, administrative and other volunteer programs costs associated with the Senior Companion Program and $2,957 will go to FGP FY2023 Match (1005621) associated with the Foster Grandparent program. Even with the federal match, this is not enough to cover the total costs of these two programs, so an additional amount of $105,104 is allocated to subsidize these two programs. The $140,601 in Edward D. Reiskin, City Administrator
Subject: SCP/FGP Renewal Grant Applications
Date: June 22, 2022
City Council
July 19, 2022
General Purpose Fund contribution is included in the Mayor’s proposed FY 2022-2023 Midcycle Budget pending City Council adoption.
PUBLIC OUTREACH / INTEREST
Senior Companion and Foster Grandparent volunteers will perform service activities under a COVID memorandum of program guidance. They are assigned and supervised in community- based programs. The programs include public and private organizations that work with Oakland residents and their families.
Volunteers are placed at the following City of Oakland as well as other government and non- government community-based station sites, including: Life Elder Care, East Oakland Health Center, Westlake Christian Terrace, Allen Temple Arms, Family Bridges, St. Mary’s Community Center, Posada De Colores, Multipurpose Senior Services Program, Sojourner Truth Manor, deFremery Parks & Recreation Centers, Centro Infantil De La Raza, Oakland Head Start, Oakland Unified School District, Libraries, Studio One Art Center and all four City of Oakland Senior Centers.
COORDINATION
The Office of the City Attorney and Budget Bureau were consulted in the preparation of this report and resolution.
PAST PERFORMANCE, EVALUATION AND FOLLOW-UP
Pre-COVID pandemic, Senior Companion and Foster Grandparent Program volunteers exceeded the number of assisted clients totaling 400 across all program units. Volunteers service activities included companionship, mentorship and taxi-scrip assistance. During this period, the grant funded fifty-one Senior Companions and six Foster Grandparent volunteers.
Volunteers and clients served by the program come from all seven Council Districts.
The program assessment process does not include demographic data for minors participating in the Foster Grandparents Program. In compliance with AmeriCorps confidentiality requirements the demographics of children and youth are not collected.
Follow-up assessment of volunteers who sheltered in place and received temporary allowance COVID stipends for FY22-23 will be evaluated to determine the impact on the client, volunteer and station sites. SCP volunteers received training on how to do check-in calls with their assigned clients and shared resource COVID safety information. Volunteers assisted their clients provided taxi-scrip/vouchers to family caregivers via the Taxi-Up and Go project. These and other non-in-home visits and resources provided clients with a sense of being connected to the community during this pandemic period. Chinese and Vietnamese clients maintained their connections to the community via check-in calls received monthly from their Senior Companion.
Volunteers translated resource materials and or connected with family members on behalf of Edward D. Reiskin, City Administrator
Subject: SCP/FGP Renewal Grant Applications
Date: June 22, 2022
City Council
July 19, 2022
their clients. The SCP addresses access and equity disparities among mono-lingual seniors by matching them with bi-lingual companions.
Additional outreach and recruitment are required priorities to ensure a more equitable balance throughout both programs. Having language specific volunteers serving both programs as with the Asian immigrants has helped to increase the participation of volunteers in the SCP.
Going forward and establishing partnerships with translation assistance, both programs will broaden the recruitment plans to include diverse community-based-programs, faith based and public agency services.
Tables 1 and 2 reflect race demographics and SCP volunteer program participant stations.
Table 1: Program Volunteers by Ethnicity
Ethnicity Percent
African American 27.7 %
Chinese 31.9 %
Vietnamese 29.8 %
Filipino 8.5 %
Other 2.1 %
Total 100.0 %
Table 2: Participant Stations
STN # NAME # OF CLIENTS % VOL (CLIENTS)
1 Posada Des Colores 31 9.2(11.2)
2 Family Bridges 48 20.0(17.3)
3 Linkages/MSSP 11 4.6(4.0)
4 Sojourner Truth Manor 9 3.1(3.2)
5 St.Mary's Community Ctr. 30 9.3(10.8)
6 East Oakland Health Ctr. 6 1.5(2.2)
7 Allen Temple Center 17 7.7(6.1)
8 Westlake Christian Ctr. 37 12.3(13.4)
9 Merritt Crossing Oak St. Terr. 5 1.5(1.8)
10 V.A.C.C.E.B. (Vietnamese Ctr) 68 20.2(24.5)
11 St. Mary's Gardens 1 3.1(0.4)
12 Davis St. Family Resource Ctr. 0 1.5(0.0)
13 S. Berkeley Senior Ctr. 9 3.1(3.3)
14 SCP Direct 5 3.1(1.8)
TOTAL 277 100.0 (100.0)
Edward D. Reiskin, City Administrator
Subject: SCP/FGP Renewal Grant Applications
Date: June 22, 2022
City Council
July 19, 2022
SUSTAINABLE OPPORTUNITIES
Economic: Fixed income senior volunteers receive non-taxable stipends. SCP clients receive no-cost assistance associated with aging, isolation, and limited supports that will help to prevent the high cost of institutionalization. In alignment with Oakland Promise, the FGP improves socialization and reading skills among participating at-risk youth/children, and supports school attendance, which has an economic impact.
Environmental: This report has no environmental opportunities or impact.
Race & Equity: Through an extensive network of community-based programs, senior volunteers perform civic engagement interventions that make their neighborhoods stronger by helping frail and isolated elders, children and youth that are at-risk and have special needs with social, educational and health-related activities. We added the four City of Oakland Senior Centers as stations to directly address service disparities based on race or location.
Edward D. Reiskin, City Administrator
Subject: SCP/FGP Renewal Grant Applications
Date: June 22, 2022
City Council
July 19, 2022
ACTION REQUESTED OF THE CITY COUNCIL
Staff Recommends That The City Council Adopt The Following:
Resolution
4. Accepting, Appropriating, And Authorizing Agreements For Receipt Of Grant Funds From The Corporation For National And Community Services (CNCS-AmeriCorps Seniors) For Fiscal Year (FY) 2022-23 In Amounts Not To Exceed $337,220 For The Senior Companion Program And $38,821 For The Foster Grandparent Program; And
5. Authorizing A Contribution From The General Purpose Fund For Central Services Overhead Charges In The Estimated Amount Of $39,076 For FY 2022-23; And
6. Authorizing The City Administrator To Accept And Appropriate Additional Grant Funds From CNCS That Become Available For The Same Purposes Within FY 2022-23.
For questions regarding this report, please contact Scott Means, Aging and Adult Senior Services Manager, at (510) 238-6137.
Respectfully submitted,
ESTELLE CLEMONS
Interim Director, Human Services Department
Prepared by:
Scott Means, Manager
Aging & Adult Services Division