April 12, 2022
The Honorable Josh Newman
Senate District 29
1021 O Street, Room 6520
Sacramento, CA 95814
Re: SB 1418 (Newman) Regional Public Safety Collaborative Dear Senator Newman:
The City of Orange is writing to express our support of SB 1418, which will codify and fund two parallel ongoing collaborative programs on an ongoing basis: one in North Orange County and one in the Central Coast, that takes a deliberate collaborative approach to expand and refine programs that address youth violence, promote re-entry following incarceration, and develop better and more effective strategies and plans toward solving homelessness on a regional level.
On their own, cities have had, at best, limited success addressing homelessness, youth violence, and the challenges associated with post-incarceration re-entry. On the one hand, these endemic problems tend to defy municipal boundaries, while on the other, their inherently local nature tends to defeat top-down solutions devised and implemented at the state, or even county, levels.
Leveraging the State’s investments, the North Orange County Collaborative (Collaborative) has shown significant promise in aligning and coordinating the efforts of ten local law enforcement across their shared geography, while simultaneously enlisting and funding more than 40 local community-based organizations with experience and expertise in treating the underlying causes of these complex challenges. It was originally established through the 2017-18 state budget act with an appropriation of $20 million across its first four years. The Collaborative, which initially included six cities, was subsequently expanded to include eleven cities in Northern Orange County, after receiving an additional $7.8 million allocation in last year’s budget to fund its operation through the end of the current fiscal year.
The City of Orange is proud to be a member of the Collaborative and has worked tirelessly with our partners and neighbors to address youth violence, homelessness, and re-entry programs following incarceration. Community-based organizations and law enforcement have stopped working in silos and instead are working in coordination to help individuals in the region. The proven success and evidence based results of the Collaborative SB 1418 will codify as an ongoing program the innovative existing public safety collaborative model developed in Northern Orange County while also replicating and funding a second, analogous collaborative model in the Central Coast region.
For all of the above reasons, the City of Orange supports SB 1418.
Sincerely,
Mark A. Murphy
Mayor, City of Orange