● There will be no cost to participants in the Safe Parking Program. ● Additional operational criteria may be applied by the City Manager, pursuant to Section
10.40.120(m) of the SCMC.
● An Operations and Management Plan for the Safe Parking Program shall be developed by staff and shall contain, at a minimum, the following:
- Procedures for informing law enforcement personnel of nightly availability of Safe Parking Program parking spaces. This procedure shall be in place prior to enforcement of the Section 10.40.120(a).
- Procedures for the filing and resolving of complaints from participants and nearby residents and businesses.
- Code of conduct and participation agreement.
3. Notwithstanding the exceptions noted in Section 10.40.120(g) of the Vehicles and Traffic Section of the Municipal Code and, in particular, the exception noted in Section
10.40.120(g)(7), the parking restrictions contained in Section 10.40.120(a) shall not be implemented until and unless at least one safe parking location is in operation.
4. At the end of the first year of operation, City staff will prepare a report that outlines the program operations in the Coastal Zone, its usage, the number of parking stalls affected, and complaints received regarding the program. If it is determined that any of the standards applicable in the Coastal Zone and identified in conditions above have not been met or if it is determined that a use has impacted availability of public parking spaces such that public parking is not otherwise available in the location where the safe parking program is being operated, then the City shall propose modifications to operations so as to remedy those situations. A copy of the report shall be submitted to the Executive Director of the Coastal Commission for review and approval. If the Executive Director determines that the safe parking program is negatively impacting public access, then the program shall be modified to eliminate such impacts, or mitigate them to the maximum extent feasible as directed by the Executive Director, including but not limited to elimination of the safe parking program location(s) in the Coastal Zone.
31.33 1
Bonnie Bush
From: Renee Golder
Sent: Monday, March 14, 2022 1:07 PM
To: Bonnie Bush; Matt Huffaker; Tony Condotti; Lee Butler Subject: OSV
Bonnie,
I have received comments from members of the community who felt blindsided by the conditions added by the Planning Commission on the OSV item after public comment was closed, particularly after insufficient time was provided to meaningfully analyze the feasibility of implementing new conditions, their impact on the effectiveness of the ordinance in accomplishing its stated purpose, and their fiscal impacts. In the interests of transparency and to ensure that the public has a meaningful opportunity to review and provide input on this important matter, I am therefore calling up this item for Council review pursuant to SCMC Section 24.04.175.
Many thanks,
Renee
Renée Golder
Santa Cruz City Councilmember
cityofsantacruz.com
31.34 P:\_Public\PACKETS\2022\PC\3-03-2022\OSV ordinance\Upload to Onbase\CP21-0173 OSV ordinance PC report_FINAL.docx
PLANNING COMMISSION
AGENDA REPORT
DATE: January 21, 2022
AGENDA OF: February 17, 2022
PROJECT NO: CP21-0174 CITY WIDE
RECOMMENDATION: That the Planning Commission deny the two appeals, uphold the Zoning Administrator’s acknowledgement of the environmental determination, and approve the Coastal and Design Permits based on the findings listed below and the Conditions of Approval attached in Exhibit A.
PROJECT DATA
Property Owner: City of Santa Cruz
Representative: Lee Butler, Deputy City Manager
Application Type: Appeal of the Zoning Administrators approval of a Coastal and Design Permits to authorize the development associated with the amended municipal code pertaining to the parking of oversized vehicles (e.g., parking signage, time of use restrictions, etc.) and to implement City-wide safe parking programs for unhoused City residents living in oversized vehicles licensed and registered in the City of Santa Cruz.
Zoning Designation: City-wide
Project Consistency: Section 10.40.120(m) of the Santa Cruz Municipal Code authorizes City-operated or City-sponsored safe parking locations on public and private properties
General Plan: City-wide
Project Consistency: NA
Land Use:
Existing: Public/private parking
Proposed: Public/private parking
Parking: Number of spaces does not change and will be evaluated on a caseby-case basis for sites where the designated safe parking spaces are required for other uses
Coastal Review: Coastal Permit required
Environmental Review: Categorical Exemption: 15282-(j); 15301 Class 1-c, g; 15307; 15308 and 15061(b).
Mandatory Action Date: 60 days after acknowledgement of Environmental Exemption
31.35 AGENDA REPORT
Planning Commission Meeting of March 3, 2022
SUBJECT: Oversize Vehicle Ordinance Implementation – Project No. CP21-0174 PAGE 2
Planner: Michael S. Ferry
BACKGROUND
On November 9, 2021, the City Council adopted Ordinance No. 2021-20 amending Santa Cruz Municipal Code (SCMC) Title 10 amending “Vehicles and Traffic” at Chapter 10.04 “Definitions” and Chapter 10.40 “Stopping, Standing and Parking” and Chapter 10.41 “City-Wide Parking Permit” pertaining to the parking of oversized vehicles and Chapter 16.19 “Storm Water and Urban Runoff Pollution Control” at Section 16.19.070.
The Council also approved a motion to direct staff to implement City-operated and sponsored safe parking programs for unhoused City residents living in oversized vehicles licensed and registered in the City of Santa Cruz. Council directed staff to return with draft-ready contracts and associated costs within four months of the passing of the ordinance. Safe parking programs would include a threetiered approach that consists of the following:
a) Emergency overnight safe parking on City-owned parcels for a minimum of three vehicles to be implemented immediately.
b) Safe overnight parking on City-owned parcels or other non-residential approved spaces for a minimum of thirty vehicles throughout the City to be implemented within four months of the passing of the above listed ordinance. c) A robust safe parking program in partnership with service providers, health providers, and County partners. The following subpopulations will be prioritized: Families with children; seniors; transition age youth; veterans; and those with a valid disabled placard or license plate issued pursuant to the California Vehicle Code.
The staff report and attachments that went to the City Council for approval of Ordinance No. 2021- 20 and the motion to implement the safe parking program are attached to this staff report.
Section 24.08.210 of the Zoning Ordinance requires approval of a Coastal Permit for development within the Coastal Zone that is not specifically exempted. This ordinance revision is defined in the Local Coastal Plan (LCP) as “development” because it could change the intensity of the use of the ocean or access thereto, and parking restrictions are not specifically exempted in the LCP. Section
24.08.410.9 of the Zoning Ordinance calls for approval of a Design Permit for public projects located in the Coastal Zone, and Section 24.08.410 calls for a Design Permit for projects where the applicant is a public agency over which the City can exercise land use controls. Thus, the Design Permit can authorize safe parking locations on public and private properties inside and outside the Coastal Zone, as further discussed below in the Analysis section of this report.
On January 5, 2022 the Zoning Administrator heard this item and was notified by a member of the public that one of the Zoom links was not functioning, and the item was continued to a special meeting on January 12, 2020. At the January 5th, hearing two people spoke to the item – one in favor and one opposed. Staff received nine comments with two in favor of the ordinance and the rest opposed. The January 12th hearing included eight speakers and 23 written comments in opposition. The minutes to those hearings and comments submitted are attached to the staff report. On January 12, 2022, the Zoning Administrator approved Coastal and Design Permits to authorize the development associated
31.36 AGENDA REPORT
Planning Commission Meeting of March 3, 2022
SUBJECT: Oversize Vehicle Ordinance Implementation – Project No. CP21-0174 PAGE 3
with the amended municipal code pertaining to the parking of oversized vehicles (e.g., parking signage, time of use restrictions, etc.) and to implement City-wide safe parking programs for unhoused City residentsliving in oversized vehicleslicensed and registered in the City of Santa Cruz.
On January 14th, an appeal was filed by Reggie Meisler on behalf of Santa Cruz Cares and the item was subsequently scheduled for the February 17th Planning Commission meeting. On January 25th, a second appeal was filed by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), which raised a number of issues that required more analysis than was originally envisioned following receipt of the first appeal.
The hearing on the Coastal and Design Permits is de novo, meaning that the applications are considered anew. With two appeals, the Planning Commission will consider both as part of a single item and will act on the application request and the two appeals together. Planning staff and the City Attorney’s office comprehensively address the various issues raised in both appeals in the following section. The appeal hearing was noticed in a one-eighth page newspaper advertisement in at least one newspaper of general circulation within the City 14 days prior to the scheduled February 17, 2022 Planning Commission hearing where it was continued to a time certain of March 3, 2022.
ANALYSIS
The attached staff reports for the January 2022 Zoning Administrator hearings contain a substantial amount of information related to the description and analysis of the project. Some of that information is reiterated at the end of the Analysis section, while the beginning of the Analysis section focuses on the appeal letters and the City’s responses thereto.
The first appellant, Reggie Meisler representing Santa Cruz Cares, states:
The Zoning Admin misunderstood the nature of this ordinance as intended to "help" the houseless, which the admin stated as such before passing it. Given that the services stood up by this ordinance before its enforcement are nowhere near sufficient to serve the population currently living in Santa Cruz (Even by city staff estimates it would serve less than 50%), I think this clearly demonstrates that the priority of this ordinance is to criminalize those living in vehicles, not to serve them.
An ordinance meant to serve them would focus on delivering services and security to all vehicle dwelling residents the city knows about prior to enacting enforcement of vehicle sleeping bans which would result in majority harm of this population through the mass-scale separation of people from their shelter.
Neither the proposed Coastal Permit nor the proposed Design Permit would serve to criminalize the act of living in vehicles. Rather, the Coastal Permit will authorize implementation of parking restrictions for oversized vehicles during the hours of midnight to 5:00 a.m., violations of which would result in a parking ticket (Section 10.40.120(o)), not a criminal offense, and the proposed Coastal and Design Permits will allow the City to serve, at no cost, unhoused City residents living in oversized vehicles through provision of safe overnight parking places where no such City-sponsored places currently exist (though a limited number of parking spaces have and are being offered to nonprofits for their use in private safe parking programs). The safe parking locations would offer, at a minimum, trash, restroom, and hand washing services. Per Section 10.40.120(m) of the SCMC, in addition to the private property allowances authorized through Chapter 6.36.030(a), the City may
31.37 AGENDA REPORT
Planning Commission Meeting of March 3, 2022
SUBJECT: Oversize Vehicle Ordinance Implementation – Project No. CP21-0174 PAGE 4
operate, sponsor, or authorize safe parking programs for vehicles on any City owned or leased propertiesin the City, or any City-sanctioned private parking lots, and the City Managershall develop a policy that establishes operational criteria for safe parking programs. The subject Coastal and Design Permits facilitate implementation of these provisions of the code.
The proposed conditions of approval tie the enforcement of the midnight to 5:00 a.m. parking restrictions to the implementation of the safe parking facilities, so that, coupled with the fact that the midnight to 5:00 a.m. parking restrictions cannot be enforced if a person and vehicle are eligible for a safe parking program but insufficient capacity exists in said program (Section 10.40.140(g)(7)), ensures that the act of sleeping in a vehicle is not criminalized.
The first appellant, Reggie Meisler representing Santa Cruz Cares, goes on to state:
Similarly, I had a concern about the ordinance during the meeting that the Zoning Admin clearly misunderstood. My concern was about CZU victims not being allowed to park in their friends and family member's private home driveways or in their backyards, due to how OVO is written and the CSSO provision (6.36.030(a)(4)) to which it is bound. After I asked my question, the Zoning Admin asked the City Manager's representative about CZU victims being able to park on private commercial parking lots. The City Manager's answer to that question was also made in error, in which he stated that they do not create any legal barriers to parking in private commercial parking lots. OVO clearly states in 10.40.120(e)(4) that:
"The oversized vehicle shall not be used for camping, lodging, residing or for accommodation purposes. Nothing in this section shall be construed to permit sleeping or camping in a vehicle as prohibited by the Santa Cruz Municipal Code."
The above statement thus ties the regulations of OVO to the regulations stated in CSSO, which formulates a variety of restrictions on camping, either in vehicles or tents, on private commercial property (6.36.030). This means the City Manager's representative was speaking in error and the Zoning Administrator clearly did not know that this was the case.
Because of the misinformation present during this discussion, we believe that another meeting should be had in which this policy can be scrutinized from a more accurate perspective.
In citing Section 10.40.120(e)(4) of the SCMC, the appellant is referencing the 2015 version rather than the 2021 version of the SCMC, and said language does not appear in the current, 2021 version of the ordinance. In conveying this to the appellant, the appellant indicated that he “amend[s] that issue with the notion that OVO specifically attempts to provide permits to motels/hotels but "only" to paying guests, implying that they are explicitly targeting hotels/motels who might want to have solidarity with our unhoused neighbors in vehicles and allow them to use their unused parking spaces for free.” Staff’s response is that the oversize vehicle permits issued to hotels would provide authorization for guests of the hotels to park on31.38
AGENDA REPORT
Planning Commission Meeting of March 3, 2022
SUBJECT: Oversize Vehicle Ordinance Implementation – Project No. CP21-0174 PAGE 5
street. Nothing in the ordinance precludes a hotel located in a non-residential district from authorizing oversized vehicles to park on their property pursuant to SCMC Section 6.36.030.
Section 24.10.120(m) allows safe parking program sites on public and private properties. Section
6.36.030(a) allows, with no permitting necessary, camping inside motor vehicles in religious assembly use parking lots, business parking lots in non-residential districts (including motels), and in residential driveways, subject to compliance with various provisionsstated therein, such as addressing sanitation and nuisance issues. Further, Section 10.40.120(g)(6) states that the midnight to 5:00 a.m. parking restriction does not apply during a non-pandemic related state of emergency declared by the City Council. These provisions are all intended to provide safe parking optionsfor oversized vehicles, both during and outside of emergency situations such as the fires of 2020.
The first appellant, Reggie Meisler representing Santa Cruz Cares, goes on to state:
Now, in considering how this ordinance conflicts with the City of Santa Cruz's General Plan, I would like to cite the mismanagement of CD2.2 (Work with local groups when planning significant public improvements for their neighborhoods and districts), in particular CD2.2.2 (Engage the public in long range planning projects including Area Plans and General Plan updates), as well as CC1.1 (Facilitate the participation of residents, citizen commissions, and other groups in local government decision-making) .
As we saw with the failure of TOLO, so too did the city fail to adequately engage with the public on the development of OVO, which is full of complexity when applied to houseless individuals, given it's indirect connection to regulations cited in CSSO. The city did not reach out to houseless community members in a significant way when developing this policy (as evidenced by the lack of knowledge of this ordinance's existence, discovered by Santa Cruz Cares after canvassing folks living in vehicles off of Delaware, shortly after the ordinance was passed), nor did they reach out to neighborhoods who regularly allow oversized vehicles to park on their street without complaint (My current neighborhood of 3+ years, just off Grandview & Mission, is an example of a tolerant neighborhood that is no longer allowed to be tolerant due to the strict wording of OVO & CSSO). Coupled with the incorrect comments made by the City Manager's own representative in the Zoning Administration meeting, as mentioned above, it seems clear that the effects of this ordinance are not only not fully known to the public (a failure of the goal of CC1), but possibly to city staff as well.
The City has also undertaken extensive efforts to conduct research and engage community members, including those experiencing or having previously experienced homelessness, on the topics of homelessness. In 2016 – 2017, the City Council appointed a Homelessness Coordinating Committee that researched and prepared recommendations related to homelessness (https://www.cityofsantacruz.com/home/showdocument?id=63292). The City Council established a Community Advisory Committee on Homelessness (CACH) in June of 2019 to engage with the community and consider various policy options related to homelessness. The CACH membership included people with a wide range of experience and knowledge, including a
31.39 AGENDA REPORT
Planning Commission Meeting of March 3, 2022
SUBJECT: Oversize Vehicle Ordinance Implementation – Project No. CP21-0174 PAGE 6
number of individuals who either were or had been unhoused. Over the course of a year, the CACH held approximately 16 public meetings1 and made a range of recommendations to the City Council, including expansion of parking capacity at faith-based parking lots, which the City Council subsequently approved. The CACH also had a number of subcommittees that met on a regular basis to explore certain topics in more detail.
These efforts have also been informed by substantial outreach and engagement led by the County of Santa Cruz on the topic of homelessness, including the 2015 “All-In Toward a Home for Every County Resident: The Santa Cruz County Community Strategic Plan to Prevent, Reduce, and Eventually End Homelessness,” the 2021 “Housing for a Healthy Santa Cruz: A Strategic Framework for Addressing Homelessness in Santa Cruz County” (which the City Council endorsed in 2021), and the regular Point In Time homelessness census data.
The community input regarding the challenges and impacts of oversized vehicle parking have been substantial since the 2016 California Coastal Commission hearing2 at which the Commission found “substantial issue” with a prior iteration of the Oversized Vehicle Ordinance. In February 2019, after a prior city council member's proposal to permit overnight oversized vehicle camping on Delaware Avenue on the lower Westside, over 400 letters in opposition were sent to the city council.
Community input concerns cited included environmental impacts, neighborhood safety, increased crime, garbage, human excrement, fire danger, drug dealing, and other illegal and nuisance behaviors.
One recent example in which the community provided input regarding impacts from illegally parked oversized vehicles was on a one-block section of Olive Street, a residential street off Mission Street.
Many community members contacted council to request that oversized vehicles not be permitted to park in this area due to public health and safety impacts and ultimately their request was honored by council. A petition with over 1,000 signatures, urging city staff and council to address the public health and safety impacts of oversized vehicle parking was created on Change.org and sent to City staff and council.
Information was gathered on similar ordinances in other cities and counties throughout California, including coastal areas, in order to explore existing practices and options the City of Santa Cruz may have in addressing the ongoing oversized vehicle parking challenges in Santa Cruz. Commonalities in impacts of oversized vehicles in like communities were reviewed. The draft ordinance is similar to ordinances passed in other coastal cities, such as Santa Monica.
On September 21, 2021, three Councilmembers brought forth a draft ordinance concept as an introduction to the topic of managing oversized vehicles on city streets. The purpose of this introduction was for other Councilmembers and the community to have the opportunity to provide direct feedback about the ordinance language as well as the safe parking framework.
The Mayor subsequently appointed Vice Mayor Brunner, Councilmembers Golder and KalantariJohnson to an ad hoc committee to continue to work with staff and the community in development of recommendations to the Council for the ordinance and safe parking framework. The ad-hoc 1 See https://www.cityofsantacruz.com/government/city-council-subcommittees/community-advisory-committeeon-homelessness-cach 2 https://www.coastal.ca.gov/meetings/mtg-mm16-8.html
31.40 AGENDA REPORT
Planning Commission Meeting of March 3, 2022
SUBJECT: Oversize Vehicle Ordinance Implementation – Project No. CP21-0174 PAGE 7
committee engaged community members, public health/homeless service providers, members of the Association of Faith Communities, county staff and Board of Supervisor members to receive direct feedback and engage in thought partnership to explore opportunities. This community engagement took the form of emails, phone calls, one-on-one and group meetings. The ad hoc committee also gathered research on existing efforts in similar communities, both with regard to the ordinance enforcement approach and the safe parking program approach. City staff also gathered research and met with county staff to promote alignment and explore collaboration and partnership.
The first appellant, Reggie Meisler representing Santa Cruz Cares, goes on to state:
I would also like to cite CD2.4 (Improve neighborhood quality and housing through rehabilitation and code enforcement). Given that the underlying issue of poverty behind vehicle homelessness is not actually being dealt with in the OVO, it's clear that people will continue to sleep in their vehicles, and simply be subjected to ever growing cruelties for doing so. Therefore CD2.4.3, for instance, which seeks to increase funding for code enforcement, which I'd imagine is being informally considered as part of CSSO & OVO, will not produce the desired result of CD2.4. In the spirit of the goal behind CD2.4 however, a better approach to improving neighborhood quality than OVO could be to use the county funds for homeless infrastructure to build a local gray water treatment site and formalize the concept of neighborhood contracts between housed neighbors and folks living in vehicles on their blocks. Contract disputes could then be mediated through neighborhood courts. Community groups could then better help fill the gaps, where necessary.
The proposed Coastal and Design Permits will allow the City to serve, at no cost, unhoused City residents living in oversized vehicles through provision of safe overnight parking places where no such City-sponsored places currently exist (though a limited number of parking spaces have and are being offered to non-profitsfor their use in private safe parking programs). The safe parking locations would offer, at a minimum, trash, restroom, and hand washing services. Per Section 10.40.120(m) of the SCMC, in addition to the private property allowances authorized through Chapter 6.36.030(a), the City may operate, sponsor, or authorize safe parking programs for vehicles on any City owned or leased properties in the City, or any City-sanctioned private parking lots, and the City Manager shall develop a policy that establishes operational criteria for safe parking programs. The subject Coastal and Design Permits facilitate implementation of these provisions of the code, and in doing so, some of the ancillary impacts associated with oversized vehiclesthat negatively affect neighborhood quality will be addressed. For example, despite a dumpster being made available free of charge, indiscriminate dumping of trash from oversized vehicles still commonly occurs, and that conduct negatively impacts neighborhood quality. Trash services at safe parking sites will help to minimize littering in neighborhoods. Dumping of wastewater from oversized vehicles has also been a concern, and staff is exploring how best to assist oversized vehicle owners with dumping services, either through mobile services, a new facility, or vouchers for existing facilities (such as the 76 gas station at the northeast corner of Soquel Drive and Highway 1).
The first appellant, Reggie Meisler representing Santa Cruz Cares, goes on to state:
31.41 AGENDA REPORT
Planning Commission Meeting of March 3, 2022
SUBJECT: Oversize Vehicle Ordinance Implementation – Project No. CP21-0174 PAGE 8
I'd also like to cite CC3.9 (Sustain long-term fiscal stability). It's clear that there has not been any fiscal considerations attached to the OVO regarding potential constitutionality lawsuits, nor a fiscal impact study as to the cost of enforcing the OVO without adequate tow yard capacity. This seems odd given that Section 4 of OVO puts forward a Severability clause which accounts for parts of this ordinance being found unconstitutional, implying that the members of city staff who drafted this plan were well aware of potential constitutionality lawsuits being upheld against this ordinance, but did not cite those dangers as potential fiscal impacts.
Further investigation should find this oversight particularly galling given the fact that representatives of Disability Rights California, the ACLU, and the Santa Cruz Homeless Union sent letters to council during its public readings suggesting the likelihood of legal challenge if OVO or CSSO were to be enforced. The City of Santa Cruz would be unlikely to successfully defend these ordinances in court, if challenged, given the federal court ruling of Martin v Boise. Mountain View, CA also demonstrates that more legal precedents may soon come to pass which could be used to challenge OVO. Last year, houseless activists in Mountain View filed a lawsuit against their city in hopes of overturning an RV parking ban. Though the judge did not strike down that ban, they also refused to dismiss the lawsuit. In doing so, the judge signaled that, when this law is first used to actually remove someone from their vehicle-shelter, it could indeed be legally challenged, resulting in the city not only overturning parts of these ordinances but also paying out damages sustained in the removal of people from their vehicle-shelter.
The direction provided by the City Council considered fiscal implications of the ordinance and its implementation. City staff and the Planning Commission are charged with implementing direction set forth by the City Council, and the proposed Coastal Permit and Design Permit facilitate implementation of the ordinance. The City Attorney’s Office has been regularly consulted on the legality of the ordinance. The severablity clause contained in the ordinance is standard and included in many City ordinances. However, it is not the ordinance that is under consideration with these actions. Rather, it is the Coastal and Design Permits to implement the ordinance. Thus, the key question at hand is not the constitutionality of the ordinance but whether the implementation of the parking regulations adversely impacts coastal access in a manner inconsistent with the LCP.
The second appellant, William S. Freeman, Senior Counsel representing the American Civil Liberties Union of Northern California (“ACLU”) states the following regarding one of the appellants:
By this letter, the American Civil Liberties Union of Northern California (“ACLU”), Disability Rights Advocates (“DRA”), Abbi Samuels, Peter Gelblum, and Veronica Crow (together, “Appellants”) demand the City of Santa Cruz (“City” or “Santa Cruz”) rescind Ordinance 2021- 20 (the “OSV Ban Ordinance” or “Ordinance”), which effectively prohibits people from residing in “oversized vehicles (“OSVs”) within the City. Pursuant to Santa Cruz Municipal Code (“SCMC”) Sections
24.04.182-183, this letter also serves as a notice of appeal of the coastal permit issued by the Zoning Administrator on January 12, 2022 in support of the OSV Ban Ordinance (“Permit”). The Ordinance and the Permit violate the California Coastal
31.42 AGENDA REPORT
Planning Commission Meeting of March 3, 2022
SUBJECT: Oversize Vehicle Ordinance Implementation – Project No. CP21-0174 PAGE 9
Act and related environmental justice policies, and Santa Cruz’s local plans (including its General Plan, Housing Element, Local Coastal Program, and Municipal Code). The Ordinance and Permit also violate the Federal and California Constitutions and Federal and State disability laws. If enforced, the OSV Ban and associated Coastal Permit would have a disproportionate impact on marginalized groups, driving people of color, people with disabilities, and low-income people out of the City.
The ACLU and DRA are civil rights organizations that have repeatedly written to the City to inquire about its treatment of unhoused people, including vehicularly housed people. The ACLU and DRA submit this appeal both as organizations and on behalf of all people whose rights would be harmed if the OSV Ban Ordinance and Permit were allowed to go into effect.
Abbi Samuels and Peter Gelblum are members of the Santa Cruz ACLU Chapter who have individually contested the City’s OSV Ban. Ms. Samuels lives on the Westside and is a neighbor of many vehicularly housed people in the area. Mr.
Gelblum owns an OSV and has parked within the Coastal Zone, including when evacuated due to recent wildfires.
Veronica Crow is a 70-year-old woman who lives in a recreational vehicle (“RV”) next to the ocean in west Santa Cruz. Ms. Crow resides in her RV because she cannot afford housing rents in Santa Cruz on her fixed income. She has several disabilities, including chronic brain cancer and arthritis in her hands and knees. Due to her disabilities, she cannot stay in congregate-type shelters (which are full) as the increased noise and stimulus cause her headaches to be even more unbearable.
Congregate shelters also fail to provide sufficient safety for her as a trans woman.
She has attempted to secure “safe parking” with the Association of Faith Communities (“AFC”) Safe Parking Program without success. She always strives to be a good neighbor, but she is harassed and ticketed by the City.
If the OSV Ban is allowed to go into effect, Ms. Crow fears it will be aggressively and repeatedly enforced against her. She would be unable to park her RV on any of the designated spots along West Cliff Drive because it will be too big, too close to an intersection, or in a prohibited overnight area. Thus, if she were unable to park her RV in the coastal zone due to the ordinance she would effectively be driven out of Santa Cruz and the coast, and would have to drive miles to get to the ocean every day.
However, she would be unable to afford that because of prohibitive gas costs— driving her RV is very expensive as it gets just five miles per gallon. Furthermore, if she were in a safe parking program an unknown distance away from the beach, she would be dependent on it to be close enough to walk to the beach every day, notwithstanding her disabilities. Being fined for parking her RV would make it even more difficult for Ms. Crow to afford food and other necessities, and make the possibility of returning to fixed housing even farther out of reach. Being towed for accumulating multiple infractions under the OSV Ban would deprive her of all her possessions and leave her with no place to live, leaving her in the precarious prospect
31.43 AGENDA REPORT
Planning Commission Meeting of March 3, 2022
SUBJECT: Oversize Vehicle Ordinance Implementation – Project No. CP21-0174 PAGE 10
of living the streets. If she were forced to leave Santa Cruz, she would lose her hometown of eighteen years, access to support groups and friends, access to her doctors, and access to the coast.
Ms. Crow deliberately parks within a half-mile from the ocean. She walks along the beach and along the cliffs every day. She loves the water and used to surf. Her dog Eric also loves it— especially playing with other dogs at the dog beach. She has said that “the ocean is the only thing that keeps me sane.” She has always lived relatively close to the beach, claiming “the peace and tranquility are in [her] blood, giving [her] a sense of calm.” She used to take her daughter to the seashore frequently and said that it has always been part of her life. She says that once one has lived so close to the ocean and had it in one’s life, it is hard not to feel that way. She would not know what to do without access to it.
Ms. Crow is respectful of people who live in homes with coastal views, avoiding parking in front of their houses. However, she feels that she also has the right to coastal access, having lived next to the coast her whole life, having contributed to the community for over 70 years, and—most importantly—because the ocean is there for the public. She finds the RV Ban and homeowners’ complaints especially galling because coastal access is supposed to be a public right in California, and complaints from wealthy homeowners about RVs ruining their nice views and expensive homes overlooks the fact that one should not be able to buy up the coast in California.
With rising rents, the influx of new homeowners from Silicon Valley have brought in what Ms. Crow calls a “gated community ethos” that is anti-Californian and that takes away her one of her rights as a Californian—access to the coast. She feels she is being told, “You don’t deserve to be on the beach because you are poor,” an idea she sees as biased, prejudiced, and trying “to privatize the ocean.” She said that coastal access should not just be for people with money.
With regards to Ms. Crow’s access to services, the City’s safe parking programs will include lowbarrier parking spaces that she can utilize. The Tier 3 safe parking spaces, for which the City has requested and received responses to a Request for Proposals, will not only provide safe parking spaces, but it will also provide case management that will help Ms. Crow connect with resources on a path toward securing housing. These case management services are traditionally handled by counties in California, not Cities, as state funding for such services is allocated to counties. However, recognizing the need and the overall lack of resources from the state, the City is dedicating funding towards these services that Ms. Crow could utilize. Similarly, the City is investing significant funding towards temporary shelter, including low barrier shelter, and case management services.
The appellant here expresses concern about an ability to access the coast; however, the permits at issue here would facilitate that very access by allowing for safe parking facilities to be located throughout the City, including in the Coastal Zone. The ordinance prohibits oversized vehicle parking between midnight and 5:00 a.m., so nothing in the ordinance would preclude Ms. Crow from parking in a suitable location – presumably the same location where she currently parks – during the 5:00 a.m. to midnight timeframe, thus access to the coast would remain available to her. Analysis of the
31.44 AGENDA REPORT
Planning Commission Meeting of March 3, 2022
SUBJECT: Oversize Vehicle Ordinance Implementation – Project No. CP21-0174 PAGE 11
locational restrictions is provided below, and it shows that daytime parking options for oversize vehicles would remain throughout the Coastal Zone. Nothing in the Coastal Act or Coastal Act policies requires that the City provide 24-hour access to live in parking spaces immediately adjacent to the coast, and parking access to allow recreation, which the Coastal Act does speak to, remains available in the Coastal Zone.
While the Coastal Act does not require 24-hour access to live in public parking spaces immediately adjacent to the coast, affordable housing options are a concern in California. The proposed ordinance and its implementation seek to balance this issue by offering safe parking locations, free of charge, for people residing in vehicles, and as noted elsewhere in this report, the City routinely supports publicly- and privately-initiated affordable housing development, including on City-owned properties.
The second appellant, William S. Freeman, Senior Counsel representing the American Civil Liberties Union of Northern California (“ACLU”) goes on to state the following:
According to the 2019 Santa Cruz County Homeless Point-in-Time Count (“Count”), there are 2,167 unhoused people in Santa Cruz County (“County”), including those who live in their vehicles.2 78% of all unhoused people in the County are unsheltered, with 69% of chronically homeless people in the County unsheltered. 44% of unhoused people in the County live on the streets or in an encampment; 15% live in a car, van, camper, or RV. Approximately half of the unhoused population in the County is in the City of Santa Cruz. In the City, the Count found 1,197 unhoused residents, 865 of whom were unsheltered (72%). The majority of unhoused people in the County were housed residents in the County for five or more years prior to their houseless status.
In terms of racial demographics, the County’s unhoused population is disproportionately Black and Native American. 33% of unhoused people in the County are Hispanic/Latinx, 8% are Black, and 10% are Native, as compared to 34%, 1%, and 1% of the general population in the County, respectively. 67% of unhoused people in the County are men and 33% are women.
In terms of disability, 39% of unhoused people in the County reported at least one disabling condition, with 32% reporting a history of mental illness, 30% reporting post-traumatic stress disorder, 26% reporting a physical disability, and 21% reporting chronic health conditions. 31% were employed. In comparison, 7.5% of the City’s general population under 65 reported a disability.
In is undisputed that Santa Cruz lacks sufficient housing, shelter, and parking for its unhoused residents. The City has failed to set up any safe parking on its own nor has it identified the exact number or location of safe parking by nonprofits.
The City has approved nearly every housing proposal that has come before it for at least the last four years, including a wide range of affordable housing projects. In fact, the City has directly approved or authorized construction of (through streamlining efforts such as AB 2162) at least 522 affordable
31.45 AGENDA REPORT
Planning Commission Meeting of March 3, 2022
SUBJECT: Oversize Vehicle Ordinance Implementation – Project No. CP21-0174 PAGE 12
housing units, including at least 231 supportive housing units since just November of 2020.
Approximately 170 of those affordable units, including within that 43 supportive housing units, are on City-owned properties where the City is the applicant, with supporting non-profit development partners. With two years remaining in the cycle, the City has already met its 5th Cycle Housing Element targets in all income categories with the exception of Very Low Income, and with the projects pending in the pipeline and the certainty of the City-owned projects and other projects that have been awarded grant funding, the City also expects to meet its Very Low Income targets this cycle.
The City has also invested substantial sums of money toward services that support the unhoused and that offer them stable locations to sleep. The City currently offers spaces for more than 200 people to reside, 24/7, including locations at the Benchlands (in San Lorenzo Park) and a transitional community camp at 1220 River Street. The City is also paying for a 75-bed expansion of shelter capacity at the National Guard Armory, which will also offer 24/7 accommodations. And the City provides direct monetary support to the County’s shelter program at the Armory building, which has capacity for 60 tents inside that building. The City also directly supports homeless shelter and services on Coral Street, for example, through below-market-rate rents and through investments like the bid release that was authorized by Council on February 8, 2022, which sets into motion the selection of contractors for the hygiene bay (restroom and shower) remodel at that location, estimated at approximately $1.9 million.
The City has facilitated safe parking locations by not only allowing them to operate without the need for any City permits or oversight in religious assembly and business parking lots, but the City expanded the number of vehicles allowed at said locations to six and three, respectively, at any such locations. The City has, in the past, incurred direct costs for provision of safe parking spaces on Cityowned lots. For example, the City has allowed the Association of Faith Communities to manage safe parking facilities on City parking lots, and the City has paid for trash removal, portable restroom, and handwashing facilities to be located and serviced for said parking. The Association of Faith Communities (AFC) currently manages 20 safe parking spots in the City limits and has 5 new spaces coming on line in the near future. AFC also has 25 spaces in the County, for a total of 45 spaces. It is unknown how many safe parking spaces are operated at businesses or at religious institutions not affiliated with the AFC, because, as mentioned above, the City does not require any permits or oversight of said facilities. However, it is known that businesses do participate or at least have participated in such allowances, as complaints are received regarding such uses from time to time.
At the end of February 2022, the City is operating three safe parking locations that allow for nine vehicles to park as part of the Tier 1 and Tier 2 parking programs directed by the Council. Two of these locations have additional off-street expansion capacity. The City also provides the AFC one parking spot at a public lot that they have used intermittently and has offered another public parking lot for them to use; however, they have indicated that they do not currently have the staffing to expand into another additional lot and have concerns about the location of the lot. The City has established these programs as pilots so that lessons can be learned from them in advance of expanding to accommodate larger numbers of vehicles. These programs are set up in City parking lots, and the safe parking programs are simply the City using the parking facility for what it was designed for – parking. Therefore, the subject Design Permit may authorize safe parking uses at locations not already designated for parking, and it establishes conditions that all safe parking facilities will abide
31.46 AGENDA REPORT
Planning Commission Meeting of March 3, 2022
SUBJECT: Oversize Vehicle Ordinance Implementation – Project No. CP21-0174 PAGE 13
by. However, the use of City parking facilities for safe parking does not, in and of itself, technically trigger the need for a Design Permit.
The second appellant, William S. Freeman, Senior Counsel representing the American Civil Liberties Union of Northern California (“ACLU”) goes on to state the following:
Unable to alleviate its affordable housing shortage, the City has, for many years, sought to expel unhoused persons from the City by attempting to make it so difficult and dangerous for them to survive that they will decide to move elsewhere to live.
The City’s efforts have included issuing repeated citations for alleged violations of unconstitutional laws prohibiting sitting or lying down in public places, or being in public places during prohibited hours; severely limiting the availability of “sanctioned” campground space to areas that are prone to winter flooding, and preventing encampment in other parts of the city; aggressive enforcement of parking and other motor vehicle ordinances targeted at people living in recreational vehicles; and verbally and physically harassing unhoused persons.
The City disputes this characterization of the City’s response to homelessness over the past several years, and appellant has provided no evidence in support of such statements. See also responses above regarding the City’s efforts to support the unhoused.
The second appellant, William S. Freeman, Senior Counsel representing the American Civil Liberties Union of Northern California (“ACLU”) goes on to state the following:
Most recently on November 9, 2021, the City Council adopted Ordinance 2021-20, which amended various provisions of the SCMC relating to the parking of oversized vehicles, like RVs. The Ordinance prohibits the overnight (i.e., between 12:00 a.m. and 5:00 a.m.) parking of OSVs anywhere in the City, with narrow exceptions for OSVs owned by individuals who already own or rent real property and wish to park their OSVs adjacent to their homes. SCMC §10.40.120(a), (g). It also prohibits the parking of OSVs at any time in many locations that are open to parking for other vehicles, such as within 100 feet of a crosswalk, intersection, stop sign, traffic signal, or on any arterial street. SCMC §10.40.120(f). These “prohibited zones” of 100 feet— or one-third the length of a football field—occur multiple times on any given street segment, and are each five times as long as the 20-foot zones “prohibited zones” pertaining to the parking of other vehicles near the same street features. See SCMC §10.40.040. Moreover, the prohibition of parking “at any place within 100 feet of a…boulevard” appears to prohibit parking along the entire length of all “boulevards.” Elsewhere in the SCMC, “boulevard” is defined as “[a]n arterial street or parkway.” See SCMC 23.24.030.7. Thus, the Ordinance appears to prohibit OSV parking at any time along the entire length of many of the major thoroughfares in the City.
Section 10.40.120(g) contains a wide range of exceptions to the prohibition of oversized vehicle parking between the hours of midnight and 5:00 a.m., including but not limited to exceptions for a person and vehicle that are registered to participate in a safe parking, safe sleeping, transitionalshelter,
31.47 AGENDA REPORT
Planning Commission Meeting of March 3, 2022
SUBJECT: Oversize Vehicle Ordinance Implementation – Project No. CP21-0174 PAGE 14
or other City-sanction program but that are unable to participate due to a lack of capacity (see SCMC
10.40.120(g)(7)); vehicles undergoing emergency repairs for 24 hours (SCMC 10.40.120(g)(3)); and vehicles displaying permits issued by a hotel or by the City to residents or guests.
The “boulevards” issue referenced above is a typographical punctuation error. The ordinance is intended to read “boulevard stop sign” – without the comma inadvertently included so that it currently reads “boulevard, stop sign” – meaning that the intent is to not have oversized vehicles park near an intersection with a stop sign for visibility reasons. (This typographical error will be corrected.) The rationale for restricting oversized vehicle parking near intersections is that, because of their size, they could block visibility of oncoming traffic if parked in proximity to an intersection.
The second appellant, William S. Freeman, Senior Counsel representing the American Civil Liberties Union of Northern California (“ACLU”) goes on to state the following:
In addition, the Ordinance requires that a person living in an OSV may not “permit the area surrounding the oversized vehicle to be maintained in an unsafe, untidy, and/or unsanitary/unhygienic fashion.” “Surrounding areas” must be “kept free from litter, debris, waste, discarded food products…discarded property…unleashed animals, and garbage.” §10.40.120(d). This subsection of the Ordinance does not define “unsafe” or “untidy;” does not delimit by any kind of measurement what is the “surrounding area;” and imposes on an OSV resident an obligation to clean up after anyone else who may choose to dump trash or debris in the vicinity of their vehicle. A violation of this provision is a criminal misdemeanor, which subjects the person living in the vehicle to arrest4 and is punishable by a fine of up to $1,000 and imprisonment for up to 6 months. SCMC §4.04.010(5). A single violation also subjects the vehicle to towing under Cal. Vehicle Code § 22651(h)(i).5 In addition, under the Vehicle Code, an accumulation of as few as five parking citations can subject a vehicle to towing. Cal. Vehicle Code § 22651. Given the history of the City’s enforcement of other parking ordinances against RV residents, this section is a powerful weapon that is likely to be used aggressively as a means to unlawfully threaten and harass OSV residents.
Appellant’s quarrel with this provision appears to be that it does not provide enough guidance as to whether particular “surroundings” are sufficiently untidy as to constitute a violation. In this regard, however, the OSV is consistent with many other ordinances and laws, such as the California Penal Code, which criminalizes the maintenance of a public nuisance, which is defines a “public nuisance,” at section 370 as “ anything which is injurious to health, or is indecent, or offensive to the senses, or an obstruction to the free use of property, so as to interfere with the comfortable enjoyment of life or property by an entire community or neighborhood, or by any considerable number of persons, or unlawfully obstructs the free passage or use, in the customary manner, of any navigable lake, or river, bay, stream, canal, or basin, or any public park, square, street, or highway.” Measured against the California Penal Code, the OVO is a model of specificity. Moreover, while proximity to a parked vehicle may only constitute circumstantial evidence of who placed litter and debris in an area, it is usually either directly observed or readily apparent based on the positioning of the waste or its piling against a parked vehicle. (See, for example, the photograph below, showing debris spilling from the vehicle and piling behind the
31.48 AGENDA REPORT
Planning Commission Meeting of March 3, 2022
SUBJECT: Oversize Vehicle Ordinance Implementation – Project No. CP21-0174 PAGE 15
vehicle’s wheel.) Other photos below depict similar situations. The intent of the ordinance is to address a severe problem in the City of Santa Cruz, and to hold parties responsible where there is substantial evidence that is the unsafe/unhygienic conditions are clearly attributable to a particular vehicle or person. This is actually a lower standard than is applied to homeowners, who are required to maintain the street tree and sidewalk adjacent to their residence.
The second appellant, William S. Freeman, Senior Counsel representing the American Civil Liberties Union of Northern California (“ACLU”) goes on to state the following:
The Ordinance provides that any person who parks an oversized vehicle such as an RV anywhere in the City between the hours of 12:00 p.m. and 5:00 a.m. is subject to punitive and excessive fines and towing, regardless of the unavailability of alternative shelter or a “safe parking” alternative within the City.
Delaware Ave., Saturday afternoon, 2/5/22, several blocks from a dumpster available for those living in oversized vehicles.
31.49 AGENDA REPORT
Planning Commission Meeting of March 3, 2022
SUBJECT: Oversize Vehicle Ordinance Implementation – Project No. CP21-0174 PAGE 16
The above statement is inaccurate. As noted above, Section 10.40.120(g) contains a wide range of exceptions to the prohibition of oversized vehicle parking between the hours of midnight and 5:00 a.m., including but not limited to an exception for a person and vehicle that are registered to participate in a safe parking, safe sleeping, transitionalshelter, or other City-sanction program but that are unable to participate due to a lack of capacity. (See SCMC 10.40.102(g)(7). Additionally, the penalty for a violation that is related to the parking vehicles is a $50 parking ticket. SCMC 10.40.120(o).
The second appellant, William S. Freeman, Senior Counsel representing the American Civil Liberties Union of Northern California (“ACLU”) goes on to state the following:
While the Ordinance makes passing reference to the possibility that the City “may” operate or sponsor a “safe parking” program to enable people living in RVs to park their vehicles safely on City-owned property, it neither requires the City to develop such a program nor makes the ability of the City to ticket and tow the homes of vehicularly housed persons conditional on the availability of any “safe parking” spaces or alternative shelter.
Appellant’s comment, above, conflates enforcement of the OVO with the City’s legal authority to ticket and, potentially, impound vehicles may be in violation of any number of state statutes or municipal code provisions. The purpose of the ordinance amendment and policy direction was to provide parameters on time, place, and manner of parking of oversized vehicles on city streetsin order to address environmental and public health impacts, not on the issuance of tickets for violating the California Vehicle Code or the City’s Municipal Code. As part of its motion to adopt the OVO, Council directed the implementation of a three-tiered safe parking framework to support individuals living in their vehicles. This three-tiered approach would include emergency overnight safe parking on city owned parcelsfor a minimum of three vehicles, a safe overnight parking on city owned parcels or other non-residential approved spaces for a minimum of thirty vehicles throughout the city, and a robust safe parking program in partnership with service providers, health providers, and county partners, prioritizing families with children, seniors, transition age youth, veterans, and those with a valid disabled placard or license plate issued pursuant to the California Vehicle Code. As noted above, the City has already begun implementation of Tiers 1 and 2, with expansion of those tiers occurring in the coming weeks, and responses to a Request for Qualifications are being ranked as the next step in the implementation of the Tier 3 program.
Additionally, to address potential safe parking capacity issues which could arise, the prohibition against OSV parking from 12AM-5AM does not apply to “A person and oversized vehicle that are, collectively, registered and participating in a safe parking program or other safe sleeping or transitional shelter program operated or sanctioned by the city, but do not have access to a safe parking space or other shelter options under such programs due to a lack of capacity.” SCMC
10.40.120(g)(7).
The second appellant, William S. Freeman, Senior Counsel representing the American Civil Liberties Union of Northern California (“ACLU”) goes on to state the following:
This is not the first time the City has attempted, by the enactment of an ordinance, to expel persons living in RVs. In 2016, the City passed a similar OSV ordinance and
31.50 AGENDA REPORT
Planning Commission Meeting of March 3, 2022
SUBJECT: Oversize Vehicle Ordinance Implementation – Project No. CP21-0174 PAGE 17
approved a coastal permit, which never went into effect following a finding by the Coastal Commission of the existence of a “substantial issue.” Like the prior iteration presented to the Coastal Commission in August 2016, the OSV Ban Ordinance and associated Permit unlawfully limit access to the coast, particularly for low-income people, people of color, and those with disabilities. And given the amendment of relevant legislation in 2016 authorizing both the “issuing agency” and the Coastal Commission to consider environmental justice principles, the Ordinance and Permit must be reconsidered. Pub. Res. Code § 30604(h). The City has not cured the deficiencies identified by the Coastal Commission. The Ordinance and Permit create an absolute overnight OSV ban city-wide, severely curtail daytime OSV parking, treat RV inhabitants differently than persons who dwell in fixed housing, and uniquely subject OSV residents to criminal liability for their undefined “surrounding area[s].” The repackaged OSV Ban and associated Coastal Permit are still supported by scant evidence of the link between purported harms and RV residents.
Instead, there is a perpetuation of stereotypes about poor people. Nor is the ban narrowly tailored to address those harms. Similarly, there is little data or analysis on the number of OSV residents and the availability of alternative parking. The City still has no publicly-provided safe parking alternative and relies on vague aspirational expansion of privately run safe parking programs. Condoning the OSV Ban and associated Coastal Permit will only encourage the proliferation of these exclusionary policies across the state.
The City is, in fact, facilitating the establishment of or directly establishing safe parking locations, and the subject appeals are actually delaying the full implementation of such programs in the Coastal Zone. The proposed conditions of approval tie enforcement of the midnight to 5:00 a.m. parking restrictions to the implementation of the safe parking facilities. The OVO specifies that the midnight to 5:00 a.m. parking restrictions cannot be enforced if a person and vehicle are registered to participate in a safe parking program but insufficient capacity exists. This ensuresthat individuals who are forced to live in their vehicles by circumstances beyond their control have an alternative to unregulated parking on any City street.
The attached City Council reports on the Oversized Vehicle Ordinance contain information related to the effects of oversized vehicles, and observations of areas with concentrations of oversized vehicles readily provide evidence of the side effects,such aslitter and trash, that regularly occur in these areas.
Some of the recent photographs contained herein depict those situations. The appellant refers to this as a “ban” of oversized vehicles, which is inaccurate in that safe parking options are available and more will become available following the approval of the subject permits.
The associated oversized vehicle ordinance revision was the result of the impacts that oversized/recreational vehicles (RVs) have had on the community, public safety and environment. In July 2021, a survey found an average of 65 oversized vehicles parked on city streets primarily within the Coastal Zone and raising many issues. The types of issues are reflected in the calls for service include: the illegal dumping of trash, debris and human waste onto City streets, sidewalks, and waterways; fires associated with oversized vehicles; lack of access to neighborhood and coastal parking; and increased criminal activitiesin areas where oversized vehicles are parked, including theft of bicycles and other property, private water connections being used, and gasoline thefts.
31.51 AGENDA REPORT
Planning Commission Meeting of March 3, 2022
SUBJECT: Oversize Vehicle Ordinance Implementation – Project No. CP21-0174 PAGE 18
In the first eight months of 2021, there were at least 15 emergency calls for service to 911 that were related to oversized vehicles, with seven of those calls related to fire and/or gas leakage. In calendar year 2020 and in the first eight months of 2021 the Santa Cruz Fire Department reported 38 fire incidents that are vehicle related, three that were specifically related to oversized vehicles. Also, in the first eight months of 2021, there were 12 oversized vehicle related service calls and 14 public right of way calls to the Wastewater Collection Division. Additionally, vehicle abatement activities have continued over the years. According to the Vehicle Abatement Officer, in the calendar year 2020, 2,243 abatement notices were issued, 197 vehicles were towed, including 20 which were oversized vehicles or camper vans. The five streets with the most vehicle abatement activity (Delaware, Natural Bridges, Shaffer, Mission, and Almar) were all on the West Side, and approximately one third of the abatements citywide are focused on the far West Side. The Vehicle Abatement Officer counted 15 out of state license plates on oversized vehicles that he was able to assess in one morning in certain areas of the West Side. It is important to note that these enforcement actions were primarily related to other specific Vehicle Code or Municipal Code violations, not merely the act of parking on City streets.
The City has responded by facilitating safe parking locations, allowing them to operate without the need for any City permits or oversight in religious assembly and business parking lots and expanding the number of vehicles allowed at said locations to six and three, respectively, at any such locations.
The City has, in the past, incurred direct costs for provision of safe parking spaces on City-owned lots. For example, the City has allowed the Association of Faith Communities to manage safe parking facilities on City parking lots, and the City has paid for trash removal, portable restroom, and handwashing facilities to be located and serviced for said parking. The AFC currently manages 20 safe parking spaces in the City limits and has 5 new safe parking spaces coming on line in the near future. AFC also has 25 safe parking spaces in the County, for a total of 45 spaces. It is unknown how many safe parking spaces are operated at businesses or at religious institutions not affiliated with the AFC, because, as mentioned above, the City does not require any permits or oversight of said facilities. However, it is known that business do participate or at least have participated in such allowances, as complaints are received regarding such uses from time to time.
As of the end of February 2022, the City is operating three safe parking locations that allow for nine vehicles to park as part of the Tier 1 and Tier 2 parking programs directed by the Council. Two of these locations have additional off-street expansion capacity. The City also provides the AFC one parking spot at a public lot that they have used intermittently and has offered another public parking lot for them to use; however, they have indicated that they do not currently have the staffing to expand into another additional lot and have concerns about the location of the lot. The City has established these programs as pilots so that lessons can be learned from them in advance of expanding to accommodate larger numbers of vehicles.
The proposed midnight to 5:00 a.m. parking restrictions are narrowly tailored to only address the late night/early morning hours. By having the oversize vehicles access safe parking facilities in the evenings and into morning and by offering both trash services and restroom facilities at said locations, the proposed approach contemplated with the ordinance and the implementing Coastal and Design Permits directly addresses two of the most problematic issues with oversized vehicles – trash disposal
31.52 AGENDA REPORT
Planning Commission Meeting of March 3, 2022
SUBJECT: Oversize Vehicle Ordinance Implementation – Project No. CP21-0174 PAGE 19
and wastewater disposal. Additionally, the exceptions contained in SCMC 10.40.120 further narrow the applicability of the parking restrictions contained in SCMC 10.40.120(a).
The second appellant, William S. Freeman, Senior Counsel representing the American Civil Liberties Union of Northern California (“ACLU”) goes on to state the following:
Article X of the California Constitution guarantees the right of access to navigable waters for all people. The California Coastal Act Section 30210 mandates that “maximum access…and recreational opportunities shall be provided for all the people…” Additionally, Section 30312.5 provides that “public facilities, including parking areas or facilities, shall be distributed throughout an area.” Further, Section 30223 protects “upland areas necessary to support coastal recreational uses,” including parking areas. It is undisputed that the OSV Ban Ordinance and Permit would severely limit street parking opportunities for OSV residents without any guaranteed alternatives.
The controlling of oversized vehicle parking during the hours of midnight to 5:00 a.m. does not unreasonably limit access to the coast. Other areas of the coast also have limited uses between the hours of midnight and 5:00 a.m., such as Main Beach and Cowell Beach, and in 2008, the Coastal Commission approved parking restrictions on West Cliff Drive between the hours of midnight and 5:00 a.m. The State also closes and locksits own parking areas – both free and paid lots. For example, hours posted on the California Parks and Recreation website for Lighthouse State Beach are 7:00 a.m. to sunset and for Natural Bridges State Park are 8:00 a.m. to sunset. Both areas have gates that are locked during closed hours.
With respect to the distribution of allowable daytime parking spaces in the Coastal Zone, some block lengths in the Coastal Zone exceed 1,500 feet, and many exceed 600 feet in length. Where blocks are 600 feet in length, the locational restrictions would still leave two thirds or more of such blocks available for oversized vehicle parking. Where blocks are not 600 feet in length, they are often over 400 feet in length, still leaving half or more of the block available for daytime oversize vehicle parking. Thus, locational restrictions, such as no parking within 100 feet of a stop sign or intersection, still provide ample space, distributed throughout the City, where oversized vehicles can park between the hours of 5:00 a.m. and midnight.
It is also worth noting here that one goal of the City’s OSV ordinance is to increase access to the coast for all. OSVs are, by definition, oversized, and take up a large share of coastal parking. It is common for large OSVs to remain in coastal areas for long periods of time, without significantly moving, thus, greatly reducing the amount of coastal parking available to those who wish to visit the coast. The City’s OSV ordinance facilitates the daily movement of OSVs, with an aim of increasing the total number of parking spaces available for those who wish to visit the coast.
The second appellant, William S. Freeman, Senior Counsel representing the American Civil Liberties Union of Northern California (“ACLU”) goes on to state the following:
The Coastal Commission’s 2016 questions and observations remain equally unanswered and applicable to the current OSV Ban and Coastal Permit application.
31.53 AGENDA REPORT
Planning Commission Meeting of March 3, 2022
SUBJECT: Oversize Vehicle Ordinance Implementation – Project No. CP21-0174 PAGE 20
Commissioners Howell and Turnbull-Sanders asked how the City could blame OSV residents with any increase of crime. The City provides the same vague conclusory response. One of the few specific statistics provided is a reference to a mere three of thirty-eight recent fire incidents being related to an OSV.
Conspicuously absent is any evidence of a “specific nexus,” as Commissioners Turnbull-Sanders descried, that increased debris, water discharges, or thefts are causally connected to OSV residents. Instead, the Ordinance and Permit wrongly “identif[ies] anyone [who] is homeless as a chronic drug user or thief” in the words of Commissioner McClure. The City has therefore failed to substantiate neighborhood complaints, raising the possibility that the complaints are actually driven by blanket animus towards unhoused people.
Statistics related to calls for service are provided above and in the attached City Council agenda report. With respect to three out of 38 recent vehicle fires being related to oversized vehicles, three fires represents nearly eight percent of the overall fires during that time frame. Oversized vehicles certainly do not represent eight percent of all vehicles, so fires in oversized vehicles are significantly more likely than they are in other vehicles. Said fires create safety, environmental, and resource concerns.
As shown in the photograph above from February 5, 2022 on Delaware Avenue, trash is frequently clearly attributed to a particular vehicle, such as when it is spilling out from the vehicle itself, piling up against the vehicle, and/or accumulating on both sides of a vehicles wheels, showing that it has not moved while trash has encompassed it. Another example is shown below.
31.54 AGENDA REPORT
Planning Commission Meeting of March 3, 2022
SUBJECT: Oversize Vehicle Ordinance Implementation – Project No. CP21-0174 PAGE 21
The second appellant, William S. Freeman, Senior Counsel representing the American Civil Liberties Union of Northern California (“ACLU”) goes on to state the following:
Not only do the alleged harms need to be substantiated, but the Coastal Commission requires that proposed solutions must be narrowly tailored. The City has failed to make any effort to tailor its proposed solutions. It has, for example, failed to consider providing RV residents with trash disposal or waste disposal. As Commissioner McClure observed, the provision of services also does not lead to a drawing in of unhoused people. Rather, if the OSV Ban and Coastal Permit are affirmed, it is such “drastic draconian” policies that would spread.
The proposed midnight to 5:00 a.m. parking restrictions are narrowly tailored to only address the late night/early morning hours. And, there are exceptions to the 12:00 a.m. – 5:00 a.m. rule which further limit its applicability. See SCMC 10.40.120(g). By having the oversized vehicles access safe parking facilities in the evenings and into morning and by offering both trash services and restroom facilities at said locations, the proposed approach contemplated with the ordinance and the implementing Coastal and Design Permits directly addresses two of the most problematic issues with oversized vehicles – trash disposal and wastewater disposal.
Mission Street Extension, November 2021
31.55 AGENDA REPORT
Planning Commission Meeting of March 3, 2022
SUBJECT: Oversize Vehicle Ordinance Implementation – Project No. CP21-0174 PAGE 22
Contrary to the
appellant’s
assertions, the City
has indeed provided
trash disposal
services, free of
charge to vehicle
dwellers, though it
has come at an
expense to the City.
The City Manager’s
Office spent
approximately
$21,000 during
calendar year 2021 in
refuse services solely
on the far Westside to
mitigate the illegal
dumping from
oversized vehicle/car
dwellers. This does
not include staff time
from the City
Manager’s office or
Public Works in
coordinating these efforts.
The second appellant, William S. Freeman, Senior Counsel representing the American Civil Liberties Union of Northern California (“ACLU”) goes on to state the following:
Despite multiple commissioners inquiring about the City’s identification of parking alternatives in 2016, Santa Cruz provides largely the same response now. In the intervening six years, the City has not created a single public safe parking spot. Not one. Instead, the City identifies the same Association of Faith Communities safe parking program. “As many as 22 spots” are available in Santa Cruz, but their locations, requirements, and the hours of operation are not disclosed. It is therefore unknown whether such spaces can accommodate all OSV residents. Indeed, the City does not even provide a meaningful estimate of the number OSV residents. The City proffers a number of 65 OSVs based on a count of limited streets.
The conservative 2019 Point-in-Time Homeless Count suggests there are 180 vehicularly housed people in Santa Cruz. Further, the Santa Cruz Police Department cited 294 OSVs in 2021, suggesting the number of OSVs is far greater than 65.
This picture was taken Saturday afternoon, 1/29/22, from Schaeffer Road at Delaware Avenue. The shopping cart reflects the need for Public Works crews to have to deal with additional debris that is left around the dumpster.
31.56 AGENDA REPORT
Planning Commission Meeting of March 3, 2022
SUBJECT: Oversize Vehicle Ordinance Implementation – Project No. CP21-0174 PAGE 23
The City has facilitated safe parking locations by not only allowing them to operate without the need for any City permits or oversight in religious assembly and business parking lots, but the City expanded the number of vehicles allowed at said locations to six and three, respectively, at any such locations. The City has, in the past, incurred direct costs for provision of safe parking spaces on Cityowned lots. For example, the City has allowed the Association of Faith Communities to manage safe parking facilities on City parking lots, and the City has paid for trash removal, portable restroom, and handwashing facilities to be located and serviced for said parking. The AFC currently manages 20 safe parking spaces in the City limits and has 5 new safe parking spaces coming on line in the near future. AFC also has 25 safe parking spaces in the County, for a total of 45 spaces. It is unknown how many safe parking spaces are operated at businesses or at religious institutions not affiliated with the AFC, because, as mentioned above, the City does not require any permits or oversight of said facilities. However, it is known that business do participate or at least have participated in such allowances, as a complaint is received regarding such uses from time to time.
As of the end of February 2022, the City is operating three safe parking locations that allow for nine vehicles to park as part of the Tier 1 and Tier 2 parking programs directed by the Council. Two of these locations have additional off-street expansion capacity. The City also provides the AFC one parking spot at a public lot that they have used intermittently and has offered another public parking lot for them to use; however, they have indicated that they do not currently have the staffing to expand into another additional lot and that they have concerns about the location of that lot. The City has established these programs as pilotsso that lessons can be learned from them in advance of expanding to accommodate larger numbers of vehicles. These programs are set up in City parking lots, and the safe parking programs are simply the City using the parking facility for what it was designed for – parking. Therefore, the subject Design Permit may authorize safe parking uses at locations not already designated for parking, and it establishes conditions that all safe parking facilities will abide by. However, the use of City parking facilities for safe parking does not, in and of itself, technically trigger the need for a Design Permit.
With respect to the Point in Time count, not all vehicle dwellers reside in oversized vehicles; many individuals live in smaller vehicles. With respect to Police citations, their citing of 294 oversized vehicles does not mean that people are living in each of those vehicles, and vehicles can be and are cited more than one time. Responding to appellant’s claims that the City will not have sufficient capacity at the safe parking locations to accommodate the demand, it is worth pointing out again that Section 10.40.120(g) contains a wide range of exceptions to the prohibition of oversized vehicle parking between the hours of midnight and 5:00 a.m., including but not limited to an exception for a person and vehicle that are registered to participate in a safe parking, safe sleeping, transitionalshelter, or other City-sanction program but that are unable to participate due to a lack of capacity. This provision ensuresthat anyone who isforced to live in their oversized vehicle due to lack of capacity in available safe parking spaces can avoid citation by merely registering and participating in the City’s safe parking, transitional shelter, or other City sanctioned program.
The second appellant, William S. Freeman, Senior Counsel representing the American Civil Liberties Union of Northern California (“ACLU”) goes on to state the following:
31.57 AGENDA REPORT
Planning Commission Meeting of March 3, 2022
SUBJECT: Oversize Vehicle Ordinance Implementation – Project No. CP21-0174 PAGE 24
The City has also failed to provide any analysis on the impact of its daytime parking restrictions. Neither the unspecified AFC program spots nor the City’s aspirational goal of adding 3 emergency parking spots and 30 safe parking spots can accommodate the need. The City has provided no specifics about their safe parking plans, hinting only that the programs would be time-limited (nighttime hours only), located outside of the Coastal Zone, and limited to unhoused people who meet certain barriers. Given the City’s abysmal record of creating additional parking alternatives, the aspiration parking should not be credited when considering the OSV Ban and Coastal Permit. Without alternatives, the OSV Ban and Coastal Permit will only “push[] out” people and have them “living on the street instead” as Commissioner Turnbull-Sanders observed. Or in the words of Commissioner McClure, it is time to stop “chasing people around the city.”
With respect to the daytime parking restrictions, some block lengths in the Coastal Zone exceed 1,500 feet, and many exceed 600 feet in length. Where blocks are 600 feet in length, the locational restrictions would still leave two thirds or more of such blocks available for daytime oversized vehicle parking. Where blocks are not 600 feet in length, they are often over 400 feet in length, still leaving half or more of the block available for daytime oversize vehicle parking. Thus, locational restrictions, such as no parking within 100 feet of a stop sign or intersection, still provide ample space, distributed throughout the City, where oversized vehicles can park between the hours of 5:00 a.m. and midnight.
The attached report to the Zoning Administrator, information later in this report, as well as conditions of approval that went to the Zoning Administrator and attached hereto all provide details on the proposed safe parking facilities. Those conditions of approval stated for the Zoning Administrator’s approval and continue to state that 24/7 safe parking facilities are permitted outside the Coastal Zone.
Safe parking program hours are limited inside the Coastal Zone so as to preserve coastal access opportunities.
The proposed conditions of approval tie the implementation of the safe parking facilities to the enforcement of the midnight to 5:00 a.m. parking restrictions, so that condition, coupled with the fact that the midnight to 5:00 a.m. parking restrictions cannot be enforced if a person and vehicle are eligible for a safe parking program but insufficient capacity exists, ensures that the act of sleeping in a vehicle is not criminalized.
The appellant claims that the safe parking spaces will be “limited to unhoused people meeting certain barriers.” It is unclear what barriers are being referenced here, but the intent is to have safe parking spaces in Tiers 1 and 2 that have minimal to no barriers with a permit being issued and a participant agreement outlining some reasonable codes of conduct/guidelines to be followed.
The second appellant, William S. Freeman, Senior Counsel representing the American Civil Liberties Union of Northern California (“ACLU”) goes on to state the following:
Newly adopted environmental justice policies also require reconsideration of the OSV Ban and Coastal Permit. In late 2016, the Governor signed AB 2616, which amended the Coastal Act and gives the Coastal Commission new authority to specifically consider environmental justice when making permit decisions.
31.58 AGENDA REPORT
Planning Commission Meeting of March 3, 2022
SUBJECT: Oversize Vehicle Ordinance Implementation – Project No. CP21-0174 PAGE 25
The Ordinance and Permit are in direct conflict with provisions of the Santa Cruz 2030 General Plan (“General Plan”). Santa Cruz’s General Plan provides policies to effectuate a vision and principle of a balanced community with mobility, parks and recreation, affordable housing options, and community services. The General Plan states Santa Cruz will “maintain the community’s longstanding commitment to shared social and environmental responsibility, fostering a balance between employment, housing affordable to persons of all income levels, transportation, and natural resources.” The Ordinance does the opposite by limiting vehicle usage and parking. It makes streets inaccessible to people living in their vehicles by providing for an outright ban in the evening and severely curtails daytime parking without mandating additional, alternative parking for the parking lost.
The General Plan’s prescriptions on parks and recreation are equally ignored.
Under PR3.3 the City is to “enhance publicly accessible coastal and open space areas.” This includes “ensur[ing] that development does not interfere with the public’s right to access the ocean,” (PR3.3.2), “requiring new development and public works projects to provide public access from the nearest public roadway to the shoreline and along the coast” (PR3.3.3), and “maximize public access and enjoyment of recreation areas along the coastline” (PR3.3.4). The public includes those who must reside in their vehicles, not just those with fixed housing. Therefore, the OSV Ban uniquely restricts RV residents, contrary to these provisions.
Furthermore, rather than promote “prosperity for all” or provide “provide excellent social services” (General Plan at 8), the OSV Ban and Coastal Permit promote instability by potentially stripping RV residents of their only homes. Rather than provides services or ensure alternative parking, the OSV Ban and Coastal Permit would leave people unsheltered in public.
They also run counter to Santa Cruz’ 2015-2023 Housing Element, which provides that housing for “extremely low, very low, low, and moderate income households is of utmost concern.”
“Mobile homes,” “any vehicle designed, used, or intended to be used generally for living and/or sleeping quarters which is capable of moving, being moved, towed or transported,” can be part of meeting that need which should be maintained. The Housing Element 3.1 also recognizes the special needs of housing for people with disabilities and the need for services. Again, the Ordinance and Permit limit use of OSVs, which disproportionately impacts people with disabilities, and fails to require the provision of any services to accommodate them.
The Coastal Act also requires that all counties and cities lying within the coastal zone prepare a Local Coastal Program (LCP) to guide coastal development actions with that jurisdiction. The City must ensure that any coastal permit will “[m]aintain public access to the coast along any coastline as set forth in the Local Coastal Land Use Plan.” SCMC § 24.08.250. The Santa Cruz LCP is “an integral part of the City’s General Plan since planning and land-use policies within the coastal zone are issues
31.59 AGENDA REPORT
Planning Commission Meeting of March 3, 2022
SUBJECT: Oversize Vehicle Ordinance Implementation – Project No. CP21-0174 PAGE 26
of concern to the community as a whole” and is aimed at “maximiz[ing] access to the coast for people of all income ranges.” It includes directives to “enhance public access, open space quality and recreational enjoyment in a manner that is consistent with the California Coastal Act, “ensure that development does not interfere with the public’s right to access the ocean,” and “[d]evelop and implement plans to maximize public access and enjoyment of recreations areas along the coastline.” For the above reasons, the OSV Ban limits public access to the coast, particularly poor people, people of color, and those with disabilities. The LCP also has specific provisions requiring that vehicular access to coastal areas is maintained, including free parking. Prohibiting oversized vehicles from parking on city streets directly impedes that access.
The ordinance and associated permits provide more options for those living in vehicles than are currently available. A safe place to park overnight with trash and sanitation services – all free of charge – is being offered with implementation of the ordinance, and the conditions of approval previously did and still continue to require that at least one safe parking facility be established before overnight restrictions are enforced, while the ordinance states that nighttime restrictions cannot be enforced against a person and vehicle that are eligible for the safe parking programs but are unable to access them due to capacity.
Nothing in the ordinance or the implementing permits are discriminatory. Parking lots, including those where safe parking facilities will be operated, are designed to meet accessibility requirements.
Accessible restrooms will be provided in select safe parking facilities, and those with disabilities will be directed to those locations.
The locational analysis above cites the presence of substantial opportunities for allowing daytime parking outside of the 100-foot buffer from intersections. Greater than 50% of the block length for blocks over 400 feet in length and over 66% of the block length for blocks over 600 feet in length remains available for oversized vehicle parking. Nothing in the Coastal Act speaks to access to live 24/7, free of charge in City streets in the Coastal Zone, and ample daytime oversize vehicle parking options remain available throughout the Coastal Zone and throughout the City parking to facilitate access to recreation.
Under the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition on “cruel and unusual punishment,” the City is prohibited from punishing indigent persons for life sustaining activities so long as those persons do not have reasonable alternatives for shelter. The Eighth Amendment also prohibits excessive fines, where the fine is grossly disproportionate to the gravity of the offense, will deprive the offender of their livelihood or is more than their circumstances and estate will bear. As the Supreme Court has recognized, excessive fines have often been used to wrongly punish status or a disfavored group.
The OSV Ban violates these prohibitions because it imposes penalties for living in the only shelter some have access to, their RVs parked on public roads in Santa Cruz.
There are not enough adequate shelters, housing, or safe parking for the unhoused in the City. So, for many, the only place to protect oneself from the elements is to sleep or simply “be” is in their vehicles. It is clear that the City seeks to RV residents
31.60 AGENDA REPORT
Planning Commission Meeting of March 3, 2022
SUBJECT: Oversize Vehicle Ordinance Implementation – Project No. CP21-0174 PAGE 27
from the City by (1) issuing repeating parking citations so as to make it economically impossible for such persons to live in their RVs, (2) increasing the likelihood of losing their homes through impoundment, and (3) threatening a loss of liberty through imprisonment. Accordingly, the OSV Ban violates the Eighth Amendment.
Further, under the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, a government may not act with deliberate indifference to place a person in a position of known or obvious danger that they would not otherwise have faced. OSV Ban Ordinance violates this prohibition because it empowers the City to fine RV residents (and potentially arrest them), forcing them into even greater financial destitution, and to tow the vehicles which constitute their homes and only shelter, exposing them to the severe hardship of being unsheltered in public. This would deprive them greater access to food, water, electricity, secure sleeping, storage of life necessities, and access to care and services which undoubtedly heightens the level of stress and anxiety among persons who are already confronted with the significant challenges posed by their poverty. During the COVID- 19 pandemic, the risks posed to individuals whose homes are towed are even greater. Individuals whose homes are towed are exposed to an increased risk of contracting the COVID-19 virus because they are unable to limit their travel in their homes. Rather than take COVID-19 into account, the City has expressly provided that it will only suspend enforcement during non- pandemic related emergencies.
The Federal and State Constitutions also protect the right of freedom of movement and travel. Because the OSV Ban effectively banishes RV residents from the coast and the City, without sufficient justification, it is unconstitutional.
Title II of the Americans with Disabilities Act (“ADA”) provides: “no qualified individual with a disability shall, by reason of such disability, be excluded from participation in or be denied the benefits of the services, programs, or activities of a public entity, or be subjected to discrimination by any such entity.” 42 U.S.C. § 12132. A public entity is prohibited from “utiliz[ing] criteria or methods…that have the effect of subjecting qualified individuals with disabilities to discrimination on the basis of disability.” 28 C.F.R. § 35.130(b)(3)(i) (emphasis added). Further, under Title II a public entity is affirmatively obligated to make “reasonable modifications” when necessary to avoid discrimination based on disability unless the modifications would fundamentally alter the nature of the service, program, or activity. See 28 C.F.R. § 35.130(b)(7). The California Disabled Persons Act (“CDPA”) incorporates the ADA and states that “a violation of the right of an individual under the Americans with Disabilities Act…constitutes a violation of the CDPA. Cal. Civ. Code § 54.1(d).
People with disabilities are overrepresented in the City of Santa Cruz’s houseless population and many rely on oversized vehicles as their only form of shelter and vehicular transportation. Many such individuals have a disability-related need to remain in their RVs, which are crucial to managing their disabilities, and maintaining their physical and mental health. Though enforcement of the OSV Ban will harm everyone who uses an RV and seeks to access the coast in Santa Cruz, it
31.61 AGENDA REPORT
Planning Commission Meeting of March 3, 2022
SUBJECT: Oversize Vehicle Ordinance Implementation – Project No. CP21-0174 PAGE 28
will harm this population of houseless people with disabilities in a different and greater way. As just one example, while vehicularly-housed people who do not have disabilities may be able to walk the distances required to access services, facilities, and coastal areas the OSV Ban will prevent them from parking near—albeit with difficulty—many people with disabilities cannot. Moreover, the OSV Ban does not provide or allow for any accommodations to ensure that people with disabilities who rely on RVs for shelter and transportation are not disproportionately denied access to the coast, and to services and facilities in the Coastal Area.
Each of the arguments presented above has been addressed in the preceding responses.
Ample daytime oversize vehicle parking options remain available throughout the Coastal Zone and throughout the City, even with the prohibition of oversized vehicle parking within 100 feet of an intersection, which is in place to promote safety by providing line of sight around oversized vehicles.
Aside from the limitation of not parking within 100 feet of an intersection, access to recreate at the coast is otherwise unaffected between the hours of 5:00 a.m. and midnight.
The ordinance and its implementing regulations do not criminalize living in an oversized vehicle. A violation of a parking rule results in a $50 parking ticket – not a criminal infraction or misdemeanor offense. See SCMC 10.40.120(o). Additionally, the ordinance provides opportunities for safe places to park oversized vehicles, and they provide free trash and restroom services for those living in vehicles. The ordinance also ties the prohibition of midnight to 5:00 a.m. oversize vehicle parking to the provision of safe parking facilities, and the midnight to 5:00 a.m. oversize vehicle parking prohibitions are not applied to a person and vehicle who are eligible for the safe parking program but who cannot participate due to lack of capacity.
It is also worth noting here that the appellant cites no caselaw to support its position that imposing a parking ticket on an OSV is a constitutional or ADA violation. Appellant neglects to mention that there is recent caselaw supporting the legality of the OSV ordinance. In the case Potter v.
City of Lacey, the Western Distirct of Washington determined that “neither a parking fine of $35, nor potential impoundment violate the Excessive Fines Clause. . . . Though a parking violation is a "minor" offense, it is "not de minimis." Cities have an interest in regulating parking and, a $35 fine "bears 'some relationship' to the gravity of the offense. "While a parking violation is not a serious offense, the fine is not so large, either, and likely deters violations."
Nor can the possibility of impoundment be necessarily considered an excessive fine in this case. Costs associated with impoundment are not necessarily punitive; they can reflect the costs associated with towing and storage.”
Potter v. City of Lacey, 2021 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 45173, *2-3 (internal citations omitted) (case approving of a 4-hour time limit for RV parking).
31.62 AGENDA REPORT
Planning Commission Meeting of March 3, 2022
SUBJECT: Oversize Vehicle Ordinance Implementation – Project No. CP21-0174 PAGE 29
Additional analysis related to the issues raised and general analysis of the ordinance and implementing regulations follow. One of the issues that is most often raised with regard to extended oversized vehicle parking is the discharge of raw sewage onto City streets and into storm drains.
Runoff from the City’s storm drain system is periodically tested as part of regional testing efforts, but not at a scale that would be able to quantify the environmental impacts under discussion. Any verified discharge of human waste into the storm sewer system is considered a violation of the City’s Municipal Code (Section 16.19.090); if left unaddressed, the City is at risk of violating its National Pollutant Discharge
Elimination System (NPDES) Municipal Regional Permit, which could lead to enforcement actions by the Regional Water Quality Control Board. In addition to the situation depicted here in the photographs, issues occur on public property as well. For example, on September 23, 2021, an oversized vehicle parked on Ingalls Street leaked raw sewage onto the right-of-way at that location and then drove to park on Mission Street Extension, where the blackwater leak continued. The City had to redirect staff to immediately address the biohazard and spent over $2,000 in doing so.
The AFC currently manages 20 safe parking spaces in the City limits and has 5 new safe parking spaces coming on line in the near future. AFC also has 25 safe parking spaces in the County, for a total of 45 spaces. In addition to the safe parking allowances on sites used for religious assembly, the City also allows businesses to host safe parking spaces; however, since no permits are required to allow such parking, it is unknown whether or how many such spaces are being provided by businesses. This is a significant increase in overnight safe parking availability compared to what was identified as available in the City in 2015.
The photos here were taken on April 12, 2021. They
show where a blackwater tank was emptied on a
private road, where it made its way to a storm drain
leading to the Monterey Bay. This location is adjacent
to Delaware Avenue, where oversized vehicles
regularly park. The private property owners had to
pay a company specializing in biohazard clean-up to
address the illegal dumping.
The photos here were taken on April 12, 2021. They
show where a blackwater tank was emptied on a
private road, where it made its way to a storm drain
leading to the Monterey Bay. This location is adjacent
to Delaware Avenue, where oversized vehicles
regularly park. The private property owners had to
pay a company specializing in biohazard clean-up to
address the illegal dumping.
31.63 AGENDA REPORT
Planning Commission Meeting of March 3, 2022
SUBJECT: Oversize Vehicle Ordinance Implementation – Project No. CP21-0174 PAGE 30
The ordinance amendment and policy direction isto provide parameters on time, place, and manner of parking of oversized vehicles on City streets in order to address environmental and public health impacts. A three-tiered safe parking framework to support individuals living in their vehicles includes the following:
a) Emergency overnight safe parking on City owned parcels for a minimum of three vehicles has already been implemented.
b) Safe overnight parking on city owned parcels or other non-residential approved spaces for a minimum of thirty vehicles throughout the City. The initial pilot for this has been implemented, and capacity will be expanded in the near future. c) A robust safe parking program in partnership with service providers, health providers and county partners. The following subpopulations will be prioritized:
Families with children; seniors, transition age youth; veterans; and those with a valid disabled placard or license plate issued pursuant to the California Vehicle Code. Responses to a Request for Qualifications to conduct this work have been received and are being evaluated.
A summary of the amendments are provided below:
Overnight Parking Permit. The following provisions would apply to Overnight Parking Permits:
Available to a “resident” or “out-of-town visitor,” as defined in Section 10.04.165 and 10.04.104, respectively.
Residents:
• Valid for one year, allowing parking of an oversized vehicle for four periods of up to 72 consecutive hours per calendar month.
• Parking location: Street curb immediately adjacent to the residence, or within four hundred feet of that person’s residence if adjacent parking is not possible.
Visitors:
• Valid for a maximum of 72 hours in the location identified above for residents.
• No more than six out-of-town visitor permits per residential address per calendar year.
Fee:
• A future Council resolution would establish the permit fee(s).
Denial of Permits:
• The city may deny the issuance of an oversized vehicle overnight parking permit for up to one year if the city manager or his/her designee finds that:
the applicant is not a resident; the resident or out-of-town visitor guests have
31.64 AGENDA REPORT
Planning Commission Meeting of March 3, 2022
SUBJECT: Oversize Vehicle Ordinance Implementation – Project No. CP21-0174 PAGE 31
been issued four or more citations for violations in the prior twelve months; the out-of-town visitor is not a guest of the resident applicant; or an owner of an oversized vehicle has procured any oversized vehicle parking permit through fraud or misrepresentation.
City Operated or Sponsored Safe Parking Programs.
In addition to the private property allowances authorized through Chapter 6.36.030, the City may operate, sponsor, or authorize safe parking programs for oversized vehicles on any City owned or leased properties or on city sanctioned private properties. The City Manager shall develop a policy that establishes operational criteria for such safe parking programs. In most instances, these facilities can be operated without the need for any permitsfrom the City, though the subject permits will facilitate their operation should such permits be needed for a particular location.
Safe Parking Program. In conjunction with the proposed ordinance, a safe parking framework is proposed. Site locations would include information and options for sanitation and black water dumping. General parameters for the safe parking sites include:
• Off street locations (i.e. public/private parking lots). New signage shall be small-scale and designed to be incorporated into other signage in existing parking facilities. Existing sign post shall be used when possible.
• Hours generally shall be from 8:00 PM – 8:00 AM time frame. Within the Coastal Zone, hours of operation shall be within this time frame, except that occasional, minor deviations from the 8:00 PM to 8:00 AM hours within the Coastal Zone may be allowed to facilitate provision of services to the program participants, so long as the additional hours are of a frequency, duration, and/or location such that they do not adversely interfere with coastal access. For example, depending on the site services, one hour immediately before or immediately after the typical 8:00 PM to 8:00 AM operations, a mobile dump service could operate one day per week at the site or parking could remain in place so that a service provider (such as Cal Fresh, Homeless Persons Health Project, etc.) could offer services one to two days per week. As noted above, any such services during hours outside of 8:00 PM to 8:00 AM will be scheduled with specific consideration given to minimizing any interference with coastal access. Outside the Coastal Zone, facilities (for example, Tier 3 facilities where enhanced services are provided) may be operated with extended hours, including on a 24/7 basis, so long as plans adequately address required parking for other uses.
• Sanitation will be provided at all locations (i.e., porta-potties, hand washing stations, and garbage cans). Black water dumping facilities may be provided at some locations. All facilities shall, whenever possible, be located where no impacts to public vehicular or bike parking occur.
When that is not possible, all facilities shall be located or operated in a manner so as to minimize vehicular and bike parking impactsto the greatest extent feasible. Locations of porta-potties, hand washing stations, and trash receptacles, as well as the locations of overnight parking on the site, will also take into account the adjacent uses, visibility, maintenance of views, on- and off-site circulation, and accessibility.
• Safe Parking sites will not be sited in mapped “high impact parking areas” within the Coastal Zone.
31.65 AGENDA REPORT
Planning Commission Meeting of March 3, 2022
SUBJECT: Oversize Vehicle Ordinance Implementation – Project No. CP21-0174 PAGE 32
• There will be no cost to participants in Safe Parking Program. • Additional operational criteria may be applied by the City Manager, pursuant to Section
10.40.120(m) of the SCMC.
At the end of the first year of operation, City staff will prepare a report that outlines the program operations in the Coastal Zone, its usage, the number of parking stalls affected, and complaints received regarding the program. If it is determined that any of the standards applicable in the Coastal Zone and identified in the conditions above have not been met or if it is determined that a use has impacted availability of public parking spaces such that public parking is not otherwise available in the location where the safe parking program is being operated, then the City shall propose modificationsto operations so as to remedy those situations. A copy of the report shall be submitted to the Executive Director of the Coastal Commission for review and approval. If the Executive Director determines that the safe parking program is negatively impacting public access, then the program shall be modified to eliminate such impacts, or mitigate then to the maximum extent feasible as directed by the Executive Director, including but not limited to elimination of the safe parking program in the Coastal Zone.
The safe parking framework will take a three-tiered approach. • Emergency Safe Parking spaces - Three emergency safe parking spaces have already been provided. These emergency spaces will be available for up to 72 hours and are intended to support individuals who require time and support with vehicle registration and repairs.
• Safe Overnight Parking - The City Manager’s office, Public Works, and the City Homelessness Response teams will identify and make available safe parking spaces on City owned land and/or other non-residential approved spaces for a minimum of thirty oversized vehicles. The City will either partner with outside providers or directly provide overnight monitoring. At this point in time, during the pilot program that is currently operational, City staff are directly providing oversight. Individuals in these parking spaces will be connected and linked to other transitional sheltering options that are available throughout the county.
• Safe Parking Program - The City Manager’s office, Public Works, and Homelessness Response teams will continue to work closely with County partners including the Human Services and Health departments and service providers to either expand the existing, nonprofit-run program or establish a new safe parking program. This program will include case management support to assist individuals in directly engaging in pathways to housing.
Families with children, seniors, transition aged youth, veterans, and individuals with disabilities will be prioritized. As of the drafting of this report, responses have been received for non-City entities to operate the Tier 3 safe parking program, and they are in the process of being scored. An update will be provided to the City Council on March 8, 2022, and if necessary steps can be completed in time, the Council could potentially act on Tier 3 during said meeting.
31.66 AGENDA REPORT
Planning Commission Meeting of March 3, 2022
SUBJECT: Oversize Vehicle Ordinance Implementation – Project No. CP21-0174 PAGE 33
As part of this approach, the city will implement a permit process that will allow individual vehicles to temporarily park on City streets overnight if, among other requirements, these individuals: (1) have applied to a safe parking or shelter program, (2) are unable to participate in a safe parking or shelter program due to lack of capacity, and (3) the location of their vehicle will not cause public health, safety, welfare concerns, or nuisance conditions. These individuals will still be subject to citations or other appropriate law enforcement activity if they engage in otherwise illegal and/or nuisance behaviors (e.g., illegal dumping).
Additional Supports
After analyzing the best practices in other communities, members of the community suggested some ideas to bring forward that they would initiate. These include:
● A voucher Program for Oversized Vehicle Wastewater Dumping. Developing and funding a voucher program for Santa Cruz City residents residing in oversized vehicles, with a partial or full subsidy of the $15 dump fee at the nearest dumping station. Community members interested in initiating this would coordinate with local nonprofit service providers to distribute and track the vouchers.
● A limited number of financial support subsidies for individuals who are Santa Cruz City residents needing support towards vehicle repair and registration. These funds would be established through partnerships with neighborhood groups.
Staff will coordinate with community groups wishing to provide such support, and staff will continue to analyze the best approaches for facilitating black water dumping into approved locations/facilities. Currently, the closest public black water dump site is at the 76 station at the northeast corner of Soquel Avenue and Highway 1. Staff are actively investigating mobile dumping services (both those operated by the City and those operated by a private company), vouchers for dumping at the 76 station, as well as additional dump station locations.
Local Coastal Plan (LCP) Consistency
The oversized vehicles permitting system will provide access with limited hours while trying to address many of the LCP policies listed below.
- 2.1 Meet or exceed State Water Resources Control Board standards for discharge of sewage and storm waters to the Monterey Bay.
- 2.3 Ensure that new development or land uses near surface water and groundwater recharge areas do not degrade water quality.
- 4.1.5 Protect the quality of water discharged into the Bay and allow no dumping of materials into the Monterey Bay.
- 2.1.3 Protect the Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary and the shoreline and views to and along the ocean, recognizing their value as natural and recreational resources. - 2.2 Preserve important public views and viewsheds by ensuring that the scale, bulk and setback of new development does not impede or disrupt them. - 2.6.5 Protect neighborhood quality through improvement of blighted areas, traffic management, design guidelines, adequate buffers and other development techniques.
31.67 AGENDA REPORT
Planning Commission Meeting of March 3, 2022
SUBJECT: Oversize Vehicle Ordinance Implementation – Project No. CP21-0174 PAGE 34
- 3.5 Protect coastal recreation areas, maintain all existing coastal access points open to the public, and enhance public access, open space quality and recreational enjoyment in a manner that is consistent with the California Coastal Act. - 3.5.4 Wherever feasible and appropriate, distribute public facilities (including parking areas) throughout the coastal recreation area to mitigate the impacts of overcrowding or over-use by the public of any single area.
- 3.5.5 Develop and implement plans to maximize public access and enjoyment of recreations areas along the coastline.
- 1.7 Recognize and protect the Pacific Ocean and Monterey Bay as a valuable open space, natural resource, and National Marine Sanctuary.
- 1.7 Develop plans to repair, maintain and maximize public access and enjoyment of recreational areas along the coastline consistent with sound resource conservation principle, safety, and rights of private property owners. - 2.1 The dramatic views from West Cliff Drive shall remain unimpaired and unobstructed by vegetation, structures or accumulated refuse.
Health in All Policies.
Health. The health and well-being of all Santa Cruz residents and the environment are of utmost importance. The public health impacts of extended oversized vehicle parking include dumping of trash, debris, and human waste onto City streets, sidewalks, and waterways. The proposed implementation of the ordinance will provide safe parking facilities that include restrooms and trash services to minimize the need for illegal dumping.
Equity. An appointed Council ad-hoc committee will continue to work with City staff and community partners to further develop and ensure implementation of the above described safe parking framework in a manner that is widely accessible and will report to the Council with additional recommended actions. The safe parking operation will include low barrier spaces and participation will be free.
Sustainability. Environmental sustainability is a core value of the City of Santa Cruz and informs all City operations. Prohibiting the use of public right-of-way for oversized vehicle parking throughout the City of Santa Cruz, coupled with safe parking options that provide trash and bathroom services, would reduce the likelihood of human waste entering the storm drain system or contaminating the nearby environment.
The California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) provides several “categorical exemptions” which are applicable to categories of projects and activities that the Natural Resource Agency has determined generally do not pose a risk of significant impacts on the environment. Section 15307 of the CEQA Guidelines “consists of actions taken by regulatory agencies... to assure the maintenance, restoration, or enhancement of a natural resource where the regulatory process involves procedures for protection of the environment.” Section 15308 of the CEQA Guidelines “consists of actions taken by regulatory agencies… to assure the maintenance, restoration, enhancement, or protection of the environment where the regulatory process involves procedures for the protection of the environment.” The proposed ordinance and its implementation are not anticipated to result in any new construction, including but not limited to any construction of new
31.68 AGENDA REPORT
Planning Commission Meeting of March 3, 2022
SUBJECT: Oversize Vehicle Ordinance Implementation – Project No. CP21-0174 PAGE 35
facilities for public services such as police, parks, or fire. Many individuals already park oversized vehicles in the City, and the ordinance and its implementation are not anticipated to result in any additional impacts associated with parking of oversized vehicles. By providing safe parking locations where sanitation facilities would be present and by prohibiting overnight parking elsewhere, the proposed ordinance and its implementation are expected to result in significantly fewer instances of overnight parking on City streets where sanitation facilities, including restrooms and trash services, are unavailable. That change, in and of itself, will create beneficial impacts to the environment through an increase in the proper disposal of waste compared to existing conditions and allowances, where the City itself has historically hosted no designated safe parking locations. Further, the City’s experience has been that the most significant environmental degradation associated with oversized vehicle overnight parking occurs in places where groups of oversized vehicles congregate and become entrenched in an area and remain in that area for an extended period of time. As such, the ordinance will reduce environmental impacts when comparing its outcomes to the status quo. As the majority of environmental impacts resulting from the ordinance will be beneficial rather than detrimental and with the other potential environmental effects being de minimis, the project is also exempt under Code of Regulations Section 15061(b), the “common sense exemption,” since it can be seen with certainty that no significant effect on the environment will occur.
Section 15282-(j) is for projects restriping streets to relieve traffic congestion while Section 15301Class 1-c allows for alterations of existing streets, sidewalks, gutters and similar facilities that do not create additional automobile lanes. The City’s experience has shown overnight parking occurs in places where groups of oversized vehicles congregate and become entrenched in an area causing congestion and degradation of the environment. The ordinance will reduce these impacts by proving safe parking in a controlled environment.
SUMMARY
In response to community concerns about oversized vehicle parking impacts to neighborhoods and the environment, the City Council approved amendments of existing codes to prohibit oversized vehicles parking for extended periods of time as well as an oversized vehicles permitting system that limits the total amount of time any oversized vehicles parks their vehicle on the City’s rightof-way, streets, and off-street parking lots while simultaneously directing implementation of a three-tiered safe parking program for individuals who reside in their vehicles, from emergency parking to low barrier parking to a robust safe parking program that will provide service support and opportunities for pathways to permanent housing.
While no single and simple solution exists that adequately mitigates the noted impacts, the ordinance revision and its implementation are an attempt to balance the needs of parking access with the community’s quality of life and environmental resources that are being affected by oversized vehicles.
RECOMENDATION
Staff recommends that the Planning Commission deny the appeals, uphold the Zoning Administrators acknowledgement of the environmental determination and approve the Coastal and
31.69 AGENDA REPORT
Planning Commission Meeting of March 3, 2022
SUBJECT: Oversize Vehicle Ordinance Implementation – Project No. CP21-0174 PAGE 36
Design Permits based on the findings listed below and the Conditions of Approval attached in Exhibit A.
FINDINGS
Coastal Permit, Section 24.08.250
1. Maintain views between the sea and the first public roadway parallel to the sea.
The implementation of the ordinance revision will not affect coastal views. This ordinance and its implementation are expected to enhance views by regulating parking of oversized vehicles adjacent to the coast, because no oversize vehicle parking is allowed within 100 feet of an intersection. The intent of this is to promote visibility for people driving, thereby enhancing safety; however, a benefit is also that views from roadways intersecting the first public roadway parallel to the sea will be less obstructed.
No safe parking facilities will be located in the high-impact parking zones identified by the Coastal Commission.
2. Protect vegetation, natural habitats and natural resources consistent with the Local Coastal Land Use Plan.
The ordinance and its implementation are designed to discourage illegal dumping of sewage and grey-water from RVs that may contribute to the high bacteria levels at Cowell Beach and other coastal areas. Free trash and restroom services will be provided at safe parking locations to discourage illegal dumping and littering. The project has been evaluated for potential environmental impacts in accordance with the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) and the City’s environmental review procedures. No vegetation, natural habitats or natural resources will be disturbed.
One of the issues that is most often raised with regard to extended oversized vehicle parking is the discharge of raw sewage onto City streets and into storm drains. Runoff from the City’s storm drain system is periodically tested as part of regional testing efforts, but not at a scale that would be able to quantify the environmental impacts under discussion. Any verified discharge of human waste into the storm sewer system is considered a violation of the City’s Municipal Code (Section 16.19.090); if left unaddressed, the City is at risk of violating its National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) Municipal Regional Permit, which could lead to enforcement actions by the Regional Water Quality Control Board.
3. Be consistent with any applicable design plans and/or area plans incorporated into the Local Coastal Land Use Plan, in that it implements policies therein.
The ordinance revision and its implementation, including safe parking facilities, are consistent with the General Plan, all Area Plans and Local Coastal Plan in that they further and implement many of the public safety and environmental protection policies from those plans. The oversized vehicles permitting system will provide access with
31.70 AGENDA REPORT
Planning Commission Meeting of March 3, 2022
SUBJECT: Oversize Vehicle Ordinance Implementation – Project No. CP21-0174 PAGE 37
limited hours while trying to address many of the LCP policies below. 2.1 Meet or exceed State Water Resources Control Board standardsfor discharge of sewage and storm waters to the Monterey Bay. 2.3 Ensure that new development or land uses near surface water and groundwater recharge areas do not degrade water quality.
4.1.5 Protect the quality of water discharged into the Bay and allow no dumping of materials into the Monterey Bay. 2.1.3 Protect the Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary and the shoreline and views to and along the ocean, recognizing their value as natural and recreational resources. 2.2 Preserve important public views and viewsheds by ensuring that the scale, bulk and setback of new development does not impede or disrupt them. 2.6.5 Protect neighborhood quality through improvement of blighted areas, traffic management, design guidelines, adequate buffers and other development techniques. 3.5 Protect coastal recreation areas, maintain all existing coastal access points open to the public, and enhance public access, open space quality and recreational enjoyment in a manner that is consistent with the California Coastal Act.
3.5.4 Wherever feasible and appropriate, distribute public facilities (including parking areas) throughout the coastal recreation area to mitigate the impacts of overcrowding or over-use by the public of any single area. 3.5.5 Develop and implement plans to maximize public access and enjoyment of recreations areas along the coastline. 3.7 Recognize and protect the Pacific Ocean and Monterey Bay as a valuable open space, natural resource, and National Marine Sanctuary. 1.7 Develop plans to repair, maintain and maximize public access and enjoyment of recreational areas along the coastline consistent with sound resource conservation principle, safety, and rights of private property owners. 2.1 The dramatic views from West Cliff Drive shall remain unimpaired and unobstructed by vegetation, structures or accumulated refuse.
The ordinance is designed to discourage illegal dumping of sewage and grey-water from RVs that may contribute to the high bacteria levels at Cowell Beach and other coastal areas. No vegetation, natural habitats or natural resources will be disturbed with implementation of the ordinance. Safe Parking will be located outside of the mapped “high impact” parking areas which will enhance coastal access by increasing the available parking that used to be occupied by oversized vehicles. The project has been evaluated for potential environmental impacts in accordance with the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) and the City’s environmental review procedures.
4. Maintain public access to the coast along any coastline as set forth in the Local Coastal Land Use Plan.
The parking restriction will increase coastal access by making the coast cleaner and safer for the general public, in part by minimizing litter and black water dumping, and thereby more attractive as well. There are numerous locations in the area that provide overnight facilities for oversize vehicle camping. The Upper Harbor has RV camping facilities as well as Forest of Nisene Marks, Manresa, New Brighton, San Andres KOA, Seacliff and Sunset State Beaches. These are appropriate overnight camping areas designed to accommodate large vehicles that are seeking coastal access. The oversized vehicle parking restrictions are in effect from midnight to 5:00 AM, so recreational access to the beach will not be impacted. Permit processes will provide additional options for parking oversized vehicles on-street overnight, including for visitors to the coast.
31.71 AGENDA REPORT
Planning Commission Meeting of March 3, 2022
SUBJECT: Oversize Vehicle Ordinance Implementation – Project No. CP21-0174 PAGE 38
The City Manager’s office, and the City Homelessness Response teams will identify and make available safe parking spaces on city owned land and/or other non-residential approved spaces for a minimum of thirty oversized vehicles. The city will either partner with outside providers or directly provide overnight monitoring. Individuals in these parking spaces will be connected and linked to other transitional sheltering options that are available throughout the county. The safe parking facilities located within the Coastal Zone have locational, hourly, and other operational criteria that ensure public access is maintained. Staff will prepare an analysis at the end of the first year of operation that details the safe parking operations in the Coastal Zone and offers an opportunity for collaboration with Coastal Commission staff to address any public access issues that may arise as part of the operations.
5. Be consistent with the Local Coastal Land Use Plan goal of providing visitor-serving needs as appropriate.
There are numerous appropriate locations in the area that provide overnight facilities for RV camping. The Upper Harbor has RV camping facilities as well as Forest of Nisene Marks, Manresa, New Brighton, San Andres KOA, Seacliff and Sunset State Beaches.
These are appropriate overnight camping areas designed to accommodate large vehicles that are seeking coastal access. Recreational access to the beach will not be impacted during the hours of 5:00 a.m. to midnight, and permit processes are available for visitors to the coast to temporarily park their oversized vehicles on City streets from midnight to 5:00 a.m.
The City Manager’s office, and the City Homelessness Response teams will identify and make available safe parking spaces on city owned land and/or other non-residential approved spaces for a minimum of thirty oversized vehicles. The city will either partner with outside providers or directly provide overnight monitoring. Individuals in these parking spaces will be connected and linked to other transitional sheltering options that are available throughout the county. Permit processes will provide additional options for parking oversized vehicles on-street overnight, including for visitors to the coast.
As part of its consideration of the proposed ordinance, a safe parking framework is proposed. All site locations will be outside of the mapped high impact parking areas within the coastal zone. The sites will include information and options for sanitation and black water dumping. General parameters for the safe parking sites include off street locations (i.e. public/private parking lots) with hours that will generally be from 8:00 PM to 8:00 AM in the Coastal Zone. Sanitation will be provided at these locations such as porta-potties, washing stations, garbage cans and potentially blackwater pumping facilities or vouchers. All sanitation facilities will be located to minimize parking impacts. There will be no cost to participants in Safe Parking Program.
6. Be consistent with the Local Coastal Land Use Plan goal of encouraging coastal development uses as appropriate.
31.72 AGENDA REPORT
Planning Commission Meeting of March 3, 2022
SUBJECT: Oversize Vehicle Ordinance Implementation – Project No. CP21-0174 PAGE 39
The revised ordinance and its implementation will enhance coastal access by providing a cleaner and safer environment for the general public, in part by minimizing litter and black water dumping through provision of free trash and restroom facilities for those living in oversized vehicles. Recreational access to the beach will not be impacted.
Permit processes will provide additional options for parking oversized vehicles on-street overnight, including for visitors to the coast.
All safe parking sites to be developed will be located outside of the mapped high impact parking areas within the coastal zone.
Shoreline Protection Overlay District, Section 24.10.2430
7. The project protects trees and vegetation and sensitive wildlife habitat.
The ordinance revisions and safe parking facilities will not affect trees, vegetation or sensitive wildlife habitat.
8. The project is consistent with the following criteria for bluff or cliff development:
a. The development is sited and designed to assure stability and structural integrity of its expected economic life span and minimize alterations to natural landforms.
b. The development will not create or contribute significantly to problems of erosion or geologic instability on the site or on surrounding geologically hazardous areas.
c. The development minimizes alteration of cliffs, bluff tops, faces or bases, and will not interfere with sand movement.
d. The development which proposes use of retaining walls shall be allowed only to stabilize slopes. Sea walls at the toe of sea cliffs to check marine erosion shall be allowed only where there is no less environmentally damaging alternative.
e. The development within one hundred feet of any cliff or bluff line shall follow the recommendations of an approved geologic report by a registered geologist. The area where such a report is required may be increased where the issue of slope stability requires a greater distance from any cliff or bluff line.
The ordinance revisions and implementation of them, including safe parking facilities, will not affect any cliff or bluff.
31.73 AGENDA REPORT
Planning Commission Meeting of March 3, 2022
SUBJECT: Oversize Vehicle Ordinance Implementation – Project No. CP21-0174 PAGE 40
9. The project provides maximum erosion protection, using accepted engineering practices and other methods and specifications set forth in this title.
The ordinance revisions and implementation of them, including safe parking facilities, will not affect any cliff or bluff.
10. The project maintains public view corridors between the sea and the first public roadway parallel to the sea and maintain natural views of the coastline.
The ordinance revisions and implementation of them will not adversely affect views of the coastline. Oversize vehicle parking limitations within 100 feet of an intersection will enhance views, though their primary intent is to provide safe line of sight for drivers.
Signage will predominantly be placed on existing sign posts. All safe parking sites will located outside of the mapped “high impact” parking areas within the coastal zone and generally 300 feet from the bluff.
11. The project protects paleontological resources as prescribed in the Land Use Plan.
The ordinance revisions and implementation of them, including safe parking facilities, are not expected to create any land disturbances that would affect any paleontological resources.
12. The project protects and enhances free public access to or along the beach, and sign such access when necessary.
The ordinance revision will not take away any free public parking or bona fide beach access. The revised ordinance will enhance coastal access by providing a cleaner and safer environment for the general public, in part by minimizing litter and black water dumping through the provision of free, safe, oversized vehicle parking facilities that include trash and restroom services. Recreational access to the beach will not be impacted. Permit processes will provide additional options for parking oversized vehicles on-street overnight, including for visitors to the coast. Any new signage required will predominantly use existing sign posts.
13. The project includes mitigation measures prescribed in any applicable environmental document.
31.74 AGENDA REPORT
Planning Commission Meeting of March 3, 2022
SUBJECT: Oversize Vehicle Ordinance Implementation – Project No. CP21-0174 PAGE 41
There are no mitigation measures required; however, various conditions have been included that protect the environment, such as provision of trash receptacles and portapotties at the safe parking facilities.
14. The project is compatible with the established physical scale of the area.
The ordinance revisions and their implementation will not adversely affect the physical scale of any area, and any signage will be placed predominantly on existing sign posts.
Safe parking facilities will have restroom facilities, hand washing stations, and trash receptacles that, by their nature, would not be incompatible with the scale of the area.
15. The project is consistent with the design review guidelines of this title and the policies of any applicable area plan.
The signage will be consistent with the Public Works and Police sign criteria.
16. The project is consistent with the policies of the Local Coastal Program, the General Plan, and the California Coastal Act.
The proposed ordinance revision and their implementation are consistent with the policies of the Local Coastal Program, the General Plan and the California Coastal Act in that the ordinance amendment and their implementation will result will benefit the community along stretches of the coast that are currently impacted by black water dumping, littering, and other nuisance issues. The oversized vehicles permitting system will provide access with limited hours while trying to address many of the LCP policies below. 2.1 Meet or exceed State Water Resources Control Board standards for discharge of sewage and storm waters to the Monterey Bay. 2.3 Ensure that new development or land uses near surface water and groundwater recharge areas do not degrade water quality. 4.1.5 Protect the quality of water discharged into the Bay and allow no dumping of materials into the Monterey Bay. 2.1.3 Protect the Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary and the shoreline and views to and along the ocean, recognizing their value as natural and recreational resources. 2.2 Preserve important public views and viewsheds by ensuring that the scale, bulk and setback of new development does not impede or disrupt them. 2.6.5 Protect neighborhood quality through improvement of blighted areas, traffic management, design guidelines, adequate buffers and other development techniques. 3.5 Protect coastal recreation areas, maintain all existing coastal access points open to the public, and enhance public access, open space quality and recreational enjoyment in a manner that is consistent with the California Coastal Act.
3.5.4 Wherever feasible and appropriate, distribute public facilities (including parking areas) throughout the coastal recreation area to mitigate the impacts of overcrowding or over-use by the public of any single area. 3.5.5 Develop and implement plans to maximize public access and enjoyment of recreations areas along the coastline. 3.7 Recognize and protect the Pacific Ocean and Monterey Bay as a valuable open space, natural resource, and National Marine Sanctuary. 1.7 Develop plans to repair, maintain and maximize public access and enjoyment of recreational areas along
31.75 AGENDA REPORT
Planning Commission Meeting of March 3, 2022
SUBJECT: Oversize Vehicle Ordinance Implementation – Project No. CP21-0174 PAGE 42
the coastline consistent with sound resource conservation principle, safety, and rights of private property owners. 2.1 The dramatic views from West Cliff Drive shall remain unimpaired and unobstructed by vegetation, structures or accumulated refuse.
Recreational access to the beach will not be impacted and it will not adversely affect free public parking or beach access. All safe parking sites to be developed will be located outside of the mapped high impact parking areas within the Coastal Zone.
Design Permit, Section 24.08.430 (Applicable to the safe parking locations)
17. The site plan shall be consistent with physical development policies of the General Plan, any required or optional element of the General Plan, any area plan or specific plan or other city policy for physical development. If located in the Coastal Zone, a site plan shall also be consistent with policies of the Local Coastal Program.
The project is consistent with the General Plan, the Beach South of Laurel Plan and the Seabright Area Plan in that the ordinance amendment and its implementation will benefit the community along stretches of the coast that are currently impacted by black water dumping, littering, and other nuisance issues. Safe parking facilities will be organized so as to minimize parking and aesthetic impacts. Recreational access to the beach will not be impacted and it will not adversely affect free public parking or beach access. All safe parking sites to be developed will be located outside of the mapped high impact parking areas within the coastal zone.
18. The exterior design and appearance of buildings and structures and the design of the site plan shall be compatible with design and appearance of other existing buildings and structures in neighborhoods which have established architectural character worthy of preservation.
A condition of approval requires that locations of porta-potties, hand washing stations, and trash receptacles will take into account the adjacent uses, visibility, maintenance of views, accessibility, and maintenance of public parking spaces.
19. Design of the site plan shall respect design principles in terms of maintaining a balance of scale, form and proportion, using design components, which are harmonious, materials and colors that blend with elements of the site plan and surrounding areas. Location of structures should take into account maintenance of view; rooftop mechanical equipment shall be incorporated into roof design or screened from adjacent properties. Utility installations such as trash enclosures, storage units, traffic-control devices, transformer vaults and electrical meters shall be accessible and screened.
31.76 AGENDA REPORT
Planning Commission Meeting of March 3, 2022
SUBJECT: Oversize Vehicle Ordinance Implementation – Project No. CP21-0174 PAGE 43
A condition of approval requires that locations of porta-potties, hand washing stations, and trash receptacles will take into account the adjacent uses, visibility, maintenance of views, accessibility, and maintenance of public parking spaces.
20. Where a site plan abuts, or is in close proximity to, uses other than that proposed, the plan should take into account its effect on other land uses. Where a nonresidential use abuts or is in close proximity to a residential use, the effect of the site plan should maintain the residential quality of adjacent or nearby areas.
A condition of approval requires that locations of porta-potties, hand washing stations, and trash receptacles will take into account the adjacent uses, visibility, maintenance of views, accessibility, and maintenance of public parking spaces.
21. The orientation and location of buildings, structures, open spaces and other features of the site plan shall be such as to maintain natural resources including significant trees and shrubs to the extent feasible, maintain a compatible relationship to and preserve solar access of adjacent properties, and minimize alteration of natural land forms, building profiles, location, and orientation must relate to natural land forms.
A condition of approval requires that locations of porta-potties, hand washing stations, and trash receptacles will take into account the adjacent uses, visibility, maintenance of views, accessibility, and maintenance of public parking spaces.
22. The site plan shall be situated and designed to protect views along the ocean and of scenic coastal areas. Where appropriate and feasible, the site plan shall restore and enhance visual quality of visually degraded areas.
The view of the ocean will remain unchained.
23. The site plan shall minimize the effect of traffic conditions on abutting streets through careful layout of the site with respect to location, dimensions of vehicular and pedestrian entrances, exit drives and walkways; through the adequate provision of off-street parking and loading facilities; through an adequate circulation pattern within the boundaries of the development; and through the surfacing and lighting of off-street parking facilities.
A condition of approval requires that locations of porta-potties, hand washing stations, and trash receptacles, as well as locations of overnight parking on the site, will take into account the adjacent uses, visibility, maintenance of views, accessibility, on- and off-site circulation, and maintenance of public parking spaces.
24. The site plan shall encourage alternatives to travel by automobile where appropriate, through the provision of facilities for pedestrians and bicyclists, including covered parking for bicycles and motorcycles where appropriate. Public transit stops and facilities shall be accommodated as appropriate, and other incentive provisions considered which encourage non-auto travel.
31.77 AGENDA REPORT
Planning Commission Meeting of March 3, 2022
SUBJECT: Oversize Vehicle Ordinance Implementation – Project No. CP21-0174 PAGE 44
The conditions of approval seek to preserve access to bike parking. .
25. The site shall provide open space and landscaping which complement buildings and structures. Open space should be useful to residents, employees, or other visitors to the site. Landscaping shall be used to separate and/or screen service and storage areas, separate and/or screen parking areas from other areas, break up expanses of paved area, and define open space for usability and privacy.
A condition of approval requires that locations of porta-potties, hand washing stations, and trash receptacles, as well as locations of overnight parking on the site, will take into account the adjacent uses, visibility, maintenance of views, accessibility, and maintenance of public parking spaces.
26. The site plan shall reasonably protect against external and internal noise, vibration and other factors, which may tend to make the environment less desirable. The site plan should respect the need for privacy of adjacent residents.
The safe parking program has limited hours of operation and will generally be located in existing parking facilities within the City. Conditions of approval require adherence to established standards related to noise and other nuisance activities.
27. Signs shall complement the site plan and avoid dominating the site and/or existing buildings on the site or overwhelming the buildings or structures to which they are attached. Multiple signs on a given site should be of a consistent theme.
Conditions of approval require that new signage shall be small-scale and blend with other signage in existing parking facilities. Existing sign post shall be used when possible.
28. Building and structures shall be so designed and oriented to make use of natural elements such as solar radiation, wind, and landscaping for heating, cooling and ventilation.
This finding does not apply, as no conditioned space will be constructed.
29. The site plan shall incorporate water-conservation features where possible, including in the design of types of landscaping and in the design of water-using fixtures. In addition, water restricting showerheads and faucets shall be used, as well as water-saving toilets utilizing less than three gallons per flush.
It is anticipated that portable restroom facilities will be provided at most safe parking locations, and such facilities minimize water use. Should permanent facilities be provided, water using fixtures will meet all applicable standards for minimizing water use.
31.78 AGENDA REPORT
Planning Commission Meeting of March 3, 2022
SUBJECT: Oversize Vehicle Ordinance Implementation – Project No. CP21-0174 PAGE 45
30. In all projects in Industrial (I) Zones, all buildings and structures shall be so designed and oriented to make use of natural lighting wherever possible.
This finding does not apply, as new structures are not anticipated. If restroom structures are constructed in Industrial Zones, natural lighting will be considered in the design and orientation.
Submitted by:
Michael S. Ferry, AICP
Senior Planner
Approved by:
Lee Butler, AICP
Deputy City Manager
Attachments:
1. Draft Conditions of Approval
2. Zoning Administrator staff report for January 12, 2022 a. October 26, 2021 City Council Agenda report
b. Ordinance oversized vehicles – clean
c. Ordinance oversized vehicles – track changes
d. Snapshot of volunteer vehicle abatement data 9-2020 to 6-2021 e. West Cliff pilot parking analysis, 2018 & 2019
f. Public Safety Task Force recommendations
g. Santa Cruz Community Advisory Committee on Homelessness final report, August 2020
3. Zoning Administrator January 12, 2022 minutes
4. Appeal letter dated January 14, 2022 filed by Reggie Meisler on behalf of Santa Cruz Cares
5. Appeal letter dated January 25, 2022 filed by the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU)
6. Oversized vehicle dumpster cost for West Side location
7. Photographs of oversized vehicles in Santa Cruz
31.79 EXHIBIT “A” – MARCH 3, 2022
CONDITIONS OF APPROVAL FOR APPLICATION NO. CP21-0174
Coastal and Design Permits to authorize the development associated with amended municipal code pertaining to the parking of oversized vehicles (e.g., parking signage, time of use restrictions, etc.) and to implement City-wide safe parking programs for unhoused City residents living in oversized vehicles licensed and registered in the City of Santa Cruz.
1. If one or more of the following conditions related to the safe parking program is not met with respect to all its terms, then the approval of a safe parking program at a specified location may be revoked.
2. If, upon exercise of this permit, any developed safe parking site within the coastal zone is at any time determined by the Zoning Administrator to be incompatible with the surrounding neighborhood, revocation of, or amendment to, this permit by the Planning Commission could occur. Outside of the coastal zone the Design Permit can be revoked or amended in accordance with the Santa Cruz Municipal Code.
3. The use shall meet the standards and shall be developed within limits established by Chapter
24.14 of the Santa Cruz Municipal Code as to the emission of noise, odor, smoke, dust, vibration, wastes, fumes or any public nuisance arising or occurring incidental to its establishment or operation.
4. The Safe Parking Program. As part of its consideration of the proposed development, a safe parking framework is proposed. Site locations would include information and options for sanitation and black water dumping. General parameters for the safe parking sites include:
• Off street locations (i.e. public/private parking lots). New signage shall be small-scale and designed to be incorporated into other signage in existing parking facilities. Existing sign post shall be used when possible.
• Hours generally shall be from 8:00 PM – 8:00 AM time frame. o Within the Coastal Zone, hours of operation shall be within this time frame, except that occasional, minor deviations from the 8:00 PM to 8:00 AM hours within the Coastal Zone may be allowed to facilitate provision of services to the program participants, so long as the additional hours are of a frequency, duration, and/or location such that they do not adversely interfere with coastal access.
o Outside the Coastal Zone, facilities (for example, Tier 3 facilities where enhanced services are provided) may be operated with extended hours, including on a 24/7 basis, so long as plans adequately address required parking for other uses. • Sanitation will be provided at all locations (i.e., porta-potties, hand washing stations, and garbage cans). Black water dumping facilities may be provided at some locations. All facilities shall, whenever possible, be located where no impacts to public vehicular or bike parking occur. When that is not possible, all facilities shall be located or operated in a manner so as to minimize vehicular and bike parking impacts to the greatest extent feasible.
Locations of porta-potties, hand washing stations, and trash receptacles, as well as the locations of overnight parking on the site, will also take into account the adjacent uses, visibility, maintenance of views, on- and off-site circulation, and accessibility. • Safe Parking sites will not be sited in mapped “high impact parking areas” within the Coastal Zone.
• There will be no cost to participants in the Safe Parking Program. • Additional operational criteria may be applied by the City Manager, pursuant to Section
10.40.120(m) of the SCMC.
31.80 CONDITIONS OF APPROVAL
Planning Commission Meeting of March 3, 2022
SUBJECT: Oversized Vehicle Ordinance Implementation – Coastal Permit & Design Permit – Application No. CP21-0174
5. Notwithstanding the exceptions noted in Section 10.40.120(g) of the Vehicles and Traffic Section of the Municipal Code and, in particular, the exception noted in Section
10.40.120(g)(7), the parking restrictions contained in Section 10.40.120(a) shall not be implemented until and unless at least one safe parking location is in operation.
6. At the end of the first year of operation, City staff will prepare a report that outlines the program operations in the Coastal Zone, its usage, the number of parking stalls affected, and complaints received regarding the program. If it is determined that any of the standards applicable in the Coastal Zone and identified in conditions above have not been met or if it is determined that a use has impacted availability of public parking spaces such that public parking is not otherwise available in the location where the safe parking program is being operated, then the City shall propose modifications to operations so as to remedy those situations. A copy of the report shall be submitted to the Executive Director of the Coastal Commission for review and approval. If the Executive Director determines that the safe parking program is negatively impacting public access, then the program shall be modified to eliminate such impacts, or mitigate them to the maximum extent feasible as directed by the Executive Director, including but not limited to elimination of the safe parking program location(s) in the Coastal Zone.
31.81 ZONING ADMINISTRATOR
AGENDA REPORT
DATE: December 16, 2021
AGENDA OF: January 5, 2022
ITEM NO.: CP21-0174 City-Wide
RECOMMENDATION: That the Zoning Administrator acknowledge the environmental determination and approve the Coastal and Design Permits based on the Findings listed below.
PROJECT DATA
Property Owner: City of Santa Cruz
Representative: Lee Butler, Deputy City Manager
Application Type: Coastal and Design Permits to authorize the development associated with the amended municipal code pertaining to the parking of oversized vehicles (e.g., parking signage, time of use restrictions, etc.) and to implement City-wide safe parking programs for unhoused City residents living in oversized vehicles licensed and registered in the City of Santa Cruz.
Zoning Designation: City-wide
Project Consistency: Section 10.40.120(m) of the Santa Cruz Municipal Code authorizes City-operated or City-sponsored safe parking locations on public and private properties
General Plan: City-wide
Project Consistency: NA
Land Use:
Existing: Public parking
Proposed: Public parking
Parking: Number of spaces does not change
Coastal Review: Coastal Permit required
Environmental Review: Categorical Exemption: 15282-(j); 15301 Class 1-c, g; 15307; 15308 and 15061(b).
Mandatory Action Date: 60 days after acknowledgement of Environmental Exemption Planner: Michael S. Ferry
PROJECT DESCRIPTION
On November 9, 2021, the City Council adopted Ordinance No. 2021-20 amending Santa Cruz Municipal Code (SCMC) Title 10 amending “Vehicles and Traffic” at Chapter 10.04 “Definitions” and Chapter 10.40 “Stopping, Standing and Parking” and Chapter 10.41 “City-Wide Parking
31.82 1.1
AGENDA REPORT
ZA Meeting of January 5, 2022
SUBJECT: Regulation of oversize vehicles and safe parking program– Application No.
CP21-0174
Permit” pertaining to the parking of oversized vehicles and Chapter 16.19 “Storm Water and Urban Runoff Pollution Control” at Section 16.19.070.
The Council also approved a motion to direct staff to implement City-operated and sponsored safe parking programs for unhoused City residents living in oversized vehicles licensed and registered in the City of Santa Cruz. Staff is required to return to Council with draft-ready contracts and associated costs within four months of the passing of the ordinance. Safe parking programs would include a three-tiered approach that consists of the following:
a) Emergency overnight safe parking on City-owned parcels for a minimum of three vehicles to be implemented immediately.
b) Safe overnight parking on City-owned parcels or other non-residential approved spaces for a minimum of thirty vehicles throughout the City to be implemented within four months of the passing of the above listed ordinance. c) A robust safe parking program in partnership with service providers, health providers, and County partners. The following subpopulations will be prioritized:
Families with children; seniors; transition age youth; veterans; and those with a valid disabled placard or license plate issued pursuant to the California Vehicle Code.
The staff report and attachments that went to the City Council for approval of Ordinance No. 2021- 20 and the motion to implement the safe parking program are attached to this staff report.
Section 24.08.210 of the Zoning Ordinance requires approval of a Coastal Permit for development within the Coastal Zone that is not specifically exempted. This ordinance revision is defined in the Local Coastal Plan (LCP) as “development” because it could change the intensity of the use of the ocean or access thereto, and parking restrictions are not specifically exempted in the LCP. Section
24.08.410-12 of the Zoning Ordinance requires approval of a Design Permit for public projects located in the Coastal Zone. The Design Permit also serves to authorize safe parking locations on public and private properties outside the Coastal Zone, as Section 24.08.410 calls for a Design Permit for projects where the applicant is a public agency over which the City can exercise land use controls.
ANALYSIS
This ordinance revision was the result of the impacts that oversized/recreational vehicles (RVs) have had on the community, public safety and environment. In July 2021 a survey found an average of 65 oversized vehicles parked on city streets primarily within the Coastal Zone and raising many issues. The types of issues are reflected in the calls for service include: the illegal dumping of trash, debris and human waste onto City streets, sidewalks, and waterways; fires associated with oversized vehicles; lack of access to neighborhood and coastal parking; and increased criminal activities in areas where oversized vehicles are parked, including theft of bicycles and other property, private water connections being used, and gasoline thefts.
In the first eight months of 2021, there were at least 15 emergency calls for service to 911 that were related to oversized vehicles, with seven of those calls related to fire and/or gas leakage. In calendar
31.83 1.2
AGENDA REPORT
ZA Meeting of January 5, 2022
SUBJECT: Regulation of oversize vehicles and safe parking program– Application No.
CP21-0174
year 2020 and in the first eight months of 2021, the Santa Cruz Fire Department reported 38 fire incidents that are vehicle related, three that were specifically related to oversized vehicles. Also, in the first eight months of 2021, there were 12 oversized vehicle related service calls and 14 public right of way calls to the Wastewater Collection Division. Additionally, vehicle abatement activities have continued over the years. According to the Vehicle Abatement Officer, in the calendar year 2020, 2,243 abatement notices were issued, 197 vehicles were towed, including 20 which were oversized vehicles or camper vans. The five streets with the most vehicle abatement activity (Delaware, Natural Bridges, Shaffer, Mission, and Almar) were all on the West Side, and approximately one third of the abatements citywide are focused on the far West Side. The Vehicle Abatement Officer counted 15 out of state license plates on oversized vehicles that he was able to assess in one morning in certain areas of the West Side. The City Manager’s Office has spent approximately $10,000 so far this calendar year in refuse services solely on the far Westside to mitigate the illegal dumping from oversized vehicle/car dwellers. This does not include staff time from the City Manager’s office or Public Works in coordinating these efforts.
One of the issues that is most often raised with regard to extended oversized vehicle parking is the discharge of raw sewage onto City streets and into storm drains. Runoff from the City’s storm drain system is periodically tested as part of regional testing efforts, but not at a scale that would be able to quantify the environmental impacts under discussion. Any verified discharge of human waste into the storm sewer system is considered a violation of the City’s Municipal Code (Section
16.19.090); if left unaddressed, the City is at risk of violating its National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) Municipal Regional Permit, which could lead to enforcement actions by the Regional Water Quality Control Board.
Community input regarding the challenges and impacts of oversized vehicle parking have been substantial. In February 2019, after a prior city council member's proposal to permit overnight oversized vehicle camping on Delaware Avenue on the lower Westside, over 400 letters in opposition were sent to the city council. Community input concerns cited included environmental impacts, neighborhood safety, increased crime, garbage, human excrement, fire danger, drug dealing, and other illegal and nuisance behaviors. A petition with over 1,000 signatures, urging city staff and council to address the public health and safety impacts of oversized vehicle parking was created on Change.org and sent to city staff and council.
Information was gathered on similar ordinances in other cities and counties throughout California, including coastal areas, in order to explore existing practices and options the City of Santa Cruz may have in addressing the ongoing oversized vehicle parking challenges in our City.
Commonalities in impacts of oversized vehicles in like communities were reviewed. The draft ordinance is similar to ordinances passed in other coastal cities, such as Santa Monica and Santa Barbara.
Within City limits, the Association of Faith Communities (AFC) manages as many as 22 safe parking spaces, including approximately 20 on religious assembly sites and two on city-owned property. AFC also has up to an additional 21 spaces outside the City limits. In addition to the safe parking allowances on sites used for religious assembly, the City also allows businesses to host safe parking spaces; however, since no permits are required to allow such parking, it is unknown
31.84 1.3
AGENDA REPORT
ZA Meeting of January 5, 2022
SUBJECT: Regulation of oversize vehicles and safe parking program– Application No.
CP21-0174
whether or how many such spaces are being provided by businesses. This is a significant increase in overnight safe parking availability compared to what was identified as available in the City in 2015.
The ordinance amendment and policy direction is to provide parameters on time, place, and manner of parking of oversized vehicles on City streets in order to address environmental and public health impacts. A three-tiered safe parking framework to support individuals living in their vehicles includes the following:
a) Emergency overnight safe parking on City owned parcels for a minimum of three vehicles has already been implemented.
b) Safe overnight parking on city owned parcels or other non-residential approved spaces for a minimum of thirty vehicles throughout the City. c) A robust safe parking program in partnership with service providers, health providers and county partners. The following subpopulations will be prioritized:
Families with children; seniors, transition age youth; veterans; and those with a valid disabled placard or license plate issued pursuant to the California Vehicle Code.
A summary of the amendments are provided below:
Overnight Parking Permit. The following provisions would apply to Overnight Parking Permits:
Available to a “resident” or “out-of-town visitor,” as defined in Section 10.04.165 and 10.04.104, respectively.
Residents:
Valid for one year, allowing parking of an oversized vehicle for four periods of up to 72 consecutive hours per calendar month. Parking location: Street curb immediately adjacent to the residence, or within four hundred feet of that person’s residence if adjacent parking is not possible.
Visitors:
Valid for a maximum of 72 hours in the location identified above for residents.
No more than six out-of-town visitor permits per residential address per calendar year.
Fee:
A future Council resolution would establish the permit fee(s).
Denial of Permits:
The city may deny the issuance of an oversized vehicle overnight parking permit for up to one year if the city manager or his/her designee finds that:
the applicant is not a resident; the resident or out-of-town visitor guests
31.85 1.4
AGENDA REPORT
ZA Meeting of January 5, 2022
SUBJECT: Regulation of oversize vehicles and safe parking program– Application No.
CP21-0174
have been issued four or more citations for violations in the prior twelve months; the out-of-town visitor is not a guest of the resident applicant; or an owner of an oversized vehicle has procured any oversized vehicle parking permit through fraud or misrepresentation.
City Operated or Sponsored Safe Parking Programs.
In addition to the private property allowances authorized through Chapter 6.36.030 without the need for any permits from the City, the City may operate, sponsor, or authorize safe parking programs for oversized vehicles on any City owned or leased properties or on city sanctioned private properties. The City Manager shall develop a policy that establishes operational criteria for such safe parking programs.
Safe Parking Program. In conjunction with the proposed ordinance, a safe parking framework is proposed. Site locations would include information and options for sanitation and black water dumping. General parameters for the safe parking sites include:
Off street locations (i.e. public/private parking lots). New signage shall be small-scale and designed to be incorporated into other signage in existing parking facilities. Existing sign post shall be used when possible.
Hours generally shall be from 8:00 PM – 8:00 AM time frame. Within the Coastal Zone, hours of operation shall be within this time frame, except that occasional, minor deviations from the 8:00 PM to 8:00 AM hours within the Coastal Zone may be allowed to facilitate provision of services to the program participants, so long as the additional hours are of a frequency, duration, and/or location such that they do not adversely interfere with coastal access. For example, depending on the site services, one hour immediately before or immediately after the typical 8:00 PM to 8:00 AM operations, a mobile dump service could operate one day per week at the site or parking could remain in place so that a service provider (such as Cal Fresh, Homeless Persons Health Project, etc.) could offer services one to two days per week. As noted above, any such services during hours outside of 8:00 PM to 8:00 AM will be scheduled with specific consideration given to minimizing any interference with coastal access. Outside the Coastal Zone, facilities (for example, Tier 3 facilities where enhanced services are provided) may be operated with extended hours, including on a 24/7 basis, so long as plans adequately address required parking for other uses. Sanitation will be provided at all locations (i.e., porta-potties, hand washing stations, and garbage cans). Black water dumping facilities may be provided at some locations. All facilities shall, whenever possible, be located where no impacts to public parking occur. When that is not possible, all facilities shall be located or operated in a manner so as to minimize parking impacts to the greatest extent feasible. Locations of porta-potties, hand washing stations, and trash receptacles, as well as the locations of overnight parking on the site, will also take into account the adjacent uses, visibility, maintenance of views, and accessibility. Safe Parking sites will not be sited in mapped “high impact parking areas” within the Coastal Zone.
There will be no cost to participants in Safe Parking Program.
31.86 1.5
AGENDA REPORT
ZA Meeting of January 5, 2022
SUBJECT: Regulation of oversize vehicles and safe parking program– Application No.
CP21-0174
At the end of the first year of operation, City staff will prepare a report that outlines the program operations in the Coastal Zone, its usage, the number of parking stalls affected, and complaints received regarding the program. If it is determined that any of the standards applicable in the Coastal Zone and identified in the conditions above have not been met or if it is determined that a use has impacted availability of public parking spaces such that public parking is not otherwise available in the location where the safe parking program is being operated, then the City shall propose modifications to operations so as to remedy those situations. A copy of the report shall be submitted to the Executive Director of the Coastal Commission for review and approval. If the Executive Director determines that the safe parking program is negatively impacting public access, then the program shall be modified to eliminate such impacts, or mitigate then to the maximum extent feasible as directed by the Executive Director, including but not limited to elimination of the safe parking program in the Coastal Zone.
The safe parking framework will take a three-tiered approach. Emergency Safe Parking spaces - A minimum of three emergency safe parking spaces has already been provided. These emergency spaces will be available for up to 72 hours and are intended to support individuals who require time and support with vehicle registration and repairs.
Safe Overnight Parking - The City Manager’s office, and the City Homelessness Response teams will identify and make available safe parking spaces on city owned land and/or other non-residential approved spaces for a minimum of thirty oversized vehicles.
The city will either partner with outside providers or directly provide overnight monitoring. Individuals in these parking spaces will be connected and linked to other transitional sheltering options that are available throughout the county. Safe Parking Program - The City Manager’s office, Public Works and Homelessness Response teams will continue to work closely with County partners including the Human Services and Health departments, and service providers to either expand the existing, non-profit-run program or establish a new safe parking program. This program will include case management support to assist individuals in directly engaging in pathways to housing. Families with children, seniors, transition aged youth, veterans, and individuals with disabilities will be prioritized. The Safe Parking program will return to Council within four months of the passing of this ordinance with a draft ready contract for services that includes costs.
As part of this approach, the city will implement a permit process that will allow individual vehicles to temporarily park on City streets overnight if, among other requirements, these individuals: (1) have applied to a safe parking or shelter program, (2) are unable to participate in a safe parking or shelter program due to lack of capacity, and (3) the location of their vehicle will not cause public health, safety, welfare concerns, or nuisance conditions. These individuals will still be subject to citations or other appropriate law enforcement activity if they engage in otherwise illegal and/or nuisance behaviors (e.g., illegal dumping).
31.87 1.6
AGENDA REPORT
ZA Meeting of January 5, 2022
SUBJECT: Regulation of oversize vehicles and safe parking program– Application No.
CP21-0174
Additional Supports
After analyzing the best practices in other communities, members of the community suggested some ideas to bring forward that they would initiate. These include:
● A voucher Program for Oversized Vehicle Wastewater Dumping. Developing and funding a voucher program for Santa Cruz city residents residing in oversized vehicles, with a partial or full subsidy of the $15 dump fee at the nearest dumping station.
Community members interested in initiating this would coordinate with local nonprofit service providers to distribute and track the vouchers. ● A limited number of financial support subsidies for individuals who are Santa Cruz city residents needing support towards vehicle repair and registration. These funds would be established through partnerships with neighborhood groups.
Staff continue to analyze the best approaches for facilitating black water dumping into approved locations/facilities. Currently, the closest public black water dump site is at the northeast corner of Soquel Avenue and Highway 1. Staff are actively investigating mobile dumping services (both those operated by the City and those operated by a private company), as well as additional dump station locations.
Health in All Policies.
Health. The health and well-being of all Santa Cruz residents and the environment are of utmost importance. The public health impacts of extended oversized vehicle parking include: dumping of trash, debris, and human waste onto City streets, sidewalks, and waterways; fires and criminal activities, such as bicycle and other personal property theft; private water connections being used; and gasoline thefts.
Equity. An appointed Council ad-hoc committee will continue to work with City staff and community partners to further develop and ensure implementation of the above described safe parking framework in a manner that is widely accessible and will report to the Council with additional recommended actions.
Sustainability. Environmental sustainability is a core value of the City of Santa Cruz and informs all City operations. Prohibiting the use of public right-of-way for oversized vehicle parking throughout the City of Santa Cruz would reduce the likelihood of human waste entering the storm drain system or contaminating the nearby environment.
The California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) provides several “categorical exemptions” which are applicable to categories of projects and activities that the Natural Resource Agency has determined generally do not pose a risk of significant impacts on the environment. Section 15307 of the CEQA Guidelines “consists of actions taken by regulatory agencies... to assure the maintenance, restoration, or enhancement of a natural resource where the regulatory process involves procedures for protection of the environment.” Section 15308 of the CEQA Guidelines “consists of actions taken by regulatory agencies… to assure the maintenance, restoration, enhancement, or protection of the environment where the regulatory process involves procedures 31.88 1.7
AGENDA REPORT
ZA Meeting of January 5, 2022
SUBJECT: Regulation of oversize vehicles and safe parking program– Application No.
CP21-0174
for the protection of the environment.” The proposed ordinance is not anticipated to result in any new construction, including but not limited to any construction of new facilities for public services such as police, parks, or fire. Many individuals already park oversized vehicles in the City, and the ordinance is not anticipated to result in any additional impacts associated with parking of oversized vehicles. By providing safe parking locations where sanitation facilities would be present and by prohibiting overnight parking elsewhere, the proposed ordinance is expected to result in significantly fewer instances of overnight parking on City streets where sanitation facilities, including restrooms and trash services, are unavailable. That change, in and of itself, will create beneficial impacts to the environment through an increase in the proper disposal of waste compared to existing conditions and allowances, where the City has no designated safe parking locations. Further, the City’s experience has been that the most significant environmental degradation associated with oversized vehicle overnight parking occurs in places where groups of oversized vehicles congregate and become entrenched in an area and remain in that area for an extended period of time. As such, the ordinance will reduce environmental impacts when comparing its outcomes to the status quo. As the majority of environmental impacts resulting from the ordinance will be beneficial rather than detrimental and with the other potential environmental effects being de minimis, the project is also exempt under Code of Regulations Section 15061(b), the “common sense exemption,” since it can be seen with certainty that no significant effect on the environment will occur.
Section 15282-(j) is for projects restriping streets to relieve traffic congestion while Section 15301Class 1-c allows for alterations of existing streets, sidewalks, gutters and similar facilities that do not create additional automobile lanes. The City’s experience has shown overnight parking occurs in places where groups of oversized vehicles congregate and become entrenched in an area causing congestion and degradation of the environment. The ordinance will reduce these impacts by proving safe parking in a controlled environment.
SUMMARY
In response to community concerns about oversized vehicle parking impacts to neighborhoods and the environment, the City Council approved amendments of existing codes to prohibit oversized vehicles parking for extended periods of time as well as an oversized vehicles permitting system that limits the total amount of time any oversized vehicles parks their vehicle on the City’s right-of-way, streets, and off-street parking lots. A three tiered safe parking program has also been approved for individuals who reside in their vehicles, from emergency parking to low barrier parking to a robust safe parking program that will provide service support and opportunities for pathways to permanent housing.
While no single and simple solution exists that adequately abates the noted impacts, the ordinance revision is an attempt to balance the needs of parking access with our community’s quality of life and environmental resources that are being affected by oversized vehicles.
31.89 1.8
AGENDA REPORT
ZA Meeting of January 5, 2022
SUBJECT: Regulation of oversize vehicles and safe parking program– Application No.
CP21-0174
RECOMENDATION
Staff recommends approval of the Coastal Development and Design Permits based on the attached Findings.
FINDINGS
Coastal Permit, Section 24.08.250
1. Maintain views between the sea and the first public roadway parallel to the sea.
The ordinance revision will not affect coastal views. This ordinance is expected to enhance views by regulating overnight parking of oversized vehicles adjacent to the coast. No safe parking facilities will be located in the high-impact parking zones identified by the Coastal Commission.
2. Protect vegetation, natural habitats and natural resources consistent with the Local Coastal Land Use Plan.
The ordinance is designed to discourage illegal dumping of sewage and grey-water from RVs that may contribute to the high bacteria levels at Cowell Beach and other coastal areas. The project has been evaluated for potential environmental impacts in accordance with the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) and the City’s environmental review procedures. No vegetation, natural habitats or natural resources will be disturbed.
One of the issues that is most often raised with regard to extended oversized vehicle parking is the discharge of raw sewage onto City streets and into storm drains. Runoff from the City’s storm drain system is periodically tested as part of regional testing efforts, but not at a scale that would be able to quantify the environmental impacts under discussion. Any verified discharge of human waste into the storm sewer system is considered a violation of the City’s Municipal Code (Section 16.19.090); if left unaddressed, the City is at risk of violating its National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) Municipal Regional Permit, which could lead to enforcement actions by the Regional Water Quality Control Board.
3. Be consistent with any applicable design plans and/or area plans incorporated into the Local Coastal Land Use Plan, in that it implements policies therein.
The ordinance revision and safe parking facilities are consistent with the General Plan, all Area Plans and Local Coastal Plan in that it implements many of the public safety
31.90 1.9
AGENDA REPORT
ZA Meeting of January 5, 2022
SUBJECT: Regulation of oversize vehicles and safe parking program– Application No.
CP21-0174
and environmental protection policies from those plans. The ordinance is designed to discourage illegal dumping of sewage and grey-water from RVs that may contribute to the high bacteria levels at Cowell Beach and other coastal areas. No vegetation, natural habitats or natural resources will be disturbed with implementation of the ordinance.
Safe Parking will be located well outside of the mapped “high impact” parking areas which will enhance coastal access by increasing the available parking that used to be occupied by RVs. The project has been evaluated for potential environmental impacts in accordance with the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) and the City’s environmental review procedures.
4. Maintain public access to the coast along any coastline as set forth in the Local Coastal Land Use Plan.
The parking restriction will increase coastal access by making the coast cleaner and safer for the general public, in part by minimizing litter and black water dumping, and thereby more attractive. There are numerous locations in the area that provide overnight facilities for RV camping. The Upper Harbor has RV camping facilities as well as Forest of Nisene Marks, Manresa, New Brighton, San Andres KOA, Seacliff and Sunset State Beaches. These are appropriate overnight camping areas designed to accommodate large vehicles that are seeking coastal access. The oversized vehicle parking restrictions are in effect from midnight to 5:00 AM, so recreational access to the beach will not be impacted.
Permit processes will provide additional options for parking oversized vehicles on-street overnight, including for visitors to the coast.
Safe Parking - The City Manager’s office, and the City Homelessness Response teams will identify and make available safe parking spaces on city owned land and/or other non-residential approved spaces for a minimum of thirty oversized vehicles. The city will either partner with outside providers or directly provide overnight monitoring.
Individuals in these parking spaces will be connected and linked to other transitional sheltering options that are available throughout the county. The safe parking facilities located within the Coastal Zone have locational, hourly, and other operational criteria that ensure public access is maintained. Staff will prepare an analysis at the end of the first year of operation that details the safe parking operations in the Coastal Zone and offers an opportunity for collaboration with Coastal Commission staff to address any public access issues that may arise as part of the operations.
5. Be consistent with the Local Coastal Land Use Plan goal of providing visitorserving needs as appropriate.
There are numerous appropriate locations in the area that provide overnight facilities for RV camping. The Upper Harbor has RV camping facilities as well as Forest of Nisene Marks, Manresa, New Brighton, San Andres KOA, Seacliff and Sunset State Beaches.
These are appropriate overnight camping areas designed to accommodate large vehicles that are seeking coastal access. Bona fide recreational access to the beach will not be impacted.
31.91 1.10
AGENDA REPORT
ZA Meeting of January 5, 2022
SUBJECT: Regulation of oversize vehicles and safe parking program– Application No.
CP21-0174
The City Manager’s office, and the City Homelessness Response teams will identify and make available safe parking spaces on city owned land and/or other non-residential approved spaces for a minimum of thirty oversized vehicles. The city will either partner with outside providers or directly provide overnight monitoring. Individuals in these parking spaces will be connected and linked to other transitional sheltering options that are available throughout the county. Permit processes will provide additional options for parking oversized vehicles on-street overnight, including for visitors to the coast.
As part of its consideration of the proposed ordinance, a safe parking framework is proposed. All site locations will be outside of the mapped high impact parking areas within the coastal zone. The sites will include information and options for sanitation and black water dumping. General parameters for the safe parking sites include off street locations (i.e. public/private parking lots) with hours that will generally be from 8:00 PM to 8:00 AM in the Coastal Zone. Sanitation will be provided at these locations such as porta-potties, washing stations, garbage cans and depending on the location, blackwater pumping facilities. All sanitation facilities will be located to minimize parking impacts.
There will be no cost to participants in Safe Parking Program.
6. Be consistent with the Local Coastal Land Use Plan goal of encouraging coastal development uses as appropriate.
The revised ordinance will enhance coastal access by providing a cleaner and safer environment for the general public, in part by minimizing litter and black water dumping. Recreational access to the beach will not be impacted. Permit processes will provide additional options for parking oversized vehicles on-street overnight, including for visitors to the coast.
All safe parking sites to be developed will be located outside of the mapped high impact parking areas within the coastal zone.
Shoreline Protection Overlay District, Section 24.10.2430
7. The project protects trees and vegetation and sensitive wildlife habitat.
The ordinance revisions and safe parking facilities will not affect trees, vegetation or sensitive wildlife habitat.
8. The project is consistent with the following criteria for bluff or cliff development:
a. The development is sited and designed to assure stability and structural integrity of its expected economic life span and minimize alterations to natural landforms.
31.92 1.11
AGENDA REPORT
ZA Meeting of January 5, 2022
SUBJECT: Regulation of oversize vehicles and safe parking program– Application No.
CP21-0174
b. The development will not create or contribute significantly to problems of erosion or geologic instability on the site or on surrounding geologically hazardous areas.
c. The development minimizes alteration of cliffs, bluff tops, faces or bases, and will not interfere with sand movement.
d. The development which proposes use of retaining walls shall be allowed only to stabilize slopes. Sea walls at the toe of sea cliffs to check marine erosion shall be allowed only where there is no less environmentally damaging alternative.
e. The development within one hundred feet of any cliff or bluff line shall follow the recommendations of an approved geologic report by a registered geologist. The area where such a report is required may be increased where the issue of slope stability requires a greater distance from any cliff or bluff line.
The ordinance revisions and safe parking facilities will not affect any cliff or bluff.
9. The project provides maximum erosion protection, using accepted engineering practices and other methods and specifications set forth in this title.
The ordinance revisions and safe parking facilities will not affect any cliff or bluff.
10. The project maintains public view corridors between the sea and the first public roadway parallel to the sea and maintain natural views of the coastline.
The ordinance revisions will not adversely affect views of the coastline. Signage will predominantly be placed on existing sign posts. All safe parking sites will located outside of the mapped “high impact” parking areas within the coastal zone and generally 300 feet from the bluff.
11. The project protects paleontological resources as prescribed in the Land Use Plan.
The ordinance revisions and safe parking facilities are not expected to create any land disturbances that would affect any paleontological resources.
12. The project protects and enhances free public access to or along the beach, and sign such access when necessary.
The ordinance revision will not take away any free public parking or bona fide beach access. The revised ordinance will enhance coastal access by providing a cleaner and safer environment for the general public, in part by minimizing litter and black water dumping. Recreational access to the beach will not be impacted. Permit processes will provide additional options for parking oversized vehicles on-street overnight, including 31.93 1.12
AGENDA REPORT
ZA Meeting of January 5, 2022
SUBJECT: Regulation of oversize vehicles and safe parking program– Application No.
CP21-0174
for visitors to the coast. Any new signage required will predominantly use existing sign posts.
13. The project includes mitigation measures prescribed in any applicable environmental document.
There are no mitigation measures required; however, various conditions have been included that protect the environment, such as provision of trash receptacles and portapotties at the safe parking facilities.
14. The project is compatible with the established physical scale of the area.
The ordinance revisions will not affect any area, and any signage will be placed predominantly on existing sign posts. Safe parking facilities will have restroom facilities, hand washing stations, and trash receptacles that, by their nature, would not be incompatible with the scale of the area.
15. The project is consistent with the design review guidelines of this title and the policies of any applicable area plan.
The signage will be consistent with the Public Works and Police sign criteria.
16. The project is consistent with the policies of the Local Coastal Program, the General Plan, and the California Coastal Act.
The proposed ordinance revision is consistent with the policies of the Local Coastal Program, the General Plan and the California Coastal Act in that the ordinance amendment will result will benefit the community along stretches of the coast that are currently impacted by black water dumping, littering, and other nuisance issues.
Recreational access to the beach will not be impacted and it will not adversely affect free public parking or beach access. All safe parking sites to be developed will be located outside of the mapped high impact parking areas within the coastal zone.
Design Permit, Section 24.08.430 (Applicable to the safe parking locations)
17. The site plan shall be consistent with physical development policies of the General Plan, any required or optional element of the General Plan, any area plan or specific plan or other city policy for physical development. If located in the Coastal Zone, a site plan shall also be consistent with policies of the Local Coastal Program.
31.94 1.13
AGENDA REPORT
ZA Meeting of January 5, 2022
SUBJECT: Regulation of oversize vehicles and safe parking program– Application No.
CP21-0174
The project is consistent with the General Plan, the Beach South of Laurel Plan and the Seabright Area Plan in that the ordinance amendment will result will benefit the community along stretches of the coast that are currently impacted by black water dumping, littering, and other nuisance issues. Recreational access to the beach will not be impacted and it will not adversely affect free public parking or beach access. All safe parking sites to be developed will be located outside of the mapped high impact parking areas within the coastal zone.
18. The exterior design and appearance of buildings and structures and the design of the site plan shall be compatible with design and appearance of other existing buildings and structures in neighborhoods which have established architectural character worthy of preservation.
A condition of approval requires that locations of porta-potties, hand washing stations, and trash receptacles will take into account the adjacent uses, visibility, maintenance of views, accessibility, and maintenance of public parking spaces.
19. Design of the site plan shall respect design principles in terms of maintaining a balance of scale, form and proportion, using design components, which are harmonious, materials and colors that blend with elements of the site plan and surrounding areas. Location of structures should take into account maintenance of view; rooftop mechanical equipment shall be incorporated into roof design or screened from adjacent properties. Utility installations such as trash enclosures, storage units, traffic-control devices, transformer vaults and electrical meters shall be accessible and screened.
A condition of approval requires that locations of porta-potties, hand washing stations, and trash receptacles will take into account the adjacent uses, visibility, maintenance of views, accessibility, and maintenance of public parking spaces.
20. Where a site plan abuts, or is in close proximity to, uses other than that proposed, the plan should take into account its effect on other land uses. Where a nonresidential use abuts or is in close proximity to a residential use, the effect of the site plan should maintain the residential quality of adjacent or nearby areas.
A condition of approval requires that locations of porta-potties, hand washing stations, and trash receptacles will take into account the adjacent uses, visibility, maintenance of views, accessibility, and maintenance of public parking spaces.
21. The orientation and location of buildings, structures, open spaces and other features of the site plan shall be such as to maintain natural resources including significant trees and shrubs to the extent feasible, maintain a compatible relationship to and preserve solar access of adjacent properties, and minimize alteration of natural land forms, building profiles, location, and orientation must relate to natural land forms.
31.95 1.14
AGENDA REPORT
ZA Meeting of January 5, 2022
SUBJECT: Regulation of oversize vehicles and safe parking program– Application No.
CP21-0174
A condition of approval requires that locations of porta-potties, hand washing stations, and trash receptacles will take into account the adjacent uses, visibility, maintenance of views, accessibility, and maintenance of public parking spaces.
22. The site plan shall be situated and designed to protect views along the ocean and of scenic coastal areas. Where appropriate and feasible, the site plan shall restore and enhance visual quality of visually degraded areas.
The view of the ocean will remain unchained.
23. The site plan shall minimize the effect of traffic conditions on abutting streets through careful layout of the site with respect to location, dimensions of vehicular and pedestrian entrances, exit drives and walkways; through the adequate provision of off-street parking and loading facilities; through an adequate circulation pattern within the boundaries of the development; and through the surfacing and lighting of off-street parking facilities.
A condition of approval requires that locations of porta-potties, hand washing stations, and trash receptacles, as well as locations of overnight parking on the site, will take into account the adjacent uses, visibility, maintenance of views, accessibility, and maintenance of public parking spaces.
24. The site plan shall encourage alternatives to travel by automobile where appropriate, through the provision of facilities for pedestrians and bicyclists, including covered parking for bicycles and motorcycles where appropriate. Public transit stops and facilities shall be accommodated as appropriate, and other incentive provisions considered which encourage non-auto travel.
The finding is not applicable.
25. The site shall provide open space and landscaping which complement buildings and structures. Open space should be useful to residents, employees, or other visitors to the site. Landscaping shall be used to separate and/or screen service and storage areas, separate and/or screen parking areas from other areas, break up expanses of paved area, and define open space for usability and privacy.
A condition of approval requires that locations of porta-potties, hand washing stations, and trash receptacles, as well as locations of overnight parking on the site, will take into account the adjacent uses, visibility, maintenance of views, accessibility, and maintenance of public parking spaces.
26. The site plan shall reasonably protect against external and internal noise, vibration and other factors, which may tend to make the environment less desirable. The site plan should respect the need for privacy of adjacent residents.
31.96 1.15
AGENDA REPORT
ZA Meeting of January 5, 2022
SUBJECT: Regulation of oversize vehicles and safe parking program– Application No.
CP21-0174
The safe parking program has limited hours of operation and will be located in existing parking facilities within the City. Conditions of approval require adherence to established standards related to noise and other nuisance activities.
27. Signs shall complement the site plan and avoid dominating the site and/or existing buildings on the site or overwhelming the buildings or structures to which they are attached. Multiple signs on a given site should be of a consistent theme.
New signage shall be small-scale and blend with other signage in existing parking facilities. Existing sign post shall be used when possible.
28. Building and structures shall be so designed and oriented to make use of natural elements such as solar radiation, wind, and landscaping for heating, cooling and ventilation.
This finding does not apply.
29. The site plan shall incorporate water-conservation features where possible, including in the design of types of landscaping and in the design of water-using fixtures. In addition, water restricting showerheads and faucets shall be used, as well as water-saving toilets utilizing less than three gallons per flush.
This finding does not apply.
30. In all projects in Industrial (I) Zones, all buildings and structures shall be so designed and oriented to make use of natural lighting wherever possible.
This finding does not apply.
Submitted by:
Michael S. Ferry, AICP
Senior Planner
Approved by:
Ryan Bayne
Senior Planner
Attachments:
1. October 26, 2021 City Council Agenda report
2. Ordinance oversized vehicles - clean
31.97 1.16
AGENDA REPORT
ZA Meeting of January 5, 2022
SUBJECT: Regulation of oversize vehicles and safe parking program– Application No.
CP21-0174
3. Ordinance oversized vehicles – track changes
4. Snapshot of volunteer vehicle abatement data 9-2020 to 6-2021
5. West Cliff pilot parking analysis, 2018 & 2019
6. Public Safety Task Force recommendations
7. Santa Cruz Community Advisory Committee on Homelessness final report, August 2020
31.98 1.17
EXHIBIT “A”
CONDITIONS OF APPROVAL FOR APPLICATION NO. CP21-0174
Coastal and Design Permits to authorize the development associated with amended municipal code pertaining to the parking of oversized vehicles (e.g., parking signage, time of use restrictions, etc.) and to implement City-wide safe parking programs for unhoused City residents living in oversized vehicles licensed and registered in the City of Santa Cruz.
1. If one or more of the following conditions related to the safe parking program is not met with respect to all its terms, then the approval of a safe parking program at a specified location may be revoked.
2. If, upon exercise of this permit, any developed safe parking site within the coastal zone is at any time determined by the Zoning Administrator to be incompatible with the surrounding neighborhood, revocation of, or amendment to, this permit by the Planning Commission could occur. Outside of the coastal zone the Design Permit can be revoked.
3. The use shall meet the standards and shall be developed within limits established by Chapter
24.14 of the Santa Cruz Municipal Code as to the emission of noise, odor, smoke, dust, vibration, wastes, fumes or any public nuisance arising or occurring incidental to its establishment or operation.
4. The Safe Parking Program. As part of its consideration of the proposed development, a safe parking framework is proposed. Site locations would include information and options for sanitation and black water dumping. General parameters for the safe parking sites include:
Off street locations (i.e. public/private parking lots). New signage shall be small-scale and designed to be incorporated into other signage in existing parking facilities. Existing sign post shall be used when possible.
Hours generally shall be from 8:00 PM – 8:00 AM time frame. o Within the Coastal Zone, hours of operation shall be within this time frame, except that occasional, minor deviations from the 8:00 PM to 8:00 AM hours within the Coastal Zone may be allowed to facilitate provision of services to the program participants, so long as the additional hours are of a frequency, duration, and/or location such that they do not adversely interfere with coastal access.
o Outside the Coastal Zone, facilities (for example, Tier 3 facilities where enhanced services are provided) may be operated with extended hours, including on a 24/7 basis, so long as plans adequately address required parking for other uses. Sanitation will be provided at all locations (i.e., porta-potties, hand washing stations, and garbage cans). Black water dumping facilities may be provided at some locations. All facilities shall, whenever possible, be located where no impacts to public parking occur.
When that is not possible, all facilities shall be located or operated in a manner so as to minimize parking impacts to the greatest extent feasible. Locations of porta-potties, hand washing stations, and trash receptacles, as well as the locations of overnight parking on the site, will also take into account the adjacent uses, visibility, maintenance of views, and accessibility.
Safe Parking sites will not be sited in mapped “high impact parking areas” within the Coastal Zone.
There will be no cost to participants in the Safe Parking Program.
5. At the end of the first year of operation, City staff will prepare a report that outlines the program operations in the Coastal Zone, its usage, the number of parking stalls affected, and complaints
31.99 1.18
AGENDA REPORT
ZA Meeting of December 15, 2021
SUBJECT: Regulation of oversize vehicles and safe parking program– Application No.
CP21-0174
received regarding the program. If it is determined that any of the standards applicable in the Coastal Zone and identified in conditions above have not been met or if it is determined that a use has impacted availability of public parking spaces such that public parking is not otherwise available in the location where the safe parking program is being operated, then the City shall propose modifications to operations so as to remedy those situations. A copy of the report shall be submitted to the Executive Director of the Coastal Commission for review and approval. If the Executive Director determines that the safe parking program is negatively impacting public access, then the program shall be modified to eliminate such impacts, or mitigate them to the maximum extent feasible as directed by the Executive Director, including but not limited to elimination of the safe parking program location(s) in the Coastal Zone.
31.100 1.19
From: Allison Webster
To: Samantha Haschert
Subject: ZA comments online/ cityplan email
Date: Wednesday, December 15, 2021 9:07:44 AM
Good morning Chief,
We did not received any correspondence from the online survey nor through cityplan email for todays, 12/15 ZA meeting.
See you soon.
-A
Allison Webster | Administrative Assistant II
Planning & Community Development
(831) 420-5102 | Let Us Know How We are Doing
31.101 1.20
City Council
AGENDA REPORT
DATE: 10/15/2021
AGENDA OF: 10/26/2021
DEPARTMENT: City Council, City Manager, Police, City Attorney, Public Works SUBJECT: An Ordinance of the City Council of the City of Santa Cruz Amending Title 10 “Vehicles and Traffic” at Chapter 10.04 “Definitions” and Chapter
10.40 “Stopping, Standing and Parking” and Chapter 10.41 “City-Wide Parking Permit” Pertaining to the Parking of Oversized Vehicles and Chapter 16.19 “Storm Water and Urban Runoff Pollution Control” at Section 16.19.070 “Discharge of Sewage Prohibited” (CN/CM/PD/CA) RECOMMENDATION:
1) Introduce for publication an ordinance amending Title 10 “Vehicles and Traffic” at Chapter 10.04 “Definitions” and Chapter 10.40 “Stopping, Standing and Parking” and Chapter 10.41 “City-Wide Parking Permit” pertaining to the parking of oversized vehicles and Chapter 16.19 “Storm Water and Urban Runoff Pollution Control” at Section 16.19.070 “Discharge of Sewage Prohibited.”
2) Motion to direct staff to implement City-operated and expand sponsored safe parking programs for unhoused City residents living in oversized vehicles licensed and registered in the City of Santa Cruz, and return to Council with draft-ready contracts and associated costs within four months of the passing of the above listed ordinance. Safe parking programs would include a three-tiered approach that consists of the following:
a) Emergency overnight safe parking on City-owned parcels for a minimum of three vehicles to be implemented immediately.
b) Safe overnight parking on City-owned parcels or other non-residential approved spaces for a minimum of thirty vehicles throughout the City to be implemented within four months of the passing of the above listed ordinance. c) A robust safe parking program in partnership with service providers, health providers, and County partners. The following subpopulations will be prioritized:
Families with children; seniors; transition age youth; veterans; and those with a valid disabled placard or license plate issued pursuant to the California Vehicle Code.
BACKGROUND: The City of Santa Cruz is experiencing an increasing number of oversized vehicles parking for long periods of time on city streets, impacting public safety, health, and the environment for those who are housed and unhoused. The City must balance the preservation of
31.102 1.21
health and safety with helping our most vulnerable. The purpose of this agenda item is to provide tools to improve the health and safety in our community for both people living in their vehicles as well as for housed individuals experiencing the impacts of unsheltered homelessness.
Local Context. The increase in the number of oversized vehicles parking in the City of Santa Cruz, and the subsequent impacts, may be quantified in multiple ways. In July 2021, local residents conducted a two-week oversized vehicle count of the most heavily impacted streets on the lower Westside (Delaware, Shaffer, Natural Bridges, McPherson, Ingalls, Fair, Mission St., and Garfield Park), as well as some other areas of the city (Harvey West etc.). An average of 65 oversized vehicles were found to be parked on city streets in those areas. This number ebbs and flows based on a variety of factors.
Community residents contact the city regularly with requests to address the presence of and/or impacts from extended oversized vehicle parking. These requests come via Santa Cruz Police Dispatch, Public Works Parking Division, and through emails, phone calls, and verbal communications directly to staff and council.
The types of issues raised through these calls for service include: the illegal dumping of trash, debris and human waste onto City streets, sidewalks, and waterways; fires associated with oversized vehicles; lack of access to neighborhood and coastal parking; and increased criminal activities in areas where oversized vehicles are parked, including theft of bicycles and other property, private water connections being used, and gasoline thefts.
Local data demonstrates the extent of the challenges. In the first eight months of 2021 (at the time data collection was completed), there have been at least 15 emergency calls for service to 911 that have been related to oversized vehicles, with seven of those calls related to fire and/or gas leakage. In calendar year 2020 and in the first eight months of 2021, the Santa Cruz Fire Department reported 38 fire incidents that are vehicle related, three that were specifically related to oversized vehicles. Also, in the first eight months of 2021, there were 12 oversized vehicle related service calls and 14 public right of way calls to the Wastewater Collection Division.
Additionally, vehicle abatement activities have continued over the years. According to the Vehicle Abatement Officer, in the calendar year 2020, 2,243 abatement notices were issued, 197 vehicles were towed, including 20 which were oversized vehicles or camper vans. Attachment 3 provides additional vehicle abatement information including recent heat map data and graphs of frequency and locations of vehicle abatement activities. As the graph demonstrates, various parts of the city are disproportionately impacted. The five streets with the most vehicle abatement activity (Delaware, Natural Bridges, Shaffer, Mission, and Almar) were all on the West Side, and approximately one third of the abatements citywide are focused on the far West Side. The Vehicle Abatement Officer counted 15 out of state license plates on oversized vehicles that he was able to assess in one morning in certain areas of the West Side. A pilot parking study was conducted using the city’s Smart City Sensor located at the Cowell overview parking lot, and showed that fewer than 6% of vehicles were blocking access for almost 30% of all parking spaces (see Attachment 4), with some of those vehicles being oversized vehicles. The City Manager’s Office has spent approximately $10,000 so far this calendar year in refuse services solely on the far Westside to mitigate the illegal dumping from oversized vehicle/car dwellers.
This does not include staff time from the City Manager’s office or Public Works in coordinating these efforts.
31.103 1.22
One of the issues that is most often raised with regard to extended oversized vehicle parking is the discharge of raw sewage onto City streets and into storm drains. Runoff from the City’s storm drain system is periodically tested as part of regional testing efforts, but not at a scale that would be able to quantify the environmental impacts under discussion. Any verified discharge of human waste into the storm sewer system is considered a violation of the City’s Municipal Code (Section 16.19.090); if left unaddressed, the City is at risk of violating its National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) Municipal Regional Permit, which could lead to enforcement actions by the Regional Water Quality Control Board.
The challenges described above have been on-going. In 2013, the Public Safety Citizens Task Force came together to address the negative impacts (as described above) created by oversized vehicles on city streets. In late 2013, the Task Force recommended that the City review and implement strict parking ordinances related to oversized vehicles parking on City streets and called for additional enforcement of existing parking restrictions (see Attachment 5). On November 24, 2015 City Council approved the first reading and on December 8, 2015, it finally adopted Ordinance No. 2015-17 adding Section 10.04.085, 10.04.104, 10.04.106, 10.04.165,
10.40.120 and amending Section 10.41.060 of the Municipal Code Relating to the Parking of Oversized Vehicles. After consultation with Coastal Commission staff, City staff processed a Coastal Development Permit (CDP) for implementation of the Ordinance in the Coastal Zone.
On June 1, 2016 the City of Santa Cruz Zoning Administrator approved a CDP to prohibit overnight oversized vehicle parking on City streets within the coastal zone from midnight to 5 a.m., which was appealed to the Coastal Commission. On August 10, 2016, the Coastal Commission found “substantial issue” with respect to the Ordinance’s consistency with Coastal Act policies. The appeal is currently pending. Since the 2016 Coastal Commission decision, other cities and counties in the coastal zone have passed similar ordinances.
Outreach, Council Direction and Efforts Underway.
This report responds to city council direction at the June 22, 2021 hearing to:
Direct staff to begin evaluating the City’s existing RV ordinance (2015-2017) for amendments to align with the existing Camping Services and Standards ordinance including programming such as designated safe parking programs, in partnership with faith community/community partners; as well as time, place, and manner of use of RVs for daytime and nighttime camping, and return to Council to provide input on community engagement approach, with an update in October on ordinance amendment approach, and with an update on California Coastal Commission process for approvals in the coastal zone.
The community input regarding the challenges and impacts of oversized vehicle parking have been substantial since the 2016 Coastal Commission appeal. In February 2019, after a prior city council member's proposal to permit overnight oversized vehicle camping on Delaware Avenue on the lower Westside, over 400 letters in opposition were sent to the city council. Community input concerns cited included environmental impacts, neighborhood safety, increased crime, garbage, human excrement, fire danger, drug dealing, and other illegal and nuisance behaviors.
One recent example in which the community provided input regarding impacts from illegally parked oversized vehicles was on a one block section of Olive Street, a residential street off Mission Street. Many community members contacted council to request that oversized vehicles not be permitted to park in this area due to public health and safety impacts and ultimately their request was honored by council. A petition with over 1000 signatures, urging city staff and
31.104 1.23
council to address the public health and safety impacts of oversized vehicle parking was created on Change.org and sent to city staff and council.
Information was gathered on similar ordinances in other cities and counties throughout California, including coastal areas, in order to explore existing practices and options the City of Santa Cruz may have in addressing the ongoing oversized vehicle parking challenges in our City.
Commonalities in impacts of oversized vehicles in like communities were reviewed. The draft ordinance is similar to ordinances passed in other coastal cities, such as Santa Monica.
Within City limits, the Association of Faith Communities (AFC) manages as many as 22 safe parking spaces, including approximately 20 on religious assembly sites and two on city-owned property. AFC also has up to an additional 21 spaces outside the city limits. The city also allows businesses to host safe parking spaces; however, since no permits are required to allow such parking, it is unknown whether or how many such spaces are being provided by businesses. This is a significant increase in overnight safe parking availability compared to what was present and available in the city when this ordinance was first introduced to the city council in 2015.
On September 21, 2021, three Councilmembers brought forth a draft ordinance concept as an introduction to the topic of managing oversized vehicles on city streets. The purpose of this introduction was for other Councilmembers and the community to have the opportunity to provide direct feedback about the ordinance language as well as the safe parking framework. The PowerPoint presentation provided as part of the September 21 hearing is attached to this report for reference.
The Mayor subsequently appointed Vice Mayor Brunner, Councilmembers Golder and Kalantari-Johnson to an ad hoc committee to continue to work with staff and the community in development of recommendations to the Council for the ordinance and safe parking framework.
The ad-hoc committee engaged community members, public health/homeless service providers, members of the Association of Faith Communities, county staff and Board of Supervisor members to receive direct feedback and engage in thought partnership to explore opportunities.
This community engagement took the form of emails, phone calls, one on one and group meetings. The ad hoc committee also gathered research on existing efforts in similar communities, both with ordinance approach and safe parking program approach. City staff also gathered research and met with county staff to promote alignment and explore collaboration and partnership.
DISCUSSION:
The purpose of this ordinance amendment and policy direction is to:
1) Provide parameters on time, place, and manner of parking of oversized vehicles on city streets in order to address environmental and public health impacts.
2) Implement a three-tiered safe parking framework to support individuals living in their vehicles. This three-tiered approach would include the following:
a) Emergency overnight safe parking on city owned parcels for a minimum of three vehicles, to be implemented immediately.
b) Safe overnight parking on city owned parcels or other non-residential approved spaces for a minimum of thirty vehicles throughout the city.
31.105 1.24
c) A robust safe parking program in partnership with service providers, health providers and county partners. The following subpopulations will be prioritized:
Families with children; seniors, transition age youth; veterans; and those with a valid disabled placard or license plate issued pursuant to the California Vehicle Code.
The proposed ordinance amendments build on existing Santa Cruz Municipal Code provisions that address oversized vehicles’ environmental and public health impacts while providing policy direction to expand safe parking programming.
A summary of the amendments are provided below.
Overnight Parking Permit. The following provisions would apply to Overnight Parking Permits:
● Available to a “resident” or “out-of-town visitor,” as defined in Section 10.04.165 and
10.04.104, respectively.
○ Residents
■ Valid for one year, allowing parking of an oversized vehicle for four periods of up to 72 consecutive hours per calendar month. ■ Parking location: Street curb immediately adjacent to the residence, or within four hundred feet of that person’s residence if adjacent parking is not possible.
○ Out-of-town visitors
■ Valid for a maximum of 72 hours in the location identified above for residents.
■ No more than six out-of-town visitor permits per residential address per calendar year.
● Fee
○ A future Council resolution would establish the permit fee(s). ● Denial of Permits
○ The city may deny the issuance of an oversized vehicle overnight parking permit for up to one year if the city manager or his/her designee finds that: the applicant is not a resident; the resident or out-of-town visitor guests have been issued four or more citations for violations in the prior twelve months; the out-of town visitor is not a guest of the resident applicant; or an owner of an oversized vehicle has procured any oversized vehicle parking permit through fraud or misrepresentation.
City Operated or Sponsored Safe Parking Programs.
● In addition to the private property allowances authorized through Chapter 6.36.030 without the need for any permits from the City, the City may operate, sponsor, or authorize safe parking programs for oversized vehicles on any City owned or leased properties or on city sanctioned private properties. The City Manager shall develop a policy that establishes operational criteria for such safe parking programs.
31.106 1.25
Safe Parking Program.
As part of its consideration of the proposed ordinance, a safe parking framework is proposed.
Site locations would include information and options for sanitation and black water dumping.
The safe parking framework will take a three-tiered approach. 1) Emergency Safe Parking spaces - A minimum of three emergency safe parking spaces will be provided effective immediately. These emergency spaces will be available for up to 72 hours and are intended to support individuals who require time and support with vehicle registration and repairs.
2) Safe Overnight Parking - The City Manager’s office, and the City Homelessness Response teams will identify and make available safe parking spaces on city owned land and/or other non-residential approved spaces for a minimum of thirty oversized vehicles.
The city will either partner with outside providers or directly provide overnight monitoring. Individuals in these parking spaces will be connected and linked to other transitional sheltering options that are available throughout the county. 3) Safe Parking Program - The City Manager’s office, Public Works and Homelessness Response teams will continue to work closely with County partners including the Human Services and Health departments, and service providers to either expand the existing, non-profit-run program or establish a new safe parking program. This program will include case management support to assist individuals in directly engaging in pathways to housing. Families with children, seniors, transition aged youth, veterans, and individuals with disabilities will be prioritized. The Safe Parking program will return to Council within four months of the passing of this ordinance with a draft ready contract for services that includes costs.
As part of this approach, the city will implement a permit process that will allow individual vehicles to temporarily park on City streets overnight if, among other requirements, these individuals: (1) have applied to a safe parking or shelter program, (2) are unable to participate in a safe parking or shelter program due to lack of capacity, (3) the location of their vehicle will not cause public health, safety, welfare concerns, or nuisance conditions. These individuals will still be subject to citations or other appropriate law enforcement activity if they engage in otherwise illegal and/or nuisance behaviors (e.g., illegal dumping).
The Santa Cruz Community Advisory Committee on Homelessness (CACH) recommended that the Council adopt “municipal code amendments to increase safe parking capacity at faith-based parking lots” in their August 11, 2020 final report to the Council. The Council has already made such amendments through the Camping Services and Standards Ordinance. While not explicitly called out as one of the final CACH recommendations, the recommendation in this report to further expand the number of safe sleeping locations available within the City and County, including through a City-sponsored program, is consistent with the CACH’s desire to expand safe parking capacity on faith-based parking lots (Attachment 6).
Additional Supports
Members of the community are committed to the success of these efforts in both mitigating negative impacts on surrounding neighborhoods where oversized vehicles are parked as well as supporting individuals who reside long-term in oversized vehicles. After analyzing the best practices in other communities, members of the community suggested some ideas to bring forward that they would initiate. These include:
31.107 1.26
● A voucher Program for Oversized Vehicle Wastewater Dumping. Developing and funding a voucher program for Santa Cruz city residents residing in oversized vehicles, with a partial or full subsidy of the $15 dump fee at the nearest dumping station.
Community members interested in initiating this would coordinate with local nonprofit service providers to distribute and track the vouchers. ● A limited number of financial support subsidies for individuals who are Santa Cruz city residents needing support towards vehicle repair and registration. These funds would be established through partnerships with neighborhood groups.
Consistency with Prior Council Direction.
● Public Safety Task Force Recommendations of 2013 (Attachment 5) ● Adoption of Ordinance No. 2015-17 adding Section 10.04.085, 10.04.104, 10.04.106,
10.04.165, 10.40.120 and amending Section 10.41.060 of the Municipal Code Relating to the Parking of Oversized Vehicles, December 2015
● CACH Final Report and Recommendations, August 2020 (Attachment 6) ● Current council direction provided on June 22, 2021
Health in All Policies.
Health. The health and well-being of all Santa Cruz residents and the environment are of utmost importance. The public health impacts of extended oversized vehicle parking include: dumping of trash, debris, and human waste onto City streets, sidewalks, and waterways, fires and criminal activities such as bicycle and other personal property theft, private water connections being used, and gasoline thefts.
Equity. We acknowledge that the parameters set forth and permitting requirements in this ordinance may be challenging for some community members with oversized vehicles. Therefore appointed council ad-hoc committee will continue to work with city staff and community partners to further develop and ensure implementation of the above described safe parking framework and report to the Council with additional recommended actions.
Sustainability. Environmental sustainability is a core value of the City of Santa Cruz and informs all City operations. Prohibiting the use of public right-of-way for oversized vehicle parking throughout the City of Santa Cruz would accomplish reduction of the likelihood of human waste entering the storm drain system or contaminating the nearby environment.
Environmental Review.
The California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) provides several “categorical exemptions” which are applicable to categories of projects and activities that the Natural Resource Agency has determined generally do not pose a risk of significant impacts on the environment. Section 15307 of the CEQA Guidelines “consists of actions taken by regulatory agencies... to assure the maintenance, restoration, or enhancement of a natural resource where the regulatory process involves procedures for protection of the environment.” Section 15308 of the CEQA Guidelines “consists of actions taken by regulatory agencies… to assure the maintenance, restoration, enhancement, or protection of the environment where the regulatory process involves procedures for the protection of the environment.” The proposed ordinance is not anticipated to result in any new construction, including but not limited to any construction of new facilities for public
31.108 1.27
services such as police, parks, or fire. Many individuals already park oversized vehicles in the City, and the ordinance is not anticipated to result in any additional impacts associated with parking of oversized vehicles. By providing safe parking locations where sanitation facilities would be present and by prohibiting overnight parking elsewhere, the proposed ordinance is expected to result in significantly fewer instances of overnight parking on City streets where sanitation facilities, including restrooms and trash services, are unavailable. That change, in and of itself, will create beneficial impacts to the environment through an increase in the proper disposal of waste compared to existing conditions and allowances, where the City has no designated safe parking locations. Further, the City’s experience has been that the most significant environmental degradation associated with oversized vehicle overnight parking occurs in places where groups of oversized vehicles congregate and become entrenched in an area and remain in that area for an extended period of time. As such, the ordinance will reduce environmental impacts when comparing its outcomes to the status quo. As the majority of environmental impacts resulting from the ordinance will be beneficial rather than detrimental and with the other potential environmental effects being de minimis, the project is also exempt under Code of Regulations Section 15061(b), the “common sense exemption,” since it can be seen with certainty that no significant effect on the environment will occur. Therefore, the adoption of this ordinance is exempt from CEQA.
Summary.
The approaches proposed by the Ad Hoc Committee and City staff includes the amendment of existing codes to prohibit oversized vehicles parking in the City of Santa Cruz for extended periods of time; and an oversized vehicles Permitting system that limits the total amount of time any oversized vehicles or registered owner of an oversized vehicle parks their vehicle on the City’s right-of-way, streets, and off-street parking lots.
Additionally, the Ad Hoc Committee proposes a three tiered safe parking approach for individuals who reside in their vehicles, from emergency parking to limited low barriers parking to a robust safe parking program that would provide service support and opportunities for pathways to permanent housing.
FISCAL IMPACT: The exact fiscal impacts of the ordinance and the policy direction contained in these recommendations is unknown at this time. However, each of the three proposed tiers will incur different costs for permit administration, sanitation services, monitoring, and (for tier three) case management services. Cost sharing with the County Health and Human Services departments, and with local non-governmental organizations is desirable and would be sought but is not guaranteed. City staff will need to dedicate time towards the issuance of oversized vehicle parking permits. Costs for said permits, along with the extent of cost recovery, are yet to be determined. The ultimate costs for the safe parking program will vary depending on the number of locations, number of vehicles, and hours of operation, each of which will affect the number of staff necessary to provide oversight and services to the program and participants. Initial research looking at other jurisdictions suggests an annual cost of between $300,000 - $500,000 for operating a robust safe parking program. In conversations with a local nonprofit service provider, it was estimated that it would cost approximately $328,000 to operate a safe parking program for 30 vehicles. This estimate includes some initial infrastructure to establish the program and a staffing plan that includes case managers and counselors consistent with a tier 3 approach. Additional infrastructure costs, such as ongoing costs of hygiene units (port-o-potties and hand washing stations), would be in addition to these costs.
The number of hygiene units necessary would depend on how many locations are provided, but
31.109 1.28
would run in the tens of thousands of dollars range annually. While some estimates are provided herein, more detailed cost estimates for the safe parking sites can be explored as part of the recommended policy direction. For example, the costs for the tier 2 program would be over $100,000 per year in monitoring and hygiene services alone, though specific proposals or estimates have not been sought at this point. Additionally, increased costs for towing and associated enforcement activities would likely be incurred by the City’s Police and parking teams.
Prepared By:
Sonja Brunner
Vice Mayor
Renee Golder
Councilmember
Shebreh Kalantari-Johnson
Councilmember
Submitted By:
Sonja Brunner
Vice Mayor
Renee Golder
Councilmember
Shebreh Kalantari-Johnson
Councilmember
Approved By:
Rosemary Menard
Interim City Manager
ATTACHMENTS:
1. DRAFT ORDINANCE OVERSIZED VEHICLES - CLEAN.DOCX
2. DRAFT ORDINANCE OVERSIZED VEHICLES - TRACK CHANGES.PDF
3. SNAPSHOT OF VOLUNTEER VEHICLE ABATEMENT DATA 9-2020-6-2021.PDF
4. WEST CLIFF PILOT PARKING ANALYTICS, 2018 & 2019.PDF
5. 2103 PUBLIC SAFETY TASK FORCE RECOMMENDATIONS.PDF
6. SANTA CRUZ COMMUNITY ADVISORY COMMITTEE ON HOMELESSNESS (CACH) FINAL REPORT AND RECOMMENDATIONS, AUGUST 2020.PDF
7. SEPTEMBER 21, 2021 POWERPOINT PRESENTATION TO COUNCIL ON THE OVERSIZED VEHICLE ORDINANCE.PDF
31.110 1.29
Oversized Vehicle
Ordinance
LEE BUTLER, DEPUTY CITY MANAGER
OCTOBER 26, 2021 CITY COUNCIL
31.111 1.30
History
2015 - Council adoption
2016 - Coastal Commission hearing
Sept. 2021- Council discussion
Subcommittee
31.112 1.31
Oversized Vehicle
>20’ long or
>8’ tall and >7’ wide
31.113 1.32
Prohibitions
OSV parking midnight to 5:00 a.m.
Electric/gas/other utility connections
Open fires
Unsafe, untidy, unsanitary conditions
Unattached trailers
OSV parking within 100’ of intersection
31.114 1.33
Allowances / Permits
Participants in a safe parking / other
City-sanctioned program
Public/commercial vehicles
Permits
Commercial vehicles
Hotels
Residents/visitors
31.115 1.34
Resident / Visitor Permits
Resident
Valid for 1 year
4 periods of 72 hours per month
Out-of-Town Visitors
72 hours
6 per address per year
31.116 1.35
Safe Parking Programs
Tiers
1. Emergency
2. Basic
3. Robust
City Manager operational criteria
31.117 1.36
Violations
Parking violations = parking ticket
Unpermitted utility connections = infraction
Misdemeanors apply to:
Fires
Unsafe, untidy, unsanitary conditions
31.118 1.37
ORDINANCE NO. 2021-
AN ORDINANCE OF THE CITY COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF SANTA CRUZ AMENDING TITLE 10 “VEHICLES AND TRAFFIC” AT CHAPTERS 10.04 “DEFINITIONS,” 10.40 “STOPPING, STANDING AND PARKING,” 10.41 “CITY-WIDE PARKING PERMIT,”
PERTAINING TO THE PARKING OF OVERSIZED VEHICLES AND AMENDING CHAPTER 16.19 “STORM WATER AND URBAN RUNOFF POLLUTION CONTROL” AT SECTION 16.19.070 “DISCHARGE OF SEWAGE PROHIBITED”
WHEREAS, over the last decade, the community has worked on addressing the public health, public safety and environmental impacts of oversized vehicles parked on city streets, and these impacts affect both individuals who are housed and those who are unhoused; and WHEREAS, our City is committed to the well-being of all and therefore is establishing a set of parameters to facilitate time and manner of oversized vehicle parking on city roads as well as alternative safe parking sites; and
WHEREAS, Chapter 6.36 of the Municipal Code allows for religious assembly uses to host six or fewer oversized vehicles and for businesses to host three or fewer oversized vehicles on a site, and pursuant to such regulations, safe overnight parking locations currently exist within the City to serve individuals experiencing homelessness who reside in their vehicles; and WHEREAS, the City is now committing itself to further expand programs that provide parking and/or shelter options available to those living in oversized vehicles without the economic means to find non-vehicle shelter or safe legal parking locations; and NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT ORDAINED by the City Council of the City of Santa Cruz as follows:
Section 1. Chapter 10.04 “Definitions” is hereby amended by adding Sections 10.04.065 “Current Address,” 0.04.085 “Loading and unloading,” 10.04.104 “Out-of-town visitor,”
10.04.106 “Oversized vehicle” and 10.04.165 “Resident,” as follows:
A. “10.04.065 CURRENT ADDRESS. “Current Address” shall mean the street name and postal address number, along with the city, state, and zip code, of the primary physical residence where an individual resides. If the individual has more than one address, it shall be the location where they are registered to vote. If they are not registered to vote, it shall be the location where they spend the most time during the year.
B. “10.04.085 LOADING AND UNLOADING. “Loading and unloading” shall mean actively moving items to or from an oversized vehicle including the activities required to prepare the vehicle for travel or storage.”
C. “10.04.104 OUT-OF-TOWN VISITOR. “Out-of-town visitor” shall mean any person who does not reside in the City of Santa Cruz, who is temporarily visiting as a guest of a resident of the city, and who has applied for and obtained an oversized vehicle overnight
31.119 1.38
ORDINANCE NO. 2021-
2 parking permit.”
D. “10.04.106 OVERSIZED VEHICLE. “Oversized vehicle” shall mean any motorized vehicle (as defined of Section 670 of the Vehicle Code) or combination of motorized vehicles and/or non-motorized vehicles or trailers that: (1) meets or exceeds twenty feet in length at any time, or (2) both of the two following criteria, exclusive of fixtures, accessories, or property: eight feet in height and seven feet in width. (a) To determine the height, width or length of the vehicles defined in this section, any extension to the vehicle caused by mirrors, air conditioners, or similar attachments as allowed by Section 35109, 35110 or 35111 of the Vehicle Code as may be amended shall not be included.
(b) Oversized vehicle does not include pickup trucks, vans, or sport utility vehicles that are less than twenty feet in length and eight feet in height.” E. “10.04.165 RESIDENT “Resident” shall mean a person who customarily resides and maintains a place of abode with a street address number in the City of Santa Cruz or who owns land within the City of Santa Cruz with a street address number. It shall not mean a person who maintains an address at a post office box, mailbox drop, or who rents a room without it being the primary place of abode.”
Section 2. Chapter 10.40 “Stopping, standing and parking” is hereby amended by adding Section 10.40.120 “Parking of Oversized Vehicles,” to read as follows:
“10.40.120 PARKING OF OVERSIZED VEHICLES.
(a) No person shall stop, stand, park, or leave standing any oversized vehicle on any public highway, street, alley, or city parking lot at any time between the hours of midnight and 5:00 a.m. unless explicitly permitted by Section 10.40.120(g). (b) No person shall permit, cause, or allow any electrical, water, gas, telephone, or other utility connection (such as electrical cords, extension cords, hoses, cables, or other items) to encroach into any public right-of-way including across or above any street or sidewalk from a residential or commercial property to an oversized vehicle or trailer parked on a public highway, street, or city parking lot.
(c) No person shall establish or maintain an open fire on any public highway, street, alley or city parking lot, (such as camp fires, bonfires, BBQs, recreational fires, burning of garbage, or portable outdoor fireplaces) without a permit from the City. In addition, it shall be unlawful to intentionally or negligently set fire to or cause the burning of combustible material on any public highway, street, alley or city parking lot in such a manner as to endanger the safety of persons or property. A violation of this subsection is a misdemeanor. (d) No person, who owns or maintains an oversized vehicle, shall permit the area
31.120 1.39
ORDINANCE NO. 2021-
3 surrounding the oversized vehicle to be maintained in an unsafe, untidy, and/or unsanitary/unhygienic fashion. Surrounding areas must be kept free from litter, debris, waste, discarded food products, discarded hypodermic needles, discarded property, improperly disposed gray or black water, unleashed animals, and garbage. A violation of this subdivision shall be a misdemeanor, and may subject the vehicle to towing pursuant to Vehicle Code section 22651(h)(1)
(e) Unattached trailers are prohibited from being parked on any city street or alley at any time, unless in the process of actively being loaded or unloaded. (f) Oversized vehicles shall not be parked at any place within 100 feet of a crosswalk, intersection, boulevard, stop sign, official electric flashing device or approach to any traffic signal.
(g) The prohibitions contained in Subsection (a) shall not apply to any of the following:
(1) Oversized vehicles owned by a resident or out-of-town visitor displaying a permit for overnight parking issued by the city manager or their designee in accordance with this article. The issuance of a permit shall not allow any other activity otherwise prohibited by law.
(2) Oversized vehicles displaying a permit issued by the city manager to a hotel as defined in Sections 24.22.450 and 24.22.550, respectively, for the exclusive use of its registered guests.
(3) Oversized vehicles involved in an emergency or being repaired under emergency conditions. Emergency parking may be allowed for twenty-four consecutive hours where an oversized vehicle is left standing at the roadside because of mechanical breakdown or because of the driver’s physical incapacity to proceed.
(4) Oversized vehicles belonging to federal, state, or local authorities or public utilities that are temporarily parked while the operator of the oversized vehicle is conducting official business.
(5) Oversized commercial vehicles actively engaged in the loading and unloading and deliveries of person, merchandise, wares, supplies, goods, or other materials in the course of construction or other work from or to any adjacent building or structure.
(6) Parking of any oversized vehicle during the pendency of a non-pandemic related state of emergency declared to exist within the City of Santa Cruz by the city council, city manager or governor.
(7) A person and oversized vehicle that are, collectively, registered and participating in a safe parking program or other safe sleeping or transitional shelter
31.121 1.40
ORDINANCE NO. 2021-
4 program operated or sanctioned by the City, but do not have access to a safe parking space or other shelter options under such programs due to a lack of capacity. (8) Any oversized commercial vehicle that has been issued and is displaying a contractor's oversized vehicle parking permit.
(h) Any resident may obtain an oversized vehicle overnight parking permit to park an oversized vehicle registered to them adjacent to their residence. Any resident may obtain an oversized vehicle overnight parking permit to park an oversized vehicle belonging to an out-of-town visitor. The city manager or their designee may issue a permit for overnight parking of an oversized vehicle to any resident or out-of-town guest of a resident subject to the following provisions:
(1) The oversized vehicle shall be owned, leased, rented by, or registered to, a resident or out-of-town visitor.
(2) The oversized vehicle shall park at the street curb immediately adjacent to the address for which the oversized vehicle parking permit has been granted, or within four hundred feet of that address if the area immediately adjacent to the address is not available for parking due to curb configuration; due to the adjacent parking spaces being occupied by vehicles belonging to someone other than the owner, permittee, or a visitor of the owner or permittee; or due to the immediately adjacent parking resulting in a violation of Section 10.40.120(f) . (3) The oversized vehicle overnight parking permit shall be prominently displayed in the lower driver’s side of the windshield or the nearest window of the vehicle. The permit shall be clearly visible from the exterior of the oversized vehicle and shall not cover the Vehicle Identification Number. Attached trailers shall display the permit on the side of the trailer so that the permit is visible from the street.
(4) Any oversized vehicle present in conjunction with a short-term rental shall need a valid permit to park and shall park immediately adjacent to the short-term rental if that space complies with Section 10.40.120(f), or if the immediately adjacent space is unavailable, within 400 feet of the short-term rental. (5) The city manager or their designee may deny or revoke an oversized vehicle overnight parking permit if, upon a review of the location where the oversized vehicle will be parked, the city manager or their designee determines that it would create a traffic hazard or otherwise would adversely affect public safety, traffic flow, bike lanes, or access. Upon the filing of the application, the City may make such an investigation as necessary to determine whether such a permit should be issued. The application for a permit must contain:
a. Name, current address, phone number, and current valid driver's license number of the resident applicant.
31.122 1.41
ORDINANCE NO. 2021-
5 b. The vehicle license plate number, make, model and type of vehicle for which an overnight parking permit is requested.
c. The name and current address of the registered owner of the vehicle d. Proof of ownership and current registration of said vehicle e. The dates for which the permit is requested.
f. A statement that the applicant declares under penalty of perjury that all statements in the application are true; and
g. The signature of the applicant and date of application.
In addition, the application shall include:
a. Valid California Driver’s License for the vehicle’s owner b. Proof of current registration
c. Proof of current utility bill which matches the resident’s address indicated in the permit application
(6) Permits are not transferable. Individuals who are found to have sold or transferred their permit will lose future permit privileges. (i) Overnight Parking Permit Duration.
(1) Each resident oversized vehicle overnight parking permit shall be valid for one year. A resident oversized vehicle permit allows a resident to park an oversized vehicle for four periods of up to seventy-two consecutive hours per calendar month.
The oversized vehicle must be absent from the location authorized by Subsection (h) (2) for a minimum of twenty-four consecutive hours to be lawfully parked overnight at the location again.
(2) Each oversized vehicle overnight parking permit issued to an out-of-town visitor shall be valid for a maximum of seventy-two hours. (3) No more than six out-of-town visitor permits shall be issued in respect of any address in a calendar year. No more than one resident oversized vehicle overnight parking permit shall be issued in respect of any address at one time. (j) Parking Permit fee. The parking permit fee for oversized vehicles shall be established by city council resolution.
(k) Fraudulent Permit Penalty. Every person who displays a fraudulent, forged, altered
31.123 1.42
ORDINANCE NO. 2021-
6 or counterfeit oversized vehicle parking permit or permit number is guilty of an infraction for the first offense. Any subsequent offense committed within twelve months of a previous citation is a misdemeanor. Pursuant to Section 4.04.010(3), any misdemeanor offense be charged and prosecuted as an infraction or a misdemeanor. (l) Overnight Parking Permit Denial. The city shall deny the issuance of an oversized vehicle overnight parking permit for up to one year if the city manager or his/her designee finds that any of the following conditions exist:
(1) The applicant or the person the applicant is visiting is not a bona fide resident, as defined by section 10.04.165 above.
(2) The resident or out-of-town visitor guests of a resident have been issued five or more citations for violations in the twelve calendar months prior to application.
(3) The out-of-town visitor is not a guest of the resident applicant. (4) An owner of an oversized vehicle has procured any oversized vehicle parking permit through fraud or misrepresentation, for example, the information submitted by the applicant is materially false.
(5) The hotel or motel establishment is issuing oversized vehicle permits to non-paying guests of the commercial establishment and/or the guests are camping in the vehicle rather than residing in the commercial establishment. (m) City Operated or Sponsored Safe Parking Programs. In addition to the private property allowances authorized through Chapter 6.36.030, the City may operate, sponsor, or authorize safe parking programs for vehicles on any City owned or leased properties in the City, or any City-sanctioned private parking lots. The City Manager shall develop a policy that establishes operational criteria for safe parking programs. (n) A person may obtain a contractors oversized vehicle parking permit for a specific oversized commercial vehicle if he or she demonstrates in writing to the satisfaction of the Public Works Director or his or her designee, on an application form prepared by the Public Works Director and upon payment of a fee prescribed by resolution of the City Council, that they meet and agree to each the following conditions:
(1) The person owns or lawfully possesses an oversized commercial vehicle which is registered with the Department of Motor Vehicles as a commercial vehicle and displays identifiable California commercial license plates; (2) The person possesses a valid business license issued pursuant to Chapter
5.04 of the Santa Cruz Municipal Code and has paid all other applicable City taxes; (3) The oversized commercial vehicle is necessary for use in the business for
31.124 1.43
ORDINANCE NO. 2021-
7 which the city business license has been issued;
(4) The oversized commercial vehicle will at no time be parked unattended in any location that creates or exacerbates a dangerous traffic safety condition; and (5) The contractor's oversized commercial vehicle shall bear a clearly visible notice in the driver’s side window which includes contact information which would allow City safety or enforcement personnel to contact the vehicle operator. (o) A violation of any of the provisions of this chapter, except those provisions specifically identified as misdemeanors and/or provisions related to parking or standing vehicles, shall be punishable as an infraction. Violations of any of the provisions of this chapter related to parking or standing vehicles shall be subject to a $50.00 civil penalty (parking ticket), the enforcement of which shall be governed by the civil administrative procedures set forth in Division 17, Chapter 1, Article 3 (commencing with Section 40200) of the California Vehicle Code.
(p) The City Manager is authorized to promulgate and publish rules and regulations to interpret and implement this section.
Section 3. Chapter 10.41 “Citywide Permit Parking” is hereby amended at Section 10.41.060 “Authority to Issue Parking Permits” to read as follows:
“10.41.060 AUTHORITY TO ISSUE PARKING PERMITS.
The local authority shall be authorized to issue parking permits for the city’s permit parking programs, pursuant to the requirements of this Chapter, for vehicles that do not fall within the definition of “oversized vehicles” as defined by Section 10.40.106.” Section 4. Chapter 16.19 “Storm Water and Urban Runoff Pollution Control” is hereby amended at Section 16.19.070 “Discharge of Sewage Prohibited” to read as follows:
“16.19.070 DISCHARGE OF SEWAGE PROHIBITED.
No person shall cause the discharge of sewage or grey water to the storm drain system including, but not limited to, discharges of recreational vehicle holding tanks. In addition, if the director determines that a building drain or building sewer is not operating properly and causes the discharge of sewage to the street, sidewalk, or storm drain system, the director may declare this condition to constitute a public nuisance and proceed to abate that nuisance in accordance with Section 16.19.180.
Section 5. Severability. If any section, subdivision, paragraph, sentence, clause, or phrase of this ordinance is for any reason held to be unconstitutional or invalid, such a decision shall not
31.125 1.44
ORDINANCE NO. 2021-
8 affect the validity of the remaining portion of the ordinance. The City Council hereby declares that it would have passed each section, subsection, subdivision, paragraph, sentence, clause, or phrase of this ordinance irrespective of the unconstitutionality or invalidity of any section, subdivision, subsection, paragraph, sentence, clause, or phrase of this ordinance.
Section 6. Effective Date. This ordinance shall take effect and be in force thirty (30) days after final adoption.
PASSED FOR PUBLICATION this 26th day of October, 2021, by the following vote:
AYES:
NOES:
ABSENT:
DISQUALIFIED:
APPROVED: ______________________________
Donna Meyers, Mayor
ATTEST:__________________________________
Bonnie Bush, City Clerk Administrator
PASSED FOR FINAL ADOPTION this ____ day of _____, 2021, by the following vote:
AYES:
NOES:
ABSENT:
DISQUALIFIED:
APPROVED: ______________________________
Donna Meyers, Mayor
ATTEST:__________________________________
Bonnie Bush, City Clerk Administrator
This is to certify that the above and
foregoing document is the original
of Ordinance No. 2021-XX and
that it has been published or posted
in accordance with the Charter of
the City of Santa Cruz.
________________________________
Bonnie Bush, City Clerk Administrator
31.126 1.45
ORDINANCE NO. 2021-
AN ORDINANCE OF THE CITY COUNCIL OF THE CITY OF SANTA CRUZ AMENDING TITLE 10 “VEHICLES AND TRAFFIC” AT CHAPTERCHAPTERS 10.04 “DEFINITIONS” AND CHAPTER,” 10.40 “STOPPING, STANDING AND PARKING”,”
10.41 “CITY-WIDE PARKING PERMIT,” PERTAINING TO THE PARKING OF OVERSIZED VEHICLES. AND AMENDING CHAPTER 16.19 “STORM WATER AND URBAN RUNOFF POLLUTION CONTROL” AT SECTION 16.19.070 “DISCHARGE OF SEWAGE PROHIBITED”
WHEREAS, over the last decade, the community has worked on addressing the public health, public safety and environmental impacts of oversized vehicles parked on city streets, and these impacts affect both individuals who are housed and those who are unhoused; and WHEREAS, our City is committed to the well-being of all and therefore is establishing a set of parameters to facilitate time and manner of oversized vehicle parking on city roads as well as alternative safe parking sites; and
WHEREAS, Chapter 6.36 of the Municipal Code allows for religious assembly uses to host six or fewer oversized vehicles and for businesses to host three or fewer oversized vehicles on a site, and pursuant to such regulations, safe overnight parking locations currently exist within the City to serve individuals experiencing homelessness who reside in their vehicles; and WHEREAS, the City is now committing itself to further expand programs that provide parking and/or shelter options available to those living in oversized vehicles without the economic means to find non-vehicle shelter or safe legal parking locations; and NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT ORDAINED by the City Council of the City of Santa Cruz as follows:
Section 1. Chapter 10.04 “Definitions” is hereby amended by adding Sections 10.04.065 “Current Address,” 10.04.050085 “Loading and unloading,” 10.04.104 “Out-of-town visitor,”
10.04.106 “Oversized vehicle” and 10.04.165 “Resident,” as follows:
A. “10.04.065 CURRENT ADDRESS. “Current Address” shall mean the street name and postal address number, along with the city, state, and zip code, of the primary physical residence where an individual resides. If the individual has more than one address, it shall be the location where they are registered to vote. If they are not registered to vote, it shall be the location where they spend the most time during the year. “10.04.085 LOADING AND UNLOADING.
A.B. “Loading and unloading” shall mean actively moving items to or from an oversized vehicle including the activities required to prepare the vehicle for travel or storage.”
31.127 1.46
B.C. “10.04.104 OUT-OF-TOWN VISITOR. “Out-of-town visitor” shall mean any person who does not reside in the City of Santa Cruz, who is temporarily visiting as a guest of a resident of the city, and who has applied for and obtained an oversized vehicle overnight parking permit.”
C.D. “10.04.106 OVERSIZED VEHICLE. “Oversized vehicle” shall mean any motorized vehicle (as defined of Section 670 of the Vehicle Code) or combination of motorized vehicles and/or non-motorized vehicles or trailers that: (1) meets or exceeds twenty-two feet in length at any time, or (2) botha combination of the two following criteria, exclusive of fixtures, accessories, or property: seveneight feet in height and seven feet in width. (a) To determine the height, width or length of the vehicles defined in this section, any extension to the vehicle caused by mirrors, air conditioners, or similar attachments as allowed by Section 35109, 35110 or 35111 of the Vehicle Code as may be amended shall not be included.
(b) Oversized vehicle does not include pickup trucks, vans, or sport utility vehicles, which that are less than twenty-five feet in length and eight feet in height.” D.E. .“10.04.165 RESIDENT “Resident” shall mean a person who customarily resides and maintains a place of abode with a street address number in the City of Santa Cruz or who owns land within the City of Santa Cruz. with a street address number. It shall not mean a person who maintains an address at a post office box, mailbox drop, or who rents a room without it being the primary place of abode.”
Section 2. Chapter 10.40 “Stopping, standing and parking” is hereby amended by adding SectionsSection 10.40.120 “Parking of Oversized Vehicles,” and 10.40.125, to read as follows:
“10.40.120 PARKING OF OVERSIZED VEHICLES.
(a) No person shall stop, stand, park, or leave standing any oversized vehicle on any public highway, street, alley, or city parking lot at any time between the hours of 2:00 a.m.midnight and 5:00 a.m. unless otherwise authorizedexplicitly permitted by this article.Section 10.40.120(g).
(b) No person shall permit, cause, or allow any electrical, water, gas, telephone, or other utility connection (such as electrical cords, extension cords, hoses, cables, or other items) to encroach into any public right-of-way including across or above any street or sidewalk from a residential or commercial property to an oversized vehicle or trailer parked on a public highway, street, or city parking lot. (c) No person shall establish or maintain an open fire on any public highway, street, alley or city parking lot, (such as camp fires, bonfires, BBQs, recreational fires, burning of garbage, or portable outdoor fireplaces) without a permit from the City. In addition, it
31.128 1.47
shall be unlawful to intentionally or negligently set fire to or cause the burning of combustible material on any public highway, street, alley or city parking lot in such a manner as to endanger the safety of persons or property. A violation of this subsection is a misdemeanor.
(d) No person, who owns or maintains an oversized vehicle, shall permit the area surrounding the oversized vehicle to be maintained in an unsafe, untidy, and/or unsanitary/unhygienic fashion. Surrounding areas must be kept free from litter, debris, waste, discarded food products, discarded hypodermic needles, discarded property, improperly disposed gray or black water, unleashed animals, and garbage. A violation of this subdivision shall be a misdemeanor, and may subject the vehicle to towing pursuant to Vehicle Code section 22651(h)(1)
(e) Unattached trailers are prohibited from being parked on any city street or alley at any time, unless in the process of actively being loaded or unloaded. (f) Oversized vehicles shall not be parked at any place within 100 feet of a crosswalk, intersection, boulevard, stop sign, official electric flashing device or approach to any traffic signal.
(c)(g) The provisions ofprohibitions contained in Subsection (a) shall not apply to any of the following:
(1) Oversized vehicles owned by a resident or out-of-town visitor displaying a permit for overnight parking issued by the city manager or their his/her designee in accordance with this article. The issuance of a permit shall not allow any other activity otherwise prohibited by law.
(2) Oversized vehicles displaying a permit issued by the city manager to a hotel as defined in Sections 24.22.450 and 24.22.550, respectively, for the exclusive use of its registered guests.
(3) Oversized vehicles involved in an emergency or being repaired under emergency conditions. Emergency parking may be allowed for twenty-four consecutive hours where an oversized vehicle is left standing at the roadside because of mechanical breakdown or because of the driver’s physical incapacity to proceed.
(4) Oversized vehicles belonging to federal, state, or local authorities or public utilities that are temporarily parked while the operator of the oversized vehicle is conducting official business.
(5) Oversized commercial vehicles actively engaged in the loading and unloading and deliveries of person, merchandise, wares, supplies, goods, or other materials in the course of construction or other work from or to any adjacent
31.129 1.48
building or structure.
(6) Parking of any oversized vehicle during the pendency of a nonpandemic related state of emergency declared to exist within the City of Santa Cruz by the city council, city manager or governor.
(7) A person and oversized vehicle that are, collectively, participating in a safe parking program or other safe sleeping or transitional shelter program operated or sanctioned by the City, but do not have access to a safe parking space or other shelter options under such programs due to a lack of capacity. (8) Any oversized commercial vehicle that has been issued and is displaying a contractor's oversized vehicle parking permit.
(d)(h) Any resident may obtain an oversized vehicle overnight parking permit to park an oversized vehicle registered to them adjacent to his/hertheir residence. Any resident may obtain an oversized vehicle overnight parking permit to park an oversized vehicle belonging to an out-of-town visitor. The city manager or his/hertheir designee may issue a permit for overnight parking of an oversized vehicle to any resident or out-of-town visitorguest of a resident subject to the following provisions:
(1) The oversized vehicle shall be owned, leased, rented by, or registered to, a resident or out-of-town visitor.
(2) The oversized vehicle shall park at the street curb immediately adjacent to the residenceaddress for which the oversized vehicle parking permit has been granted, or within four hundred feet of that person’s residenceaddress if thisthe area immediately adjacent to the address is not available for parking due to curb configuration; due to the adjacent parking spaces being occupied by vehicles belonging to someone other than the owner, permittee, or codified parking restrictions.
(3)(2) (3) The oversized vehicle shall not be parked at any place within 20 feeta visitor of a crosswalk, intersection, boulevard, stop sign, official electric flashing devicethe owner or within 30 feetpermittee; or due to the immediately adjacent parking resulting in a violation of the approach to any traffic signal. Section 10.40.120(f) .
(4)(3) The oversized vehicle overnight parking permit shall be prominently displayed in the lower driver’s side of the windshield or the nearest window of the vehicle. The permit shall be clearly visible from the exterior of the oversized vehicle and shall not cover the Vehicle Identification Number. TrailersAttached trailers shall display the permit on the side of the trailer so that the permit is visible from the street.
(4) Any oversized vehicle present in conjunction with a short-term rental shall need a valid permit to park and shall park immediately adjacent to the
31.130 1.49
short-term rental if that space complies with Section 10.40.120(f), or if the immediately adjacent space is unavailable, within 400 feet of the short-term rental.
(5) The city manager or his/hertheir designee may deny or revoke an oversized vehicle overnight parking permit if, upon a review of the location where the oversized vehicle will be parked, the city manager or his/hertheir designee determines that it would create a traffic hazard or otherwise would adversely affect public safety, traffic flow or access., bike lanes, or access.
Upon the filing of the application, the City may make such an investigation as necessary to determine whether such a permit should be issued. The application for a permit must contain:
a. Name, current address, phone number, and current valid driver's license number of the resident applicant.
b. The vehicle license plate number, make, model and type of vehicle for which an overnight parking permit is requested.
c. The name and current address of the registered owner of the vehicle d. Proof of ownership and current registration of said vehicle e. The dates for which the permit is requested.
f. A statement that the applicant declares under penalty of perjury that all statements in the application are true; and
g. The signature of the applicant and date of application.
In addition, the application shall include:
a. Valid California Driver’s License for the vehicle’s owner b. Proof of current registration
c. Proof of current utility bill which matches the resident’s address indicated in the permit application
(6) Permits are not transferable. Individuals who are found to have sold or transferred their permit will lose future permit privileges. (e)(i) Overnight Parking Permit Duration.
(1) Each resident oversized vehicle overnight parking permit shall be valid for one year. A resident oversized vehicle permit allows a resident to park an oversized vehicle for four periods of up to seventy-two consecutive hours per calendar month. The oversized vehicle must be absent from the location authorized by Subsection (d)(h) (2) for a minimum of twenty-four consecutive hours to be lawfully parked overnight at the location again.
31.131 1.50
(2) Each oversized vehicle overnight parking permit issued to an out-of-town visitor shall be valid for a maximum of seventy-two hours. (3) No more than six out-of-town visitor permits shall be issued to a resident in respect of any addressin a calendar year. No more than one resident oversized vehicle overnight parking permit shall be issued in respect of any address at one time.
(j) Parking Permit fee. The parking permit fee for oversized vehicles shall be established by city council resolution.
(f)(k) Fraudulent Permit Penalty. Every person who displays a fraudulent, forged, altered or counterfeit oversized vehicle parking permit or permit number is guilty of an infraction for the first offense. Any subsequent offense within offense committed within one (1) calendar yeartwelve months of a previous citation is a misdemeanor. Pursuant to Section 4.04.010(3), any misdemeanor offense be may, at the discretion of the city attorney, be charged and prosecuted as an infraction or a misdemeanor. (g)(l) Overnight Parking Permit Denial. The city mayshall deny the issuance of an oversized vehicle overnight parking permit for up to one year if the city manager or his/her designee finds that any of the following conditions exist:
(1) The applicant or the person the applicant is visiting is not a bona fide resident., as defined by section 10.04.165 above.
(2) The resident or out-of-town visitor guests of a resident have been issued twofive or more citations for violations in the sametwelve calendar year for either exceeding the allotted seventy-two-hour permit time and/or parking greater than four hundred feet from the designated residence or land owned address.months prior to application.
(3) The out-of-town visitor is not a guest of the resident applicant. (4) An owner of an oversized vehicle has procured any oversized vehicle parking permit through fraud or misrepresentation, for example, the information submitted by the applicant is materially false.
(5) The hotel or motel establishment is issuing oversized vehicle permits to non-paying guests of the commercial establishment and/or the guests are camping in the vehicle rather than residing in the commercial establishment. (m) City Operated or Sponsored Safe Parking Programs. In addition to the private property allowances authorized through Chapter 6.36.030, the City may operate, sponsor, or authorize safe parking programs for vehicles on any City owned or leased properties in the City, or any City-sanctioned private parking lots. The City Manager shall develop a policy that establishes operational criteria for safe parking programs. (n) A person may obtain a contractors oversized vehicle parking permit for a specific
31.132 1.51
oversized commercial vehicle if he or she demonstrates in writing to the satisfaction of the Public Works Director or his or her designee, on an application form prepared by the Public Works Director and upon payment of a fee prescribed by resolution of the City Council, that they meet and agree to each the following conditions:
(1) The person owns or lawfully possesses an oversized commercial vehicle which is registered with the Department of Motor Vehicles as a commercial vehicle and displays identifiable California commercial license plates; (2) The person possesses a valid business license issued pursuant to Chapter
5.04 of the Santa Cruz Municipal Code and has paid all other applicable City taxes;
(3) The oversized commercial vehicle is necessary for use in the business for which the city business license has been issued;
(4) The oversized commercial vehicle will at no time be parked unattended in any location that creates or exacerbates a dangerous traffic safety condition; and
(5) The contractor's oversized commercial vehicle shall bear a clearly visible notice in the driver’s side window which includes contact information which would allow City safety or enforcement personnel to contact the vehicle operator. (o) A violation of any of the provisions of this chapter, except those provisions specifically identified as misdemeanors and/or provisions related to parking or standing vehicles, shall be punishable as an infraction. Violations of any of the provisions of this chapter related to parking or standing vehicles shall be subject to a $50.00 civil penalty (parking ticket), the enforcement of which shall be governed by the civil administrative procedures set forth in Division 17, Chapter 1, Article 3 (commencing with Section 40200) of the California Vehicle Code.
(p) The City Manager is authorized to promulgate and publish rules and regulations to interpret and implement this section.
Section 3. Chapter 10.41 “Citywide Permit Parking” is hereby amended at Section
10.41.060 “Authority to Issue Parking Permits” to read as follows:
“10.41.060 AUTHORITY TO ISSUE PARKING PERMITS.
The local authority shall be authorized to issue parking permits for the city’s permit parking programs, pursuant to the requirements of this Chapter, for vehicles that do not fall within the definition of “oversized vehicles” as defined by Section 10.40.106.” Section 4. Chapter 16.19 “Storm Water and Urban Runoff Pollution Control” is hereby amended at Section 16.19.070 “Discharge of Sewage Prohibited” to read as follows:
“16.19.070 DISCHARGE OF SEWAGE PROHIBITED.
No person shall cause the discharge of sewage or grey water to the storm drain system
31.133 1.52
including, but not limited to, discharges of recreational vehicle holding tanks. In addition, if the director determines that a building drain or building sewer is not operating properly and causes the discharge of sewage to the street, sidewalk, or storm drain system, the director may declare this condition to constitute a public nuisance and proceed to abate that nuisance in accordance with Section 16.19.180.
Section 5. Severability. If any section, subdivision, paragraph, sentence, clause, or phrase of this ordinance is for any reason held to be unconstitutional or invalid, such a decision shall not affect the validity of the remaining portion of the ordinance. The City Council hereby declares that it would have passed each section, subsection, subdivision, paragraph, sentence, clause, or phrase of this ordinance irrespective of the unconstitutionality or invalidity of any section, subdivision, subsection, paragraph, sentence, clause, or phrase of this ordinance.
Section 6. Effective Date. This ordinance shall take effect and be in force thirty (30) days after final adoption.
PASSED FOR PUBLICATION this 24th26 day of November, 2015October, 2021, by the following vote:
AYES:
NOES:
ABSENT:
DISQUALIFIED:
APPROVED: ______________________________
Donna Meyers, Mayor
ATTEST:_______________________________________________
Bonnie Bush, City Clerk Administrator
31.134 1.53
PASSED FOR FINAL ADOPTION this ____ day of ______, 2021, by the following vote:
AYES:
NOES:
ABSENT:
DISQUALIFIED:
APPROVED: ______________________________
Donna Meyers, Mayor
ATTEST:_____________________________________________
Bonnie Bush, City Clerk Administrator
This is to certify that the
above and foregoing
document is the original of
Ordinance No. 2021-XX
and that it has been
published or posted in
accordance with the
Charter of the City of Santa
Cruz.
________________________________
Bonnie Bush, City Clerk Administrator
31.135 1.54
/
Heatmap
© 2021 TomTom, © 2021 Microsoft Corporation, © OpenStreetMap Vehicle Abatement Activity 2020 - 2021
31.136 1.55
/
Notification Locations
© 2021 TomTom, © 2021 Microsoft Corporation, © OpenStreetMap Vehicle Abatement Activity 2020 - 2021
31.137 1.56
/
Vehicle Abatement Activity 2020 - 2021
Count of Notifications by Street
0 50 100 150 200
Count of Notifications
Street
Delaware Ave
Natural Bridges Dr
Shaffer Rd
Mission St
Almar Ave
Harvey West Blvd
Mountain View Ave
McPherson St
Liberty St
Melrose Ave
Sylvania Ave
Soquel Ave
Dufour St
Cayuga St
Mission St Ext
Plymouth St
Walk Circle
Broadway
Grandview
Grandview St
Seaside St
Woodrow
Escalona Dr
Market St
Effey St
198
141
37 31
23 20
19 17
15 15
15 13
12 11
11 11
11 10
10 10
9 9
8 8
7 Frequency of notifications
0 100
200
300
400
500
Count
Count of Count
5 10 15 20 25 30 35
535
2 1
2 1
22 3
30 10
3 31.138 1.57
/
Vehicle Abatement Activity 2020 - 2021
Notifications with no plates
48 Count of Lic
Notifications in total
1274
Count of Lic
Notifications by Date
0 50
100
150
200
250
300
Year
Count of Date
Sep 2020 Nov 2020 Jan 2021 Mar 2021 May 2021 Jul 2021
31.139 1.58
1 WEST CLIFF DRIVE PILOT PROJECT
PARKING ANALYTICS
TABLE OF CONTENTS
1. Project Overview & Key Findings Page 2
2. Detailed Findings
2.1. Dwell Time Page 3
2.2. Access Blockers Page 4
2.3. Parking by Time of Day Page 5
2.4. Summer vs. Winter Page 6
2.5. Lot Utilization Page 7
2.6. Trouble Index Page 8
31.140 1.59
2 1. PROJECT BACKGROUND
The Cowell’s Overview Parking Lot is an 18-space parking lot on West Cliff Drive adjacent to the access stairs to the Cowell’s Beach and surf break. This lot has a commanding view of the north end of Monterey Bay, the Santa Cruz Municipal Wharf, the Boardwalk, and Cowell’s Beach.
Cowell’s is extremely popular with tourists and surfers, in particular female surfers and families with young children. The area is part of a city park that extends from Cowell’s Beach up to Cowell’s Point (AKA Cypress Point) opposite the Oblates Church.
While there is ample anecdotal information about the usage of the parking lot, the project team wanted to take a scientific / data-driven approach to determine what was going on and how people use the parking lots on West Cliff Drive.
In July 2018, a smart city sensor was installed to measure data such as usage, duration of stay (Dwell Time), time of day, and other key metrics. The data collection exercise has been extremely successful. More than 100,000 parking events have been captured and analyzed over the past 15 months.
The Key Findings were:
1. This parking lot is highly utilized, with more than 100,000 parking events each year.
2. It is a high turnover lot. More than 50% of people park for less than 20 minutes, and 95% of people park for 2 hours or less.
3. There is a small group of people (representing less than 6%) who consume more than 31% of all parking. We call them “access blockers,” defined as people parking for more than 2 hours. These blockers are limiting access for others.
4. Crime happens most often at night in Spring and Summer when the days are long. We tracked a “Trouble Index” (Calls for Service per 1000 parking events) and found that it spikes after 9PM to almost 5X the normal daytime average. Between 9PM and 5AM is when neighborhood integrity and public safety is compromised.
31.141 1.60
3 2.1 DWELL TIME
Dwell time is how long a car is parked in the parking lot. Most of the neighborhood and surfing community thought the average parking time would be 3 to 4 hours; however, the average parking time is much less.
This figure shows the following:
• 50% of people park for less than 20 minutes. Median time is 16.75 minutes. • The average park time is 36 minutes.
• 95% of all people park for 2 hours or less.
• Some people park for more than 24 hours. Maximum time is 2,260 minutes.
Figure 2.1: Dwell Time
31.142 1.61
4 2.2 ACCESS BLOCKERS
A small group of people are blocking access to the parking lot for regular use. We used the 95 percentile (2 hours) as our delineation between normal parkers and what we call “Access Blockers.” We found that a small minority is using more than 30% of parking.
This figure shows:
• 5,123 parked in the lot for more than 2 hours.
• These people “consumed” 1,002,639 minutes of available parking time. • Access Blocking events represent 6% of all parking events but consume 31% of all parking.
Figure 2.2: Access Blockers
31.143 1.62
5 2.3 PARKING BY TIME OF DAY
The parking lot is highly utilized and often full. People begin parking early in the morning and continue to late into the night, especially in Spring and Summer.
This figure shows:
• Parking begins well before the current 5AM curfew and extends past the midnight curfew as well.
• Winter / Fall people arrive just before daybreak, and they leave around 5PM. • Spring / Summer the parking lot gets very busy after 5PM and often extends late into the night.
Figure 2.3: Parking by Time of Day
31.144 1.63
6 2.4 SUMMER VS. WINTER PARKING
In Spring and Summer, the days are longer, and more people utilize the parking lot, especially in the evening and late at night. The increase in usage during the day seems to work well, but problems often arise after 9PM when parties and bad behavior are prevalent.
Many neighbors and community members stated that they love the Fall and Winter seasons because of the decreased crowds and traffic.
This figure shows:
• Summer and Spring have similar parking patterns as Winter and Fall, with but far more people, until 6PM.
• After 6PM there are more than 3X the number of people in the parking lot in Summer than in Winter.
Figure 2.4: Winter versus Summer parking events (turnover)
31.145 1.64
7 2.5 UTILIZATION
The Cowells Overview Parking Lot is a highly utilized resource by locals and visitors alike. Most days, it is hard to find a vacant parking space.
This figure shows:
• In Summer and Spring it is almost impossible to find a parking space. • Daylight hours are when the lot is most popular.
Figure 2.5: Free Parking Spaces by Season
31.146 1.65
8 2.6 TROUBLE INDEX
During the day, the parking lot is relatively safe; however, after dark, the problems and incidences of crime increase. To quantify less safe, we created the “Trouble Index.” It is the calculation of 911 calls per 1,000 parking events.
911 calls are also known as “Calls For Service” (or CFS for short). The Santa Cruz Police Department provided us with the CFS stats, which was matched with the Sensor Data to create the Trouble Index. It is not a perfect measure because not all crime happens in the parking lot, but it is a useful tool to begin to quantify the problems.
This figure shows:
• The Trouble Index spikes after 9PM.
• 10PM to 3AM is the time with most problems.
Figure 2.6: Trouble Index by hour of day
31.147 1.66
35 PUBLIC SAFETY CITIZEN TASK FORCE
Policy Recommendations
Deliberative Process
Treasurer Fred Keeley convened the Task Force deliberations on recommendations. The Task Force adopted a legislative process for this aspect of their process. The fundamentals of the legislative process are outlined as follows:
City Staff provided a draft report of recommendations for the first round of deliberations.
The Task Force moved, line by line, through the document and was asked to indicate where they had Tentative Agreement, and items for amendment.
The voting membership of the Task Force was fourteen (14) members. A majority was eight (8). It was suggested that the Task Force resolve as many issues as possible by consensus. For those points where a consensus could not be reached, a majority vote prevailed.
In order to provide the maximum opportunity for reaching consensus on the final work product, the Task Force adopted a “Caucus” procedure. This gave individual members a moment to speak in a less formal setting.
Each deliberative meeting produced a new draft recommendation report. Subsequent deliberative meetings followed the same procedure until each recommendation was voted on and adopted.
Policy Recommendations
The following recommendations came from a variety of sources – experts, community members and individual Task Force members. Every recommendation presented was considered by the Task Force. The Task Force was provided with substantial data, material and testimony and used that gathered information to make these recommendations.
Public safety policy recommendations consist of a four-pronged approach: prevention, strategic enforcement with accountability, collaborative oversight, and appropriate funding.
Highest Priority Prevention Initiatives
Although more long-range in nature, preventative programs are essential to reduce crime and victimization in a sustainable fashion. The Task Force recommends policy changes to be heavily weighted towards prevention initiatives, with the City, County, schools, neighborhoods and our non-profit service partners playing an integral role in funding, implementation and management.
Prevention initiatives should include the following highest priorities:
1. Environmental design and protection of high crime areas and open spaces
2. Enhancement of drug and alcohol treatment funding
3. Expansion of pro-social youth programs
31.148 1.67
36 PUBLIC SAFETY CITIZEN TASK FORCE
Policy Recommendations
Environmental Design and Protection of High Crime Areas and Open Spaces Findings
Crime Prevention Through Environmental Design (CPTED) and reactivation of spaces are datadriven crime prevention programs. With proven efficacy in many cities, CPTED reduces criminal opportunity through landscape and architectural design of space (lighting, visibility, cover reduction, etc.) while reactivation is intended to create pro-social activities in public locations. Environmental design and pro-social activities are lacking in the City’s greenbelt and commercial areas, particularly along the San Lorenzo River corridor, on Pacific Avenue, and in Harvey West.
The County’s Syringe Services Program (SSP) is effective in lowering the transmission of blood borne diseases such as HIV and Hepatitis C for intravenous drug uses. However, the Task Force finds that the County has not properly accounted for and mitigated the unintended consequences of locating a Syringe Exchange within a residential neighborhood and geographical constraints of Santa Cruz. There should be no occurrence of spent hypodermic syringes being found in the City’s open spaces, parks, neighborhoods, beaches and business districts. Until this public health crisis is rectified, the Task Force finds that the County Board of Supervisors should consider the management of SSP as a top priority.
Recommendations
The Task Force recommends a comprehensive environmental design and programming study of the City’s most crime-ridden public and commercial areas. The study’s implementation plan should be phased to target the community’s highest areas of safety concern. While the study is underway, the City should immediately improve lighting on the San Lorenzo River Levee and Park and the Harvey West area to discourage illegal behavior and reinvigorate those public spaces.
With regard to the County’s Syringe Exchange Program, the Task Force recommends that City staff and the City Council work with the County Health Services Agency and 3rd/5th District Supervisor Office to ensure the public safety efficacy (harm reduction of users and community affected by discarded syringes) of the County’s Syringe Services Program. The following measures are considered the highest priority by the Task Force.
Insist that the County Board of Supervisors address the community-wide impacts of SSP on their work plan/agenda.
Ensure best practices are in place for SSP to mitigate impacts to the City’s public spaces and neighborhoods.
o Relocate SSP to County-owned property located in a non-residential area. o Implement a syringe identification tagging program (e.g. color coding or serial number).
o Exchange to be on a true one for one basis with an actual physical count of syringes being exchanged. No estimations should be allowed.
31.149 1.68
37 PUBLIC SAFETY CITIZEN TASK FORCE
Policy Recommendations
o Account for both syringes being distributed and returned. Account separately for syringes without identification tag.
City should prevent additional syringe exchanges programs from operating or opening within the City limits.
Enhancement of Drug and Alcohol Treatment Funding
Findings
Treatment of drug addiction is underfunded in Santa Cruz County. Given that addiction treatment lowers the rate of criminal recidivism, the Task Force finds that investment in (and greater collaboration between) proven effective treatment programs is essential.
Recommendations
The Task Force therefore recommends that City Council and staff work with the County Board of Supervisors and the County Health Services Agency staff on the County Strategic Plan for Alcohol and Drug Treatment and Intervention to insure that proven, evidencebased interventions and treatment programs that address specific City needs, are included in the Strategic Plan and adequately funded.
Needs specific to the City noted by the Task Force include the following:
Reduce public anti-social behaviors caused by serial inebriates and drug users.
Reduce both violent and non-violent crime caused by addiction to opiates and other drugs.
With these measures, the Task Force believes that the County's Strategic Plan will further help to delineate the problems and their interventions and treatment that contribute to unsafe environments locally.
Expansion of Pro-Social Youth Programs
Findings
The Task Force finds that an investment in our youth is part of an essential strategy to reduce future criminal behavior. Children that stay in school and are active under adult supervision during after-school hours are far less likely to try drugs and/or alcohol, develop addiction, join gangs, and engage in criminal activity as young adults.
Recommendations
The Task Force recommends leveraging existing programs and, if necessary, consider creating new programs to provide pro-social activities, focusing on the 3-9 pm period, that serve both atrisk and pre-at risk youth. These programs should include activities that appeal to particular
31.150 1.69
38 PUBLIC SAFETY CITIZEN TASK FORCE
Policy Recommendations
cultures and subcultures (e.g. baile folklorica and skate boarding) as well as programs that bring different cultures and subcultures together (such as Little League and soccer). These programs should be both attractive to a wide variety of youth and focus on minimizing barriers to participation such as costs, accessibility, complex sign ups/initiation processes, location of programs, hours and duration of programs.
City should create a mechanism to inform community residents, businesses and nonprofits on how to provide scholarships for Task Force recommended Youth Programming initiatives.
City Park and Recreation Department (P&R) shall develop an outreach strategy that targets underserved youth in our community with the goal being to involve them in more P&R programs. The outreach should be both in English and Spanish.
Ensure that the long range plan for P&R includes appropriate facilities for demographic trends and to increase participation rates.
Youth Programming recommendations should include information published by the Criminal Justice Council Report on Youth Violence.
Secondary Priority Prevention Initiatives
Additional preventative recommendations were identified by the Task Force for City Council consideration. These include more specific youth programming initiatives, truancy enforcement enhancements, education and neighborhood connection, and enhancements to social service activities.
31.151 1.70
39 PUBLIC SAFETY CITIZEN TASK FORCE
Policy Recommendations
# Table 4: Prevention/Education/Connection
Youth Programming
1 City partner with Santa Cruz City Schools District (SCCS) and Santa Cruz County Office of Education (COE) to support and expand existing after school programming; specifically academic enrichment (e.g. Arts Academy) and scholastic sports programs. 2 Partner with SCCS and COE to develop mentoring/internship programs for High School students. City to incentivize businesses, non-profits and local non-governmental agencies (NGOs) to participate in mentoring/internship programming. 3 Work with Santa Cruz Metro (Metro) to explore transportation options for youth and families, specifically in regard to getting kids to school in the morning and home from school and after school programming. 4 Collaborate with SCCS and the COE to address the summer gap in programming. 5 The City to collaborate with SCCS and COE to support and expand Adult Education with emphasis on General Edcuation Development (GED) and High School (HS) diploma programs.
6 City Council to partner with Santa Cruz Youth City Council to develop all Youth Programming recommendations herein. 7 Leverage existing programs and, if necessary, consider creating new programs to provide mentoring and job opportunities to local teenagers.
Truancy Enforcement
8 City partner with SCCS and COE to enhance and strengthen truancy policies and enforcement processes. 9 Increase the number of school resource officers to four Environmental Design/Reactivation of Spaces
10 Instruct the City representatives to the Metro Board to ensure that the new transit hub is designed to minimize illegal behavior and promote positive use. (External review may be necessary).
Social Service Enhancements
11 Add to the point in time Homeless Census Survey questions that concern the City. 12 Expand the Homeward Bound program.
13 Recommend that City and County Planning Departments encourage landlords within the City and County to support investment in HUD recognized best practice programs including Housing First models such as 180/180, and any kind of incentive to renting to special needs populations. See “Santa Clara program”
14 City to coordinate with faith-based, government and non-governmental organizations to operate social service programs (soup feeds, overnight shelter, RV parking, etc.) in order to ensure public safety impacts to community are minimized. 15 City to develop and publicize self-supporting alternative to giving money to panhandlers. Program will include mobile application and other possible ways of donating such as web-based. Proceeds of program will go to proven effective programs to support people who are homeless, mentally ill and substance abusers.
Education
16 Increased community education (includes schools on certain topics) in the areas of substance abuse, domestic violence, bullying, sexual assault, mental health, gang desistence/prevention, and perhaps other related topics.
In the design, development, and implementation of prevention, education and other programs that will promote a higher level of safety for Santa Cruz residents, the City will make a special effort to include marginalized and under-represented communities. In particular, the City should identify members of those communities with the knowledge and leadership necessary to insure cultural competency in those programs. 17 Collaborate with SCCS and COE and others to ensure all youth are educated around the issues of:
Recreational drug use
31.152 1.71
40 PUBLIC SAFETY CITIZEN TASK FORCE
Policy Recommendations
# Table 4: Prevention/Education/Connection
Underage alcohol use
Gangs
Sexual assault
Domestic violence
bullying
City to provide relative data to support grant renewal of elementary counselor positions to build on existing social curriculum.
Connection
18 Recommend the City conduct community outreach “see something, say something" campaign to engage the public in crime prevention 19 Every resident should belong to a neighborhood group and be civically engaged. Neighbor to neighbor networking outreach is recommended.
Revitalize the Neighborhood Services Team to meet quarterly or more frequently as needed to collaborate with all existing neighborhood groups to collectively address issues impacting neighborhoods throughout the City. 20 Increase City coordination, financial support, and social services outreach for volunteer clean-up efforts. (such as the Leveelies, Clean Team, Save our Shores, Beach Flats, Community Center, NoLo)
31.153 1.72
41 PUBLIC SAFETY CITIZEN TASK FORCE
Policy Recommendations
1 Highest Priority Strategic Enforcement with Accountability Initiatives Findings
The mission of the Santa Cruz Police Department (SCPD) is to provide protection and services to our community. With a $23 million annual budget and 94 budgeted sworn officers serving a population of 62,000, the force runs a lean operation. In fact, an average police force for a city of 60,000 is about 140 sworn officers.1 As a destination spot for summer tourists, University of California at Santa Cruz (UCSC) students, and transients, and as an entertainment hub for Santa Cruz County and beyond, the SCPD is often stretched extremely thin.
SCPD currently has 6 vacant officer positions, with several officers out on work related and nonwork related injuries, and several other individuals in the training process. In total, SCPD are at 75 percent of sworn strength in the field. Currently there are no gaps in service or coverage.
However, this shortage puts a significant strain on those officers serving the community. While there are a number of factors contributing to officer attrition (the recent tragedy, long-term disability, retirement, etc.), SCPD historically has had difficulty maintaining a fully-staffed force. With current staffing levels, it becomes difficult to effectively balance department priorities: crime prevention, investigations, community programming, etc.
Public nuisance/quality of life crimes and repeat offenders put a heavy strain on SCPD resources.
Calls for service are at an all-time high, and individuals that self-affiliated with the Homeless Services Center (by providing 115 Coral Street address at the time of arrest) accounted for about 40% of arrests and 30 % of citations in 2012. Repeat offenders, averaging 100 individuals per year, are responsible for a staggering number of total arrests. 2 Over 50 percent of repeat offender
arrests are in some manner related to drugs or alcohol.
SCPD's record volume of repeat offender arrests and municipal code violations is a symptom of a failing criminal justice system for low-level crimes in Santa Cruz County. Lack of jail space, treatment options, Probation Department capacity, and the Superior Court’s apparent indifference to nuisance crimes has created an endless cycle of recidivism among low-level criminals.
Santa Cruz is burdened with a high number of high-risk alcohol outlets. Santa Cruz is approved by Alcohol and Beverage Control (ABC) for 102 alcohol outlets and currently has 249. In addition, Santa Cruz is overburdened with residential indoor and outdoor marijuana grow operations for medical and recreational purposes. High-risk alcohol outlets contribute to alcoholfueled violence and crime. Growing, cultivation and processing of marijuana in residential neighborhoods is a serious public safety concern, a code enforcement issue, and often involves criminal activity. The Task Force finds that a strategic intervention is required to improve community conditions around addiction-related crime and public nuisance behaviors in our neighborhoods, open spaces, parks, and business districts. Therefore, the Task Force recommends four priorities: strategic police and code enforcement, offender assistance with accountability/recidivism reduction, and criminal justice system accountability.
1 http://www.bjs.gov/index.cfm?ty=tp&tid=71
2 See Introductin and Background for more information on repeat offenders.
31.154 1.73
42 PUBLIC SAFETY CITIZEN TASK FORCE
Policy Recommendations
Recommendations
Strategic Police Enforcement
The Task Force has identified several critical priorities for SCPD. The Task Force recommends the City, with the highest priority and utmost urgency, fill existing and budgeted SCPD vacancies and, further, to increase the SCPD police force to national averages. The Task Force recommends moving to a targeted policing model, with a strategy that emphasizes enforcement of nuisance crimes in natural, city entry and focal point areas (i.e. a “broken window" policing model).
In addition, to enhance the City’s enforcement of repeat municipal code offenders, the City Council should designate existing infractions as misdemeanors in the municipal code for current infractions such as depositing of public waste, multiple offenses for illegal camping, and other offenses that the City Council designates to curb quality of life crimes in the City. This recommendation would include a request to the County to fund a municipal code prosecutor as well as designating the revenue from current infraction penalties to fund the increased court costs.
Strategic Code Enforcement
The PSTF recommends two priorities for enhanced code enforcement.
City Council to work with Code Enforcement to reduce and reform high-risk alcohol outlets.
Rewrite the municipal code 6.90.040 to prohibit the cultivation and processing of marijuana in residential properties in Santa Cruz City. Marijuana should be subject to the same zoning regulations as other agriculture.
Offender Assistance with Accountability/Recidivism Reduction The Task Force recommends a specialty court model for substance abusers, veterans, mentally ill and/or homeless offenders. The specialty court is a proven model in halting the revolving door of recidivism by linking offenders to treatment and rigorous judicial monitoring. Specialty courts are highly collaborative, bringing together the criminal justice system and service providers to enforce court-ordered sanctions. The Task Force finds that the specialty court model would provide offenders with the right balance of treatment assistance with accountability.
The Task Force recommends the City to collaborate in developing a strategic multi-disciplinary team (enforcement, criminal justice, drug treatment, social service providers) to identify individuals repeatedly exhibiting behaviors and crimes harmful to the community (i.e., the “top offenders” as identified by SCPD). Strategic team will develop an intervention and accountability plan on a case by case basis for each offender in order to reduce criminal behavior and harm to the community. The overall goal of the team would be reduce recidivism and crime in the City. The strategic team would work with SCPD on identifying those that are generating the most calls for services, arrests, and municipal code infraction citations.
31.155 1.74
43 PUBLIC SAFETY CITIZEN TASK FORCE
Policy Recommendations
Additionally, after implementation of the photo identification system and gate at the Homeless Services Center (HSC) campus, the City should work with HSC campus managers to minimize unintended negative impacts of homeless services to Santa Cruz community, while maximizing program effectiveness. Agencies located at Coral Street (on HSC campus) should cooperate with SCPD in recommendations to modify or eliminate services to persons identified as chronic offenders who threaten public safety.
The purpose of this recommendation is to improve accountability to those that continually break the law and have repeat municipal code violations.
Superior Court Accountability
The Task Force finds that the Santa Cruz County Courts have failed the community as it relates to criminal sentencing. Improved accountability should be in the form of increased transparency, consistent adjudication of the City's municipal code violations, and implementation of a specialty court model (as noted above).
The Task Force recommends following measures be implemented by the Santa Cruz County Superior Court.
Court to issue a misdemeanor warrant after three failures to appear in a six month period.
This automatic warrant issuance will eliminate the need for the City Attorney to prosecute repeat municipal code infraction offenders who fail to appear.
Compel the Presiding Judge of the Santa Cruz County Superior Court to appear before the Santa Cruz City Council twice a year to share what the Court is doing to address high repeat offender rates in the City of Santa Cruz and receive input from the City Council and City Attorney.
Secondary Priority Strategic Enforcement with Accountability Initiatives Several additional recommendations were identified by the Task Force with regard to Strategic Enforcement with Accountability. In general, secondary priority recommendations are more specific about new policing strategies, code enforcement, and additional accountability measures within the criminal justice system.
31.156 1.75
44 PUBLIC SAFETY CITIZEN TASK FORCE
Policy Recommendations
# Table 5: Strategic Enforcement With Accountability
Strategic Police Enforcement
21 In order to achieve maximum organizational efficiency and performance relative to public safety, it is recommended that an external review be conducted of the City of Santa Cruz Police Department (SCPD), City Manager’s Office, Planning and Community Development, Public Works and Parks and Recreation Deparments.
22 City will consider setting SCPD total compensation packages at a level that will improve recruitment and retention. 23 City to eexplore alternative staffing positions such as reserve officers and expand community service officers. 24 Increase SCPD foot/bike/street patrols.
25 Vigorous enforcement of bike license law/illegal to have unlicensed bike or bike with shaved serial numbers. 26 Coordinated strategy with community groups to reactivate one public area at a time starting with San Lorenzo (SL) park and Harvey West 27 Explore civil litigation against Caltrans, local railroads, Army Corps of Engineers, State of Nevada, State of California & other property owners/businesses who create “crime pollution externalities” as defined in the literature. 28 City to identify, fund and promote improved ways to report crimes, track City response to reported crimes and judicial system response to crimes. System should be easy to use, integrated and include web-, text- and Application-based systems. 29 City to implement non-judicial consequences for multiple failures to appear. 30 Maintain curfew at Cowell Beach.
31 The City and University of California, Santa Cruz (UCSC) ban and enforce all public celebration of illicit drug use. 32 City and UCSC police should vigorously enforce state marijuana laws regarding minors, public spaces, and driving under the influence (as stipulated by Measure K).
Strategic Code Enforcement
33 City of Santa Cruz Code Enforcement should explore a zoning ordinance regarding indoor agriculture. City should support landlords in eviction process who have made illegal/unsafe modifications to property to support indoor agriculture. 34 Recommend to City to make a high priority to fund additional code enforcement officers with an emphasis on life-threatening violations and public safety in Santa Cruz.
35 Recommend City review and implement strict parking and overnight camping ordinance related to RVs on City streets.
Increase enforcement of muni code violations related to RV parking in the City of Santa Cruz. 36 City to implement a time limit (example 4 hour parking) within selected City-owned parking spaces/lots along West Cliff and East Cliff Drives during daylight hours. Enforcement recommended by City parking control by marking tires and issuing parking tickets. 37 Recommend City to coordinate with California State Parks (e.g. Obtain a letter of trespass to patrol Lighthouse Field during darkness hours to enforce illegal camping, drug use and sales, litter, pollution, and other unsafe activities. 38 Explore relocation of recycling center from Harvey West to another area of the City. 39 City Council to work with Code Enforcement to reduce and reform medical marijuana dispensaries. 40 City consider a priority to either reactivate or revisit the SCPD’s Alcohol Education Monitoring and Compliance Program Officer to collaborate with Alcohol and Beverage Control (ABC), all other government, non-government and community groups to address the alcohol issue in Santa Cruz. 41 City develops and implements new web-based reporting process for code enforcement with an emphasized priority on public safety. 42 Where statute allows, implement cost recovery from the responsible party for police response and enforcement of misdemeanor and/or felony convictions and drunk in public arrests.
43 Develop or increase penalties for property owners that refuse to address habitual code compliance violations.
31.157 1.76
45 PUBLIC SAFETY CITIZEN TASK FORCE
Policy Recommendations
# Table 5: Strategic Enforcement With Accountability
44 Penalties (like party house ordinance) for high crime residential addresses. Three (3) violations in six months will be charged with a municipal code misdemeanor (also including 647Fs).
45 In all commercial and agricultural rental agreements, there shall be written permission from the landlord to grow or process marijuana on the property.
Offender Assistance with Accountability
46 Work with County to increase funding to facilitate Rountree as a coerced treatment facility for serial inebriates/substance abusers, and as a mental health treatment center for County inmates already in custody.
Criminal Justice System Accountability
47 Publicly available reporting on Santa Cruz Superior Court judges’ decision records. 48 Compel Santa Cruz County Probation Chief to appear before City Council twice per year to inform what the Probation Dept. is doing to address probation-related offenses on adult chronic reoffenders. 49 Grand Jury investigation (external review) of the current Santa Cruz Superior Court bench as it relates to the use of discretionary power of sentencing of offenders.
50 More jail space for short term incarceration post-conviction. 51 Recommend the City hire a part time or full time paralegal to process failure to appear on municipal code violations to process to failure to appear warrants.
52 City develop 3 or more non judicial mechanisms to deal with 3 failures to appear. 53 Work with County Probation to improve transparency of AB109 released prisoners into the county. Recommend County increase staffing levels of probation officers for adult population to adequately deal with AB109. 54 Recommend that the Jail to has access to funds for transportation for inmates to return to community of origin whenever possible, unless they’re released on their own recognizance (ROR).
31.158 1.77
46 PUBLIC SAFETY CITIZEN TASK FORCE
Policy Recommendations
Highest Priority Collaborative Accountability and Appropriate Funding Initiatives Within three months of accepting the Task Force report, the City shall notify in writing, each department, agency, and organization outside of their jurisdiction of theTask Force recommendations that impact their operations and ask that those named agencies respond in writing as to how they will begin to work towards achieving the objectives in the relative recommendations.
The Task Force recommends the City Council and County Board of Supervisors consider an alternative funding mechanism to fund any programs identified herein that are outside of the City and County's regular budget. The City should consider various options to fund many of these new recommendations, including but not limited to a city alcohol tax with proceeds going directly to fund public safety programs, a city or county sales tax dedicated to funding public safety programs, as well as innovative private funding and federal grant opportunities such as “Pay For Success” programs and Social Impact Bonds. The city should re-evaluate Measure E funding for specific use of clean-up programs on the San Lorenzo Riverway. The city should also consider using municipal code violation revenue to specifically fund a specialty to deal with recidivist violations. The city should also tie the distribution of Community Development Block Grants as it relates to public safety to results-based programs and require measurable deliverables.
Secondary Priority Collaborative Accountability and Appropriate Funding Initiatives Two additional priority recommendations were identified by the Task Force including creating a Department of Public Safety to review all City public safety-related actions and coordinate between the other departments.
1 31.159 1.78
47 PUBLIC SAFETY CITIZEN TASK FORCE
Policy Recommendations
# Table 6: Accountability, Collaborative Oversight and Appropriate Funding Collaborative Oversight
55 Create Dept. of Public Safety to review all city actions and integrate City Departments. 56 Instruct the City to report at a council meeting regarding their progress on the TF recommendations 6 months and 12 months after accepting the TF recommendations.
31.160 1.79
COMMUNITY ADVISORY
COMMITTEE ON
HOMELESSNESS (CACH)
FINAL REPORT AND RECOMMENDATIONS
Prepared by: Susie O’Hara, Assistant to the City Manager CACH Convened by: Honorable Fred Keeley
Assisted by: Megan Bunch, Principal Management Analyst
Brooke Newman, Homelessness Response Manager
Ron Prince, Special Projects Advisor
CITY OF SANTA CRUZ
AUGUST 11 , 2020
31.161 1.80
2 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
The CACH would like to thank the following individuals for their contributions to this effort.
CACH Convener
Fred Keeley
Focus Strategies
Kate Bristol
Katharine Gale
Wise Democracy
Corrina McFarlane
Angela Blessing
US Interagency Council on Homelessness (USICH)
Helene Schneider, Regional Coordinator
Dignity on Wheels
Marcus Givens
Housing Matters
Tom Stagg
City of Santa Cruz
Lee Butler
Katherine Donovan
Tony Elliot
Bernie Escalante
Ron Prince
Suzanne Haberman
City Attorney’s Office
Toni Condotti
Cassie Bronson
And a special thank you to all the community members who attended the regular CACH meetings, participated in the public engagement sessions, completed outreach surveys, and sent in correspondence.
31.162 1.81
3 LETTER OF TRANSMITTAL FROM THE CACH CO-CHAIRS
June 23, 2020
Mayor Cummings and City Council
809 Center Street, Room 10
Santa Cruz, CA 95060
Dear Mayor Cummings and City Council Members:
On behalf of the members of the Community Advisory Committee on Homelessness, we are pleased to transmit our Report: Santa Cruz City Community Advisory Committee on Homelessness: Final Report and Recommendations. This report serves as the culmination of our 10-month process and addresses the charge of the CACH as stipulated by the April 9, 2019 City Council Agenda Report on the subject.
The CACH committed to exploring the complex issue of homelessness and the specific impacts of this nationwide problem within the City of Santa Cruz. The CACH was designed to ensure its members represented diverse backgrounds, perspectives and life experiences. As a group, we worked cohesively to learn about the pressing issues facing people experiencing homelessness, to engage with a wide array of experts in the field, to learn about the intersection of homelessness and the work of various City departments, and to listen to community-members express their viewpoints and experiences with homelessness. Our committee’s goal was to engage with a diverse cross-section of citizens, organizations and agencies in order to develop well-informed recommendations to bring to City Council.
Through our extensive work together, we learned that Santa Cruz faces a host of complex challenges, and that our local governments (City and County), social service providers, and community members need to work collaboratively in order to address them effectively. While some of the conversations were quite difficult given the sensitive nature of the topics and the CACH was not always in full agreement on each and every recommendation, we remained committed to the process, analyzed the issues and worked to achieve consensus in our decision-making to develop feasible recommendations for your review. We stand behind this serious work and are deeply appreciative of the time, energy and thought that our Convener, Fred Keeley, City of Santa Cruz staff, Susie O’Hara, Megan Bunch and Ron Prince, and the expert panelists and other participants added to the process.
With the newly formed Homelessness Taskforce, led by the County of Santa Cruz Human Services Department, focusing on how to best serve those experiencing homelessness during the COVID-19 pandemic, the City of Santa Cruz has a unique opportunity to address many of the issues we identified through a collaborative cross-jurisdictional approach. We urge the City Council and City staff to review the report and determine how best to operationalize the recommendations. We understand that the City will need time to assess each recommendation and work with its partners to make them a reality. That being said, we ask that the City Council conduct a 6-month and 12-month check-in with the community to measure progress made on these recommendations.
Thank you all for your continued work to make Santa Cruz a community focused on social justice, health in all policies, and ensuring our most vulnerable community members are provided with dignified support and care.
Sincerely,
Candice Elliott and Taj Leahy
Community Advisory Committee on Homelessness, Co-Chairs
31.163 1.82
4 TABLE OF CONTENTS
Acknowledgements _____________________________________________________________ 2 Letter of Transmittal from the CACH Co-Chairs _______________________________________ 3 Executive Summary _____________________________________________________________ 5 Background ___________________________________________________________________ 6 City of Santa Cruz Homelessness Policy Across the Decades _____________________________ 10 CACH Work Plan and Subcommittee Approach ______________________________________ 11 CACH Immediate and Mid-Term Recommendations___________________________________ 12 CACH Recommendations in the Age of COVID-19 ___________________________________ 13 CACH Final Policy Recommendations to City Council _________________________________ 15 Conclusion___________________________________________________________________ 16 Attachments _________________________________________________________________ 17 Attachment #1: Homelessness Coordinating Committee 20 Recomondations _____________ 17 Attachment #2: 2000 Homeless Issue Task Force___________________________________ 20 Attachment #3: City of Santa Cruz Homelessness Historical Policy Review _______________ 27 Attachment #4: CACH Bylaws _________________________________________________ 32 Attachment #5: Focus Strategies Homeless System Baseline Assessment Report ___________ 39 Attachment #6: CACH Initial Work Plan _________________________________________ 98 Attachment #7: Dynamic Facilitation Process Results_______________________________ 106 Attachment #8: Fical Report on City Homelessness Expenses ________________________ 111 Attachment #9: CACH Recommendations Carried by the City Council _________________ 115 Attachment #10: 2019 Santa Cruz County HEAP and CESH Awards __________________ 119 Attachment #11: Gov. Newsom Executive Orders Jan. 16, 2020 ______________________ 127 Attachment #12: Santa Cruz COVID-19 Homelessness Taks Force ____________________ 136
31.164 1.83
5 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
With the Santa Cruz City Council’s vision to create a diverse stakeholder group to grapple with the challenge of homelessness, the Community Advisory Committee on Homelessness (CACH) convened on July 30, 2019 and set a path towards developing tangible policy recommendations to improve quality of life for both those unhoused and housed in Santa Cruz. Over a period of seven months, the CACH, comprised of 13 talented, passionate, and articulate individuals, tackled the vexing questions of what will really make a difference for those experiencing homelessness, how to lead difficult dialogue by example, and, ultimately, how to move the community towards positive and real change.
Through the course of its it education and deliberations, the CACH members engaged with policy documents, City and County staff, community stakeholders, and experts in the field to build collective knowledge on best practices, innovative programs, and the policy landscape at the regional, state and federal level. However, even more importantly, the CACH engaged deeply with those unhoused in the community, including five CACH members with lived experience, on their unique and profound needs and how best to meet those needs.
With this knowledge base, the CACH grounded itself in making change in three focused areas: community engagement, public health, and sanctioned camping/safe sleeping. Although only three threads in the fabric of homelessness policy, the CACH felt that making progress in these areas would advance the City towards positive dialogue, dignity first solutions and incremental change in shelter access.
The CACH provided two progress reports to City Council during their process, one focused on immediate policy recommendations to meet urgent needs, and the second focused on mid-term recommendations to move towards sustainable change. Those recommendations included:
- The installation of two (2) additional ADA portable toilets with hand washing stations that are in a covered and well-lighted area, distributed throughout the downtown, open 24/7. - To keep Louden Nelson Community Center restrooms open only to patrons of Louden Nelson. - For the City to continue to help fund the 1220 River Street camp program by supporting the County to write a new contract with the Salvation Army to continue services at a new location. - The creation of additional (a) managed low-barrier, ADA accessible emergency shelter program(s) to be opened last winter, either in the City limits or with a shuttle service from the City to the shelter if outside City limits. The shelter program should include ongoing feedback with regular meetings between the management and the community.
- The relocation of the shuttle pick-up site for the Laurel Street shelter program to an indoor or sheltered location.
- The expansion of CACH by one (1) individual member, with CACH determining the nomination criteria.
- The creation and implementation of additional shelter programs to include the input and feedback of management, the community, and organizations representing people experiencing homelessness. - The City Council fund a comprehensive community engagement program to include facilitated meetings across the community, and across demographics and constituents, with an independent or specially designated facilitator(s).
- The creation of one RV sewage dumping site within the City limits. - Managed and accountable models of shelter and safe sleeping sited with specific criteria to ensure ease of access for users and neighborhood compatibility. - Increased access to hygiene facilities including mobile showers with case management and a complementary program to collect data on hygiene programs to ensure a sustainable and effective long-term approach.
31.165 1.84
6 - Increased and proactive community engagement to ensure the community is intimately involved, especially around safe sleeping, in dialogue on solutions with the Council as the body embarks on future policy decisions.
- Camping municipal code amendments to increase safe parking capacity at faith-based parking lots, decriminalize the act of sleeping, and ensure the environmentally and high risk areas of the City are protected from the impacts of high density, unsanctioned camping.
While not an exhaustive list, the policies set forth by the CACH were intended to alleviate the foreseen challenges of being unsheltered during the winter season, improve access to hygiene resources, create new opportunities for low barrier shelter in the City, and create clarity around the enforcement of camping in high risk and environmentally sensitive areas.
The CACH’s process was cut short by the COVID-19 pandemic, but ironically, COVID-19 didn’t cut short the progress made by the CACH. Because of COVID-19, new attention has been paid at the federal, State and County level on homelessness response, and many of the CACH’s recommendations are integral to the emergency public health actions set forth to minimize the spread of the virus and protect our most vulnerable community members. New shelters have been erected, new sanctioned camps have been opened, new hygiene facilities have been deployed, new comprehensive community engagement has commenced, new visioning of Coral Street has taken place, and new systems have been put into place. Each of the three focus areas of the CACH are entwined into COVID-19 programming with brand new fiscal and community support.
Given this progress, the CACH enthusiastically recommends the Council leverages that hopeful momentum by investing in new community engagement processes focused exclusively on homelessness response, studying the effectiveness and maintaining the hygiene resources that have been deployed, using the lesson learned with, and community acceptance of, the COVID-19 safe sleeping programs to advance the potential for new sanctioned encampments within the City, and ultimately re-envisioning Coral Street to serve as a North County homeless support and housing navigation campus.
BACKGROUND
Proactive response and management of the vexing challenge of homelessness has been policy priority for the Santa Cruz City Council for several decades. Progress has been slow and cyclical, in part given the very narrow role cities play in health and human services and, in part, due to the complexity of the issue. Effective homelessness response is driven in breadth and depth by the intricacy of the root causes of homelessness, the significant and varied needs each individual requires to exit homelessness, and the political, fiscal and policy framework that must be developed and drawn from county, state and federal governments to make real progress. Often these significant complexities stymie local governments from making proactive change, creating frustration on part of unhoused and housed community members alike.
For the last several years, the City Council has recommitted to investing in the response to homelessness, with the aim of reducing human suffering and mitigating the real impacts street homelessness has on the community. Shortly after the 2018 election, which saw a political shift of the Council membership, the Council became deeply entrenched in homelessness-related policy largely in response to a growing unsanctioned encampment a community gateway (Gateway Encampment). Early in 2019, the issue of homelessness dominated the Council’s agenda, with several high-level policy considerations brought forward including sweeping City ordinance changes regarding transitional encampments and safe parking, recreational vehicle parking on Delaware Avenue, homelessness state of emergency and shelter crisis declarations, project charters for transitional encampments and parks facilities management, siting of a safe sleeping and storage programs on City property, an interim management plan for the Gateway Encampment, Standard Operating
31.166 1.85
7 Procedures for Vacating Homeless Encampments that Contain Significant Health and Safety or Nuisance Conditions (SOPs) and the concept of Community Advisory Committee on Homelessness (CACH).
As evidenced by the above topics, the Council tackled considerable and complicated policy in a short timeframe and attempted to balance the urgency of responding to a growing health and safety crisis at the Gateway Encampment with ensuring the community was included in developing tangible solutions. The balance became difficult to strike as the community was very polarized around the issue. Given that, the Council elected to immediately begin the process of the CACH to bring the community together and ensure diverse voices at the table regarding both short and long-term homelessness policy.
At its April 9, 2019 meeting, Councilmembers unanimously moved to create the CACH charged to advise the City Council on homelessness policy and actions, incorporating education and community engagement, in furtherance of City-adopted policy regarding homelessness including the All-In Plan, the Homelessness Coordinating Committee 20 Action Recommendations and the 2x2 Committee. Council’s motion included direction on the preferred composition of the committee with intent to create a diverse stakeholder group representing the following sectors:
- Homelessness advocacy
- Health care with special focus on the local system of homelessness care and solutions - Education
- Employment and job creation
- Local business
- Neighborhood representation
- Community members with lived homelessness experience
- Behavioral health and/or addiction system of care
- Policy and governmental expertise on homelessness
- Youth homelessness
- Student
- Others as identified by nomination and selection process The CACH application was released on April 15, 2019 and with a one-week extension, due on May 6, 2019.
In response to a strong call to action through print/social media and word of mouth, staff received 52 CACH applications from a wide cross-section of community members. Applications were received within each identified stakeholder sector, with many applicants noting more than one stakeholder affiliation. Of important note was the diverse interest, from recently arrived residents to long-time advocates, across professional and life experiences, gender, age and background.
The Council selected a cadre of exceptional applicants to form the CACH, each bringing unique perspectives, passions and backgrounds. Those members, and a brief cut out of their application statements, were:
• Co-Chair Candice Elliott, “There aren't words to describe how much I would appreciate the chance to serve on this Advisory Committee. I see this as an opportunity to find effective ways of addressing homelessness in our community, and hopefully creating a blueprint which could be used in other communities in the US who are also experiencing increased numbers of people experiencing homelessness. In addition to this work, I would enjoy working with people of diverse backgrounds on this issue and to engage with the community and other committee members.” • Co-Chair Taj Leahy, “I am a spiritual person yet I am practical as well. I believe that we must be heart-forward in our intent as well as conscious of our steps with regard to peoples’ lives. I would like to identify the needs of the homeless/addiction community and support those needs getting met.
Likewise, I feel like this is a perfect time to lay bare the causes of homelessness and addiction and work toward societal change.
31.167 1.86
8 • Alie Soares, “Since experiencing homelessness I have been humbled in ways unexplainable to most unless you’ve been there. I have a strong voice & lived experience in this demonized population. I want to help make, create & sustain change not only for myself; for others as well. I feel that my experiences as a disabled, currently housed in transitional housing homeless woman speaks for on overlooked demographic that faces not only the same challenges as my “peers” but also hurdles that an able bodied person doesn’t.”
• Ami Chen Mills, “I have been both watching and attending City Council meetings over the past couple months. I truly feel I understand each person's "separate reality"--from progressive activists to parents, business owners and even Council members. Underneath it all, we each want to feel safe, secure, respected and even loved (we can say respect is a form of love.) I don't agree with every opinion, but I can see the "kernel of truth" in almost everyone's statements. I enjoy community engagement, I enjoy life in general, even with all its bumps, and I believe I would enjoy the admittedly daunting challenge of this opportunity to try to bring more alignment to City plans for the houseless.”
• Aran Nicol, “Homelessness and injection drug use in Santa Cruz have risen to the level of a public health emergency and the community has an obligation to address these issues in a way that respects the rights of individuals and the broader population. The factors contributing to these crises are complex and mirror trends throughout the US related to rising housing costs, inequalities of income, education and opportunity, stigma, declines in behavioral health services, and the more widespread use of opiates and methamphetamine.”
• Brooke Newman, “My direct service experience has helped numerous members of our community gain access to benefits, shelter, employment and recovery from homelessness. My work is designed to help others achieve the goals that they set for themselves. I facilitate change that allows for people experiencing homelessness to work within a structure, while exercising agency in their choices to move forward that is free from coercion.”
• Don Lane, I have dedicated much of my adult life to working on issues related to homelessness and will continue that work in the years ahead. Three terms as mayor and three terms on the city council have provided many opportunities for me to speak both formally and informally with thousands of individuals and dozens of organizations on controversial issues.” • Dwaine Tait, “Over the years, I have learned a great deal from my participation with collaborative work groups and committees. Perhaps, the most important lessons I have learned and been able to put into practice are the ideas of true collaboration and true compromise when guiding deliberation and eventually decision making. As a member of our community here in Santa Cruz and as a person that has spent their career in service to others am I committed to assisting to address the homelessness problem here in Santa Cruz.”
• Evan Morrison, “I consistently develop relationships with people who are homeless and service providers throughout the county, and support homeless folks into getting into housing. Though my specialty has been veterans, I have successfully connected people from all walks of life with services that assisted them in ending their homelessness.”
• Frank Sanchez*, “I am interested because I am currently homeless and have knowledge of all aspects of this epidemic. I’ve worked for the Homeless Services Center and managed, as well as worked at, the Winter Shelter program. I’ve grown fond of many of the homeless people and fully understand their hardships.”
• Ingrid Trejo*, “Homelessness is a crisis for both this community and the person experiencing it.
Many people become homeless because of a sudden illness, family disintegration or job loss, among the many reasons. In my work, we found housing for the homeless families we were serving through the limited rental vacancies in this community. It can be done, families can find homes, it takes a lot of work, collaboration and responsible partnership with everyone, especially landlords. I believe this City can help its neighbors who spend their days and nights on the streets with effective planning, partnership and the courage to try.”
31.168 1.87
9 • Katie Woolsey*, “I serve on the board of directors of Walnut Avenue Family & Women's Center and previously worked as a consultant to write our 5-year cultural responsiveness and strategic plan.
Because homelessness touches many of our participants, this work involved deep research into all the available data and studies for the county and liaising with staff at other county organizations who work with precariously housed and unhoused persons.”
• Raphael Sonnenfeld, “My goal is to bring people together to find solutions that are widely accepted, and to ensure that the needs of all stakeholders are heard and accounted for. While I understand the imperative to act quickly to address very serious health and safety risks our city faces, it is also critical for solutions to those problems to be vetted by experts, and for the community to be engaged in their implementation.”
• Serg Kagno, “I’m excited to be of this committee. We are at a pivotal time in Santa Cruz with significant, new state funding, and we are experiencing a very polarized community discussion. This is an amazing opportunity to bring different stakeholders together to try to find solutions to meet everyone’s needs.’
• Stina Roach, “I want to be part of the solution!! Help others like myself. I am a passionate person. I know what empathy is. Want the education. Great with all people.” • Stoney Brook, “I believe we need to be intentionally strategic – fiscally, politically, legally and humanely – in our thoughts and actions. Part of our blockage comes from an ‘All or Nothing’, ‘Either/Or’ narrative; we cannot move if we see only A and B as solutions. We need to embrace solutions that respect the concerns – real or perceived – of all residents.” *CACH members who resigned before this report was drafted.
The CACH was given several months of educational and deliberative time to create informed policy. Given that, the Council moved all current homelessness policy considerations under the umbrella of the CACH process to ensure the community had been given an opportunity to fully engage and build consensus on immediate, short-term and long-term solutions. The process was intended to demonstrate a commitment on the part of the City to develop solutions, as well as an opportunity to identify system gaps in a thoughtful and deliberative way.
Understanding that homelessness policy dialogue is highly challenging and divisive in the community, the Council’s imparted its shared value to create opportunities for the community to engage and build consensus within the CACH, and create a committee that:
- listens and validates
- honors, not challenges each other’s stories
- is accountable for self / organizational behavior
- defines shared beliefs
- moves to the center and away from extremes, and
- embraces compromise as a means to an end
With a dynamic, skilled and vocal membership, the CACH held its first meeting in July 2019 and set a path to achieve the Council’s vision by 1. understanding the long-standing policy trends within the City; 2. identifying the unique needs of those with lived experience; 3. understanding the City and region’s current investment in homelessness response and where there are system gaps and failures; and 4. developing immediate, mid and long-term policy recommendations to ground the City’s response to homelessness within the larger system of care provided by the County, State and federal governments.
31.169 1.88
10 Within a few weeks of completion, the CACH’s work was cut short by the COVID-19 pandemic. While troubling to not finish the important work at the time, the pandemic created new opportunities to advance much of the vision of the CACH, creating novel collaboration and work not seen in Santa Cruz since the Loma Prieta earthquake. Although not originally conceived as a work product from the CACH, this report also reflects on those new opportunities and how best to leverage new system performance for long-term benefit.
CITY OF SANTA CRUZ HOMELESSNESS POLICY ACROSS THE DECADES With a goal to identify and advance homelessness-related City policy to improve quality of life for the entire community, both housed and unhoused, the Council envisioned the CACH’s work plan to be built around several objectives including:
• Increase knowledge of homelessness issues and best practices across the CACH and community. • Amend, reprioritize and determine policy gaps and feasibility of the Homeless Coordinating Committee 20 recommendations.
• Define community-supported program models and siting for homeless shelter programs (emergency, navigation, transitional encampments, etc.).
• Increase political and community will to site homelessness-related programs. • Define City role in homelessness response and integrate role with County system and continuum of care.
An important element of the CACH’s work plan was to frame its policy recommendations within the context of current and previously conceived homelessness policy, especially related to the above-mentioned Homeless Coordinating Committee’s 20 recommendations (Attachment 1). The CACH spent several of its first meetings learning about the decades of homelessness policy drafted by the City, and how that policy has remained relatively consistent throughout the years.
The CACH learned of policy developed within three distinct yet complimentary plans spanning a 20-year period including recent policy (2018-2019) as considered by the Council, the 2017 Homeless Coordinating Committee Report and Recommendations, and the 2000 Homeless Issues Task Force (Attachment 2). Each set of policies was derived by different Councils during different periods of community politics and vitality, yet each plan includes sets of policies that generally fit into the following categories:
- Direct Services: Improve outreach and engagement with unsheltered community members, create day services and provide increased access to dignified supportive services such as jobs programs, storage, hygiene and cell phone charging.
- Sheltering and Housing: Increase local shelter capacity to serve the diverse community of unsheltered individuals with new innovate approaches such as transitional encampments, safe sleeping sites, and navigation centers.
- Legislation/Advocacy: Build and maintain a legislative advocacy system at the regional, state and federal level to increase fiscal, administrative and operational support to local municipalities. - Systems Improvements: Identify system gaps and improve system response with enhanced and collaborative governance, access to care, and internal/external organizational structures. - Municipal Code/Ordinances: Improve City enforcement response to crimes of poverty/homelessness by amending the municipal code to address behavioral problems but not penalize the status of homelessness.
31.170 1.89
11 As evidenced the in the attached table (Attachment 3), the dozens of contemplated polices are generally consistent and on theme to the above categories and can be summarized with an action-oriented approach to create more and effective: dignity-first programming to alleviate the burden of living outside; innovative and sustainable shelter beds to meet diverse needs and lower barriers while supporting those on their path to housing; affordable and permanent supportive housing beds; legislative advocacy to shine a light on the lack of state and federal resources afforded to small cities, especially those with large homeless per capita ratios; interwoven and collaborative system response; and lastly, evolved municipal code to ensure equitable enforcement of behavioral and crime issues.
With this sense of history, the CACH committed to develop a work plan that built upon the work of previous Councils while engaging with the community of the current and pressing needs. That work plan, executed over the 7-month period served as the roadmap to the new policy set forth in this document.
CACH WORK PLAN AND SUBCOMMITTEE APPROACH
Early creation of communication ground rules, decision making criteria, bylaws and a consistent work plan was paramount to the success of the CACH. For the first several weeks of convening, the CACH committed to establishing a working framework for education, engagement and deliberation and met the following objectives:
- Approved a meeting schedule.
- Increased the CACH membership by two to better capture the voice of those with lived experience. - Received a presentation on the Brown Act and the role of committees in government policy. - Approved CACH Bylaws. (Attachment 4)
- Elected Co-Chairs.
- Conducted a review of all past City policy related to homelessness. (Attachment 3) - Received presentation by Focus Strategies on county-wide homeless systems assessment. (Attachment 5)
- Began development of the Phase 1 Work Plan. (Attachment 6) - Engaged in a Dynamic Facilitation Process. (Attachment 7) - Approved the following Subcommittees:
o Community Engagement;
o Public Health; and
o Sanctioned Campgrounds and Safe Sleeping.
- Received a presentation on policy development and structure. - Received a presentation on current funding sources. (Attachment 8) This early work served as the first phase of education for the CACH ensuring a baseline of knowledge on the subject was obtained and those with lived experience provided their important perspectives to the group.
Additionally and of critical importance, the CACH was introduced to the work of Focus Strategies, a nationally recognized consulting firm contracted by the County to perform a systems analysis of the regional homelessness response system.
The CACH conducted a study session with Focus Strategies and heard the results of their Homeless System Baseline Assessment Report and Action Items (Attachment 5). The Focus Strategies work is intended to pave the strategic roadmap to regional homelessness response by connecting systems, minimizing duplicative efforts and identifying and resolving gaps in service. Knowing that the regional effort was being conducted at the same time as the CACH, it was important to orient the CACH members to that overarching lens to ensure the work of the CACH was complementary to the systems approach.
31.171 1.90
12 Further, the CACH members were educated on the significant in-kind and direct expense homelessness and its impacts have on the City, where that investment goes and what outcomes are achieved. That overview of the fiscal impact is included as (Attachment 8) and provides valuable insight into the need to integrate City homelessness response into a regional system.
With some of these educational building blocks in place, the CACH set forth to develop a feasible work plan aimed to meet the most pressing concerns in the City. With the help of a subcommittee of CACH members and engagement with the community, the CACH identified four areas of policy focus for immediate attention:
1. Secure hygiene resources: restrooms and showers.
2. Increase local shelter options, especially identify a new site for the managed River Street Camp, but may also consider effective program modeling for emergency shelter.
3. Identify sites (or acceptable siting criteria) for new outdoor emergency shelter solutions such as transitional encampments or safe sleeping.
4. Modify the camping ordinance.
Rather than tackling this complicated policy as a collective group, the CACH elected to form sub-committees to deep dive into three areas: community engagement, public health and sanctioned campgrounds and safe sleeping. These policy areas remained consistent throughout the CACH’s work as committee members agreed to focus on recommendations bound by pragmatism, limited individual and collective capacity and resources. In other words, the CACH elected to focus on depth rather than breadth, hoping to deliver policy to the Council grounded in realistic feasibility.
CACH IMMEDIATE AND MID-TERM RECOMMENDATIONS
By October 2019, the CACH had accomplished a significant level of work and education as noted above.
Additionally, the CACH membership was becoming acutely aware of the real humanitarian crisis facing those living unsheltered and the resulting impacts to the entire community. With the winter season approaching, the CACH elected to focus immediate/urgent policy recommendations on improving conditions through the winter and brought those recommendations to Council in December 2019.
Those recommendations included the following:
- Installation of two (2) additional ADA portable toilets with hand washing stations that are in a covered and well-lighted area, distributed throughout the downtown, open 24/7. - Keep Louden Nelson Community Center restrooms open only to patrons of Louden Nelson. - City continue to help fund the 1220 River Street shelter program by supporting the County to write a new contract with the Salvation Army to continue services at a new location. - Creation of additional managed low-barrier, ADA accessible emergency shelter program(s) to be opened this winter, either in the City limits or with a shuttle service from the City to the shelter if outside City limits. The shelter program should include ongoing feedback with regular meetings between the management and the community.
- Relocation of the shuttle pick-up site for the Laurel Street shelter program to an indoor or sheltered location.
- Expansion of CACH by one (1) individual member, with CACH determining the nomination criteria. - Creation and implementation of additional shelter programs to include the input and feedback of management, the community, and organizations representing people experiencing homelessness.
31.172 1.91
13 - The City Council fund a comprehensive community engagement program to include facilitated meetings across the community, and across demographics and constituents, with an independent or specially designated facilitator(s).
- The creation of one (1) RV sewage dumping site within the City limits.
The Council accepted those recommendations and staff began working to implement all of them, prioritizing the addition of hygiene resources, relocating and weather-protecting the winter shelter intake site, and sustaining and adding winter shelter beds to the north county portfolio.
Within two months of its first presentation to Council, the CACH returned in February 2020 with its second report and mid-term policy recommendations. Guided by shared principles of prioritizing outreach, developing new accessible shelter options including safe sleeping, and recognizing human rights considerations when amending the camping ordinance, the CACH delivered the attached set of recommendations.
The CACH presented 22 recommendations to Council within the following policy areas:
- Managed and accountable models of shelter and safe sleeping sited with specific criteria to ensure ease of access for users and neighborhood compatibility. - Increased access to hygiene facilities including mobile showers with case management and a complementary program to collect data on hygiene programs to ensure a sustainable and effective long-term approach.
- Increased and proactive community engagement to ensure the community is intimately involved, especially around safe sleeping, in dialogue on solutions with the Council as the body embarks on future policy decisions.
- Camping municipal code amendments to increase safe parking capacity at faith-based parking lots, decriminalize the act of sleeping, and ensure the environmentally and high risk areas of the city are protected from the impacts of high density, unsanctioned camping.
The Council contemplated all 22 mid-term recommendations and advanced the vast majority of them in addition to the immediate recommendations accepted in December (Attachment 9). In fact, the overarching consensus of the CACH was not only accepted by the Council, but plans for implementation of the mid-term policy recommendations advanced fairly quickly thereafter.
Shortly after their February update to Council, the emerging COVID-19 pandemic abruptly changed the course of the CACH, and unfortunately, the CACH failed to provide its last scheduled update to the Council at an April meeting. That update was set to include the CACH’s long-term vision for the City and how best to integrate Focus Strategies work into the City’s strategic planning. However, even in the face of the dire conditions of the pandemic, new, relevant and opportunistic developments have arisen, allowing for the CACH to finish its work, sunset the committee, and layer its final recommendations within a new regional, state and federal policy environment focused not only protecting the vulnerable homeless community from the virus, but streamlining and removing barriers to program improvement and implementation.
CACH RECOMMENDATIONS IN THE AGE OF COVID-19
CACH policy deliberations were formed during a sea change of homelessness response leadership at the state level. The County of Santa Cruz and CA-508 Watsonville/Santa Cruz City and County Continuum of Care (CoC), also known as the Homeless Action Partnership (HAP), spent much of the 2018 and 2019 distributing in excess of $11 million of state grant funds to local government and non-profit agencies serving the homeless community. Through the State’s Homeless Emergency Assistance Program (HEAP) and California
31.173 1.92
14 Emergency Solutions and Housing (CESH) program, several local initiatives took shape, including the transition of seasonal/overnight emergency shelter beds to year round/24/7, beginning steps of shaping a county-wide approach to regional navigation centers, enhanced rental assistance programming, and a transitional age youth demonstration project (Attachment 10).
In February of this year, Governor Newsom, in an unprecedented demonstration of commitment, devoted nearly the entire State of the State address to the issue of homelessness. Newsom told the full California Legislature in the Assembly chambers, “[n]o amount of progress can camouflage the most pernicious crisis in our midst, that's the ultimate manifestation of poverty: homelessness”.
Newsom then outlined his Administration’s five-part approach – reducing street homelessness quickly and humanely through emergency actions, getting the mentally ill out of tents and into treatment, providing stable funding to get sustainable results, tackling the underproduction of affordable housing in California, and tracking outcomes with accountability and consequences.
On the heels of the State of the State address, the Governor made available $650 million in State Emergency Homeless Aid and issued a challenge for cities and counties to partner with the state on immediate impact solutions to tackle homelessness. Buttressed by two years of momentum, coupled with these new funds, initiatives and related Executive Orders (Attachment 11), the County rose to that challenge and was poised to finalize the Focus Strategies work, which promised to provide the roadmap to a system-wide response to homelessness in Santa Cruz County. Within a few short weeks of Newsom’s address, the COVID-19 pandemic was declared worldwide and the attention of the entire state and nation turned to slowing the spread of the virus.
What could’ve been a devastating blow to the progress made at the State and County level to address homelessness, in actuality became an opportunity to further advance state-wide goals and define with laser focus the need for a coordinated and effective local response. Over the past ten weeks, the County, in partnership with local cities and non-profit agencies, has led an effort to significantly bolster the homelessness shelter and care system, adding XX emergency beds to the system and developed new outreach techniques to ensure vulnerable community members are provided health screenings and resources to safely shelter in place. Furthermore, a robust system of hygiene resources was deployed across the county to increase access to restroom and handwashing.
Most importantly, the County initiated the countywide homeless response to the COVID-19 emergency through the County’s Incident Command Structure (ICS). Within the County’s Emergency Operations Center (EOC), under the authority of County Health Officer Dr. Gail Newell, the Human Services Department (HSD) Shelter and Care Departmental Operations Center (DOC) kick started the COVID-19 Homelessness Task Force, comprised of dozens of staff across government and non-profit sectors (Attachment 12). Divisions of the Shelter and Care DOC include Stabilizing Existing Shelter; Shelter Expansion; Transition Age Youth Sheltering in Place (TAY-SIP); Quarantine and Isolation (Q/I); and Homeless Outreach and Service Sites (HOSS). Each of these Divisions is rapidly implementing a wide range of emergency activities with a level of coordination and cooperation never seen locally around the issue of homelessness. This new level of coordination has provided important clarity around roles, shone light on the potential for real and tangible change, and created a new sense of partnership among agencies working in silos for years.
Further, COVID-19 has brought additional state and federal funding sources to the table, allowing for the County and partners to build into COVID-19-related response long-term and sustainable strategies. Of equal importance, needed systems improvements, as forecasted by Focus Strategies, have become acutely day lighted, requiring urgent resolution to ensure effective COVID-19 response. New programs like a universal shelter referral system, coordinated provider engagement, shelter technical assistance, physical and behavior health support at shelters, a new TAY shelter, new multi-disciplinary street outreach teams, a pilot case
31.174 1.93
15 management and housing navigation program, and a re-envisioning of congregate shelter at the Coral Street campus, all grew out of the COVID-19 crises, all important steps to significantly improve the homelessness system of care in the county.
CACH FINAL POLICY RECOMMENDATIONS TO CITY COUNCIL
With a rapidly evolving policy landscape due to the Governor’s recent focus on homelessness and the emergent COVID-19 mandates, the CACH serves as a forum to ground this expanding universe of policy and funding to meet the City’s unique needs. As noted above in the report, the CACH subcommittees served as the compass arrow for the CACH’s vision, focusing collective effort to develop policy in three areas:
community engagement, public health, and sanctioned camping/safe sleeping. When weaving those vital focus areas into the current policy landscape, a few critical policy areas arise for the City Council’s attention.
1. Community Engagement: Within the last several months, the HAP has contracted with local firm Miller Maxfield to build and deploy a comprehensive community engagement plan for the regional response to homelessness. Under the COVID-19 crisis, Miller Maxfield has played a critical role in maintaining a strong platform of engagement with the community on all aspects of the Homelessness Task Force work. The CACH recommends that, under the leadership of the new Homelessness Response Manager (HRM), to work to develop a City-centric community engagement plan on homelessness which focuses on maintaining the important engagement fostered by the CACH and clearly delineates the City’s management role within the overarching county and state response to homelessness. If the City is successful in recruiting and onboarding a new Communications Manager, it would be expected for that role to assist the HRM to accomplish this task. If the position is not filled, the CACH recommends the Council commit funds, not to exceed $10 thousand, to contract with a consultant to develop and deploy the plan.
2. Public Health: Under COVID-19, the City has deployed dozens of new portable restroom and handwashing facilities across the community. The CACH recommends leaving the vast majority of those new facilities in place through COVID-19 recovery and beyond, and building infrastructure to ensure the portable facilities blend aesthetically with the surrounding landscape and limit vandalism potential. To meet this objective safely and effectively, the CACH recommends the City conduct an audit of the current facilities and their use, especially focusing on positive community maintenance and/or damage/vandalism and engaging with unsheltered individuals on access considerations. With that information, the City can build a hygiene facility maintenance plan, which may require some level of janitorial staffing assistance to ensure long-term sustainability.
3. Sanctioned Camping and Safe Sleeping: Again under COVID-19, the City, in partnership with the County’s Homelessness Task Force, has deployed three safe sleeping zones (one tent camp on Coral Street, fully managed by Housing Matters, one tent camp at the Benchlands, under development, and one RV/car camp at Lot 17 fully managed by the Association of Faith Communities). While all safe sleeping zones were rapidly built to ensure adequate social distancing and shelter in place objectives were met, their genesis provides a unique opportunity for the City to leverage the successful operational and policy elements of the programs to build long-term safe sleeping models. It is recommended to maintain a similar or larger scale of safe sleeping through COVID-19 recovery and beyond, and use lessons learned during the COVID-19 response to ensure constant process improvement and community compatibility.
4. Envision Coral Street as a North County homeless support and housing navigation campus. As mentioned above, Coral Street is hosting one of the first sanctioned safe sleeping zones in Santa Cruz. Due to social distancing and shelter in place orders, unsanctioned encampments on Coral Street and the adjacent railroad right of ways were restructured and camp residents were moved into
31.175 1.94
16 a managed camp and other shelter beds. With that change in environment and programming, an opportunity arises to re-envision Coral Street as the confluence of homeless services, community building and volunteer service in North County and leverage the industrial design aesthetic, railroad, and businesses of the Harvey West neighborhood to create a plan to improve neighborhood compatibility with homelessness services and re-invigorate community pride in the important social justice work historically sited in the area.
CONCLUSION
As evidenced by the robust CACH process, and the new developments at the state and regional level, the City is poised to continue to make good progress on homelessness response. Of paramount importance, the City must maintain connection with State, County and regional stakeholders, especially the homeless community, on policy considerations and ensure community engagement remains a top priority.
Knowing that members of the CACH remain committed to advancing the recommendations of the body, and the work of the subcommittees laid the foundational elements of the CACH’s direction, it is recommended to use this document and call upon the CACH members/subcommittees when the Council begins to engage with their renewed strategic planning process, and maintain the three subcommittee tenets, community engagement, public health and sanctioned camping/safe sleeping, in the forefront of the City’s strategic planning around homelessness. Many of the CACH members transitioned from the CACH to working closely on elements of the county-wide regional COVID-19 response, focusing on shelter operations, safe sleeping, community engagement and other important priorities. Given the strength of the membership and their ongoing commitment to this challenging work, future opportunities for engagement in policy-making are sure to be of interest to the members of the CACH. Staff commits to ensuring, when opportunities arise, that the CACH is updated and their expertise is drawn upon to keep this vital document living into the future.
31.176 1.95
ATTACHMENT 1: HOMELESSNESS COORDINATING COMMITTEE 20 RECOMENDATIONS
31.177 1.96
Short Horizon Solutions (0-3 years), Adopted by City Council Support the Implementation and Success
of Coordinated Entry
Provide support to launch and sustain this new system.
Require that any City-supported homeless program to
integrate with the system.
Increase Homeless Outreach Services and Mobile
Behavioral Health/Mental Health Response
Expanded mobile mental health team from the County
Health Services Agency. Consider additional outreach
workers in the downtown.
Contract for Homeless Jobs Engagement Program
Contract with the Downtown Streets Team to provide
homeless outreach and jobs opportunity. Team
could assist with clean-ups, beautification projects,
maintenance of downtown, dumping clean-up, and
support services in public garages and other facilities.
Create a Triage Location/Expanded Recovery Center
for Crisis Intervention
Explore partnerships with County and health providers
to establish more treatment bed capacity and reserve
one bed for on-demand treatment of people found in
crisis. Expand services offered at the Recovery Center.
Advocate to include mental health triage center for
individuals who are sub-acute, but clearly in need of
psychiatric intervention.
Secure Storage Facilities
Identify and secure facilities to allow individuals to check their possessions into a managed storage facility or rental storage lockers. Co-locate with other services and case management, or follow the storage, shower and laundry
facility model (SHWASHLOCK).
Secure Hygiene Resources: Restrooms and Showers
Explore locations and providers of additional restrooms and showers dedicated for the homeless community.
Consider hygiene buses or mobile restroom trailers,
as well as supportive partnerships with the faith-based community, homeless advocates, businesses and
other organizations.
Continue to Fund Homeward Bound
Appropriate $25,000 in the FY 2018 Budget for
Homeward Bound. Outreach to other service-providing
agencies to offer access to these funds. Invite the
Homeless Action Partnership to jointly fund the program.
Encourage public donations.
Secure Electronic Device Charging Resources
Research the charging station program at the library.
Secure and site electronic device charging resources in the City. Encourage other locations outside of the City.
H O M E L E S S N E S S R E P O R T
AND PLAN SUMMARY
A Snapshot of Homelessness
Disabling Conditions That Contribute to Homelessness*
Psychiatric condition 39%
Substance use disorder 38%
Post-traumatic stress disorder 32%
Chronic health condition 31%
Traumatic brain injury 18%
AIDS/HIV-related condition 2%
Duration of
Homelessness*
■ 30 days or less 7%
■ 1-11 months 31%
■ 1 year or longer 49%
Locations*
■ Streets 36%
■ Vehicles 30%
■ Encampments 10%
■ Abandoned structures 4%
■ Sheltered 20%
Homeless: 1,204 people
in the City of Santa Cruz
80% Unsheltered
*Santa Cruz County
Source: 2017 Point-in-Time Homeless Census
31.178 1.97
Create a 2x2 Committee with the County
Formally invite the County to participate and schedule
the first meeting for Summer 2017.
Explore Potential for Local Help from No Place Like
Home Legislation (AB 1618)
Work with the County in anticipation of the Notice of
Financial Availability release in Winter 2018.
Develop a Revenue Source for Housing
Support the work of the Affordable Housing Committee
or other efforts to identify, create and dedicate funding for development of housing.
Coordinate State Advocacy with Other High-Ratio
Homeless Communities
Engage in Strategic Planning with the Homeless
Services Center, County and Other Service Partners
Coordinate State Advocacy with Other High-Ratio
Homeless Communities.
Engage and Advocate Federal Representatives on
Homelessness and Mental Illness Needs
Improve City’s Internal Coordination System and
Homeless Protocols from Front Line to Public Safety
Staff, and Ensure Training and Support
Create Homelessness Information and Resource Page
on City Website
Long Horizon Solutions (5+ years), Adopted by City Council Cultivate Development of Housing
Support the development of housing.
In addition, three shelter options are recommended and are ranked in terms of priority:
#1 Consider San Francisco Navigation Center Model
Engage in partner and community discussions about a regional navigation center. This is the gold standard:
a one-stop facility integrating rehabilitation, employment, shelter and wrap-around services. #2 Pursue Permanent, Regional, Year-Round Homeless Shelter Center Engage in partner and community discussion about
a regional year-round homeless shelter center.
#3 Explore a Day Center with Basic Services and Case Management Consider the re/establishment of a day center with basic services and case management workers to provide a productive environment that helps with immediate and long-term needs.
Short Horizon Solutions (continued)
Homelessness Coordinating Committee – Santa Cruz City Council Subcommittee Mayor Chase • Councilmember Noroyan • Former Councilmember Comstock • cityofsantacruz.com REV31.179 ISED 09 1.98/11/17
ATTACHMENT 2: 2000 HOMELESSNESS ISSUES TASK FORCE REPORT
31.180 1.99
ITEM: __________
CITY COUNCIL
AGENDA REPORT
DATE: June 2, 2011
AGENDA OF: January 11, 2000
DEPARTMENT: Homeless Issues Task Force
SUBJECT: INTERIM REPORT FROM HOMELESS ISSUES TASK FORCE RECOMMENDATION: That the City Council, by motion, accept the report and provide direction.
BACKGROUND:
The Homeless Issues Task Force was formed by the City Council to study homeless issues and to develop recommendations to ameliorate the conditions and conflicts relating to the homeless.
Generally, our charge has been described in these terms:
1) the development of permanent year-round shelter for all segments of the homeless community; and
2) opportunities for improving currently provided services; and 3) the rights and responsibilities of homeless persons.
Eight members of the task force began work on August 16. Council completed appointments in October, bringing our number to 13. We have all committed to twice-monthly regular meetings, as well as task-driven subcommittees.
A general plan of approach flowed from our initial meetings. At first, task force meetings were very lengthy, but as we become more familiar with each other and the City’s Advisory Board procedures, our productivity steadily improves. Attendance and participation continues to be excellent overall.
Three reasons we got rolling quickly deserve mention here. First, we had materials from the Council committee that reviewed the Camping Ordinance last year, as well as other background materials to orient us and overcome differences in backgrounds and experiences. Second, the City Manager had selected an incredible team for our staff, which provides the task force approximately 20 crucial hours per week. Third, there are a number of citizens who are not task force members who diligently attend task force and subcommittee meetings and who do heroic amounts of legwork.
The task force spent early sessions exploring ways to bring order around these overwhelming issues. Concerns and possibilities were separated into two categories: 1) Urgent, critical and emergent issues; and 2) Longer-term issues. Longer-term issues required greater exploration and more complex study, research, or development. The two issue lists then became a starting point
31.181 1.100
SUBJECT:
PAGE 2
for subcommittees, to be prioritized and developed into coherent recommendations for the Council.
Four standing subcommittees meet regularly to prioritize, sort and prepare issues for the task force agenda. Subcommittees have taken on situations and issues which have been at impasse for a long time, and have determined to develop useful recommendations and resolutions. This brings subcommittee members up against immediate unmet needs of homeless and transitioning people, and in touch with the public's need for education about issues of homelessness. The standing subcommittees are:
Shelter and Housing
Legal and Law Enforcement
Employment, Treatment, and Other Services
Outreach, Advocacy and Process
Once we organized and broke into subcommittees, the need for gathering fresh, relevant information directly from homeless individuals and families was self-evident. We were further moved by recent reports of anti-homeless assaults. We resolved to make a safe and confidential way for people who can’t or won’t usually visit public hearings to participate. We directed the Outreach, Advocacy and Process subcommittee to set up opportunities in which we could all participate, thus learning more about assaults as well as the other daily experiences of homeless people. The Outreach, Advocacy and Process Subcommittee created opportunities in which all task force members could participate. We spent an afternoon, using varied modes of approach and documentation at the Homeless Community Resource Center. Thus we learned more about underreported assaults, along with hearing from homeless people about their daily experiences.
This was an important aspect as the task force continued to prioritize its work.
PRELIMINARY RECOMMENDATIONS:
The task force previously forwarded recommendations to the City Council on matters we believed were extremely urgent as winter approached. We asked that the Council move forward quickly on these items, driven by humanitarian concerns, without waiting for our final report in February. These were:
The Camping Ordinance - We recommended repeal of this ordinance since the City does not have adequate indoor shelter for all its residents (refer to our earlier correspondence to review the reasoning and ramifications of this recommendation). We acknowledge the number of citations has decreased because of the City's practice of issuing warnings rather than citations when possible.
Rent Stabilization - Nationally Santa Cruz ranks in the top five regions for the highest rents relative to incomes. Many of the homeless are regularly, or even fully, employed, and still cannot afford to rent a home. We recommended that the City adopt rent stabilization as a means of preventing new homelessness and as a means of assisting currently homeless back into housing.
Living Wage - Because of the high cost of living, the task force recommends that the Council consider supporting a Living Wage Ordinance.
31.182 1.101
SUBJECT:
PAGE 3
The following subcommittee reports include work in progress. Some may not be addressed in the time remaining to the task force.
Safe Sleeping Zones - We recommended that the City create safe, legal sleeping zones as there is clearly not enough appropriate indoor shelter, and those sleeping outside are subject to the threat of citation and arrest and the threat of violence against themselves.
Parking Restrictions - We recommend that no additional parking restrictions be imposed for the purpose of reducing vehicular sleeping since there are no legal alternatives in place and more enforcement would create more difficulties. The task force supports a citywide approach which encompasses viable alternatives, both for people who sleep in vehicles and for housed neighbors.
Winter Shelter access—we recommend increased access to the Armory with a night bus and a linking bus to Labor Ready in the morning to accommodate the working homeless.
In addition to these recommendations, we would like to note our success in expediting the implementation of reduced fines for Camping Ordinance tickets. The implementation had languished in the bureaucracy for months after the Council ordered the reduction in fines. As well, we would like to commend the City Council for supporting a countywide survey of the homeless population and its needs.
The task force also helped initiate the creation of a process for the ISSP to formally notify the City when the Armory is at capacity. This may lead to periodic dismissal of Camping Ordinance citations, as is called for by the amendments to the Camping Ordinance that Council enacted last spring.
The task force has also initiated a draft advisory letter that will provide important legal information on the Camping Ordinance to homeless people, the court system and the community at large. We await feedback on the letter from the Mayor.
Interim Recommendations of the Task Force
The recommendations that follow include many that are not in their final form.
Shelter, housing and places to sleep
We recommend that the Council acknowledge that camping and vehicular sleeping will not stop because of laws. We suggest that the City move to an approach that regulates camping and vehicular sleeping, while minimizing negative impacts. Some examples of this approach include development of programs for expanding vehicular sleeping, including:
• Creation of a modest, staffed program to match vehicular sleepers with legal locations in church and business parking lots.
• Selection of legal parking areas on public streets or parking lots away from residences for overnight parking.
31.183 1.102
SUBJECT:
PAGE 4
• Creation of a system of permits for sleeping in vehicles which is simple, free for those in need and avoids labeling anyone homeless.
• Extension of the 3-day time limit for sleeping in a vehicle parked in a driveway with permission from the permanent residents there.
• Creation of a conventionally managed public campground in the City of Santa Cruz which would exist for both tourist and homeless campers. Revenue from tourists would help to allow subsidy of very low-income campers.
We recommend that the City work toward year-round availability of the Armory with zero or low rent, recognizing that Armory-style emergency shelter has many limitations. This would begin with an emphasis on working at the state level to make it possible to use the armory yearround.
We suggest that the City work toward creation of a shelter for families with children.
We recommend that the City work toward creation of an additional shelter site for the ISSP program that would be available 24-hours a day, 365 days a year, to be used flexibly by the program to meet special needs not currently met by church and Armory sites.
We recommend that the City help create a home-matching program for homeless families and households willing to accommodate them.
Substance abuse treatment
We recommend that the City, with other entities, work to develop a new residential substance abuse treatment facility geared specifically to meet the needs of homeless persons with a history of chronic substance abuse. The recent loss of two long-time homeless residents due to the effects of substance abuse, one of whom had been seeking treatment in vain in the last days of his life, underline the desperate need for these services. The task force will be providing information on models, potential funding sources, and potential collaboration partners, and also recommendations on the preferred features of such a treatment program.
We recommend that the City work to expand opportunities for treatment with a goal of treatment on demand, so that “windows of opportunity” are not lost.
We recommend that the City work to provide a small “safe haven” drop-in shelter for those not able to enter more structured shelter programs, with tolerance for active substance users. This project would include explicit outreach to high-risk individuals.
Supportive Services
We recommend that the City help create an independent “ombudsperson” position for homeless people to receive, document and assist with complaints related to homeless services (both agencies and governmental). The person in this position would also refer homeless people to appropriate services and/or agencies and document service shortages when there is no referral available.
We recommend that the City help create a homeless persons day labor program located at the Coral Street site.
31.184 1.103
SUBJECT:
PAGE 5
We recommend that the City help assist in the creation of a small job training and employment enterprise for homeless people.
Legal and Law Enforcement Issues
We recommend that the City work with other jurisdictions to reconcile differences between the Camping Ordinance provision related to community service for violations and existing Court practices. These differences preclude violators from performing community service for camping violations.
We wish to inform the City of our successful involvement in upgrading the hourly calculations used by the court referral program, Community Options, from five to seven dollars per hour.
We recommend that the Police Department make an effort to eliminate the appearance of selective enforcement of the “downtown ordinances” and other ordinances which are often enforced against persons who appear to be homeless but not enforced against people who appear to be well-dressed and affluent.
We recommend the Police Department adopt a consistent policy of not citing or arresting people for typically homeless-related violations when they approach the police to report violent crimes.
We recommend that the Police Department adopt a method of gathering specific data and tracking of crimes against homeless people.
We recommend revision of laws which prohibit scavenging of recyclables since this is often a source of income for homeless individuals.
The following are areas in which task force has not yet completed recommendations. We are working on, and intend to more fully examine these concerns in the remaining months:
Develop and recommend or propose a program of education and outreach to the larger community about homeless issues and needs.
Identify and recommend funding sources for additional homeless services.
Propose ways in which the City of Santa Cruz could work with other entities to increase or improve delivery of important services to homeless people.
Propose specific suggestions for revising the City’s Camping Ordinance.
Propose plans for support people such as advocates and observers for homeless people who need to deal with the courts and the criminal justice systems.
Propose revisions for the “downtown ordinances.”
Explore utilization of the “Downtown Mediation Report” and its suggestions for resolving conflicts between homeless people and others downtown.
The task force also recognizes the tremendous need for additional transitional, permanent, and ‘very low income’ housing, both to avoid displacements and to increase options for alreadyhomeless people. We believe this is a very important issue related to homelessness; one in which the City of Santa Cruz is a crucial player. However, this task force cannot do substantive work on these matters within its remaining time. We are hoping the City will address its 1998
31.185 1.104
SUBJECT:
PAGE 6
Mission Statement regarding homelessness by pursuing progress in establishing safe, accessible housing in every neighborhood.
Finally, we would like to note the enormous magnitude of issues contained in the assignment given to the task force. There is no way a group such as this can do justice to the assignment in a six-month period, with part-time staffing. We respectfully request that the City Council consider extending the life of this task force and creating a permanent advisory body dedicated to the hardest issues.
Respectfully submitted by:
Linda Lemaster, Chair Ken Cole, Vice-Chair Timote Peterson Nancy Anecito Paul Brindel Christine Sippl
Sherry Conable Peter Eberle Marilyn Weaver
Lucy Kemnitzer Thomas Leavitt Mel Nunez
Don Lane, Staff Coordinator Tom Nedelsky Laura Tucker, Staff Assistant Submitted by:
Linda Lemaster
Chair
o:\HITF.RPT
Attachments: Supplement to the Interim Report of the Homeless Issues Task Force by Lucy Kemnitzer
31.186 1.105
ATTACHMENT 3: CITY HOMELESSNESS HISTORICAL POLITY REVIEW
31.187 1.106
City of Santa Cruz Community Advisory Committee on Homeless (CACH) Review of Past and Current Homelessness-Related Policy Recommendations: By Category The following chart lists homelessness-related policy recommendations that have been presented to and considered by the Santa Cruz City Council over the last two decades. Some recommendations are broad ranging, involving multiple governmental and non-governmental agencies, while others are specific to the City alone. Recommendations are listed by category.
Recommendations Timeframe Action Taken Considerations/Challenges Direct Services
Create a Homeless Persons Day
Labor Program at Coral Street
Contract for Homeless Jobs
Engagement Program
July `17-
present
Downtown Streets Team (DST) under contract and operating since July 2017.
The CACH may elect to invite the DST team to present on their program and results.
Explore a Day Center with Basic
Services and Case Management
The RSC was originally opened in Feb. `18 as Phase I of a three phased plan to create a Day Center. Efforts on Phase 2 did not yield a feasible solution for siting
Siting for the continued operation of the RSC with
expansion to a Day Center is needed by Jan. 2020. The
CACH may elect to focus on siting and program
modeling for shelter services.
Increase Outreach Services and
Mobile Behavioral Health/Mental
Health Response
Through County contract, added one Downtown Outreach
Worker for a total of two, providing 7-day-a-week, 10-hourper-day coverage (overlap on Wednesday). Through County contract, added one Mental Health Liaison, for a total of two liaisons who partner with SCPD. PACT redesign/HOPES Team approved by the City Council on January 9, 2018, with
implementation in the spring.
The CACH may elect to be educated on current
outreach services available in the City.
Create Triage
Location/Expanded Recovery
Center for Crisis Intervention
FY `18 City committed $40,000 in funding for FY 2018 for the County operated Sobering Center. In January 2018, the Center
began accepting both alcohol and drug related arrests for sobering.
Access to substance use disorder treatment serves as a
bottleneck in our community due to limited bed space.
The CACH may elect to be educated on this subject.
Secure Storage Facilities March `19 The City allocated $5000 to support Day/Night Storage. RSC offers storage to individuals staying on site.
More storage resources are needed and the CACH may
elect to tackle this issue as a priority.
Secure Hygiene Resources:
Restrooms and Showers
FY `18 & `19 The City provides funding support ($30K) to the Homeless Services Center to add 15 hours per week in drop-in access to bathrooms, showers and laundry. As needed, the City
provides temporary hygiene and hand washing stations in areas of concentrated need.
Existing hygiene resources do not meet current demand
and the CACH may elect to tackle this issue as a priority.
Fund Homeward Bound FY `19 & `19 Funded at $25,000 in FY 2018 and $35,000 for FY 2019.
31.188 1.107
Expanded access to program to Rangers and Downtown
Outreach Workers.
Secure Electronic Device
Charging Resources
Currently available in 10 library branches countywide
Sheltering and Housing
Increase Local Shelter Options Feb–Nov `18 The City opened and operated the 1220 River Street Camp (RSC)
Due to unsuccessful attempt to find an alternate
location of the camp, the camp was closed.
Jan `19-
present
Winter Shelter is expanded to include Laurel St., in addition to VFW, both sites operated by Salvation Army
VFW shelter was closed due to facility availability, Laurel Street capacity was increased to accommodate need.
VFW will open again Nov. `19-March `20. Laurel is
currently at capacity. The CACH may elect to weigh in
on effective program modeling for emergency shelter in
our community.
May `19-
present
1220 RSC is reopened, this time operated by Salvation Army with a projected closure date of March `20
The River Camp site will close in March of `20 to
accommodate a water infrastructure project. A new site
must be found. The RSC is current at capacity. The
CACH needs to weigh in on and develop siting
recommendations for the RSC transition no later than
January 2020.
June `19 Winter Shelter is extended to run year round Homeless Emergency Aid Program (HEAP) funds, received in Feb. `19 from the state to the Continuum of Care administered by the County, are used to extend
the Winter Shelter program.
Establish Ordinance Language for
Transitional Encampments
Feb - March
`19
Council moved on March 12, 2019 to table discussion on
transitional encampment and safe parking ordinance
amendments until that subject is contemplated in the project charter scope.
The transitional encampment project charter focuses on
reaching community consensus on the program model
and siting of transitional encampments in our
community. This work was delegated by the Council to
CACH.
Identify Site Location for
Transitional Encampment or Safe
Sleeping Site
March `19 Staff presented Council with a list of possible locations to site a sanctioned encampment
The CACH may elect to include program modeling
considerations for safe sleeping and sanctioned
encampment siting in their work plan.
Design and Implement a Small
Scale Safe Sleeping and Storage
Program
March `19 Design of this program was started, but implementation was halted due to lack of support by community/neighborhoods.
Due to the rush to find a solution to the health and safety issues posed by the Gateway/Ross unsanctioned
encampment, policies were pushed upon the
community without sufficient (if any)
outreach/engagement. The CACH may elect to include
program modeling considerations for safe sleeping and
sanctioned encampment siting in their work plan.
Consider San Francisco Along with the County and other HAP jurisdictions, the City HEAP funds were put towards implementation of
31.189 1.108
Navigation Center Shelter Model
(full-service, low-barrier, yearround shelter)
has been pursuing a navigation center model for two years. Navigation Centers in both north and south counties.
Pursue Permanent, Regional,
Year-Round Homeless Shelter
Cultivate Development of
Housing
June `18-
present
The SC Council adopted the Council Housing Blueprint
subcommittee’s implementation recommendations on June
12, 2018, and staff, as directed, have been bringing back implementing policy
Create Safe Sleeping Zones
Expand Winter Shelter Access June `19 See extension of Winter Shelter above Legislation/Advocacy
Declare Shelter Crisis Jan 2018 City Council declares a Shelter Crisis in the City of Santa Cruz under California Government Code Section 8698 et. al. to facilitate the sheltering plan.
This declaration made the City eligible for state funding.
Explore Potential of No Place Like
Home Legislation (AB 1618)
The CACH may elect to study current legislation at the
state and federal level.
Develop Revenue Source for
Housing
The availability of State funding through the California Emergency Solutions and Housing (CESH) Program and
Homeless Emergency Aid Program (HEAP) countywide
presents a pivotal opportunity for investment in homelessness and housing support. However, this funding is not for housing, rather homelessness.
HEAP and CESH funds are allocated to the County and
distributed via the Homeless Action Partnership (HAP).
The City is not guaranteed access to this funding source.
The CACH may elect to study current legislation at the
state and federal level to fund housing.
Coordinate State Advocacy with
Other High-Ratio Homeless
Communities
Engage Federal Representatives
on Homelessness and Mental
Illness Needs
Systems Improvements
Create Independent
Homelessness “Ombudsperson”
Position
Support Coordinated Entry Summer `18-
present
The first phase of Coordinated Entry within County and service agencies launched summer 2018, with subsequent phases to roll out over the next two years.
The County’s Human Services Department administers
Coordinated Entry. Process improvement steps are being
taken continuously. The CACH may elect to be
educated on Coordinated Entry to understand its
opportunities and constraints.
Create a 2x2 Committee with Sept `17- Committee was formed in September 2017.
31.190 1.109
County of Santa Cruz present
Engage in Strategic Planning with
Homeless Services Center, County
and other Service Partners
Ongoing The City works closely and continuously with the County and service providers, cultivating productive partnerships to develop actionable strategies.
The CACH may elect to consider and engagement plan
with the community on current strategic planning efforts.
Improve City Internal
Coordination System and
Protocols; Ensure Training and
Support for Employees
SC Police Department training provided continuously, as requested, for staff and community members. The City has launched an internal coordinating committee to focus on homelessness issues.
Create Homelessness Information
and Resources Page on City
Website
www.cityofsantacruz.com/community/homelessness
Municipal Code/Ordinances
Revision of Laws Which Prohibit
Scavenging of Recyclables
Halt Creation of Additional
Parking Restrictions
Adapt a Method of Gathering
Specific Data and Tracking of
Crimes Against Homeless
Individuals
Adopt a Policy of Not Citing
People for Homeless-Related
Violations When They Approach
the Police to Report Violent
Crimes
Repeal of the Camping
Ordinance
April 9, `19 Council motion carried to suspend enforcement of SCMC Ch.
6.36 – Camping against homeless individuals pending an
amendment that is consistent with the 9th Circuit’s decision in Martin v. Boise.
New/revised camping ordinance must be written and
the CACH may elect to provide engagement
opportunities and policy direction on this topic.
Establish a Living Wage
Ordinance
31.191 1.110
ATTACHMENT 4: CACH BYLAWS
31.192 1.111
Community Advisory Committee on Homelessness (CACH)
BYLAWS
Approved by the Committee: Sept. 3, 2019
Revisions per motion on Jan. 21st in red
Article I. Purpose of Committee
The Committee’s purpose is to review current and previous City of Santa Cruz homelessnessrelated recommendations and policies; research best practices; identify current efforts related to homelessness and their effects on the community and people experiencing homelessness themselves; engage with the community; identify priorities; and make recommendations to the City Council.
Article II. Authority and Establishment of the Committee The Committee was established by Santa Cruz City Council on June 25, 2019 and was seated on July 30th, 2019. The Committee is subject to the Brown Act and all other applicable law. The Committee is established for 9 months from the time of the first meeting, with extensions allowed with Council approval.
Article III. Organization of the Committee
(a) Committee Composition
(i) The Committee starts work with the following thirteen members (membership has been updated as of Feb. 4, 2020):
Ami Chen Mills-Naim
Candice Elliott
Serg Kagno
Don Lane
Taj Leahy
Stina Roach
Brooke Newman
Aran Nichol
Frank Sanchez
Rafael Sonnenfeld
Dwaine Tait
Ingrid Trejo
Katie Woolsey
Stoney Brook
Alie Soares
Evan Morrison
(b) Committee member withdrawal
i. Members may withdraw from the Committee at any time by providing a letter of resignation to the Council, with copies to City staff to be distributed to the other Members.
1 31.193 1.112
ii. Members may have no more than 3 unexcused absences or 5 absences total absences during the timeline established in Article II. If a Member has more than 5 absences total, they forfeit their membership. Participation by conference call is not considered an absence, must be approved by a Co-Chair in advance, and is not preferred.
(c) Convener
The Committee shall appoint a Convener to facilitate Committee meetings. The Convener has no motion authority, will not be a voting member, and serves at the pleasure of the Committee. The Convener’s role is to oversee the meeting process and help provide structure and adherence to parliamentary norms. The Committee may elect to caucus to provide opportunities for informal conversations and dialog. In the absence of the Convener, the Co-Chairs will facilitate the meeting. (d) Co-Chairs
The Committee shall elect 2 Committee members as Co-Chairs. Their responsibilities shall include: shaping meeting agendas and serving as spokespeople when communicating with the City Council at the direction of the Committee. The Co-Chairs are the point of contact to represent the will of the Committee with City staff in the event of a media request. Individual Committee members retain the right to speak on their own behalf as a member of the Committee.
(e) Quorum
A meeting or any business activity of more than half of the current membership of the Committee must be conducted in public per the Brown Act. Committee meeting will be considered to have sufficient members present to convene if there are one more than a simple majority of the current membership at the meeting.
Article IV. Roles and Communications
(a) Committee-City Council
(i) The Committee may invite Councilmembers to meetings from time to time. The Committee appreciates if Councilmembers would not speak or actively participate in Committee meetings unless input is specifically requested by the Committee.
(ii) The Committee will communicate with the City Council by e-mail, letter or written report which may be accompanied by an oral communication as authorized by the Committee.
(iii) Reasons for the Committee to report to the Council include:
2 31.194 1.113
1) To provide updates on status of work;
2) To make recommendations based on Committee review; and 3) Individual Committee Members may communicate personally with Council members, within the constraints of the Brown Act. Individual Committee Members who communicate personally with Councilmembers, or at City Council meeting, will only do so on their own behalf. They will not represent the Committee unless authorized by the Committee.
(b) Committee Member - Committee Members
(i) Collaboration with an open outlook: Members will at all times keep to their commitment to the City that they will participate collaboratively and maintain an outlook that is open to new information and new outcomes. If the Committee members experience interpersonal conflict that may threaten the collaboration process toward the goals of the CACH, medication may be used. (c) Committee-Public
(i) Members may engage with the public to describe their experience as Members of the Committee, the information that they have learned, or any changes to their perspectives.
(ii) Members will always make it clear when they speak or write in public that they speak for themselves, and not as a spokesperson for the Committee unless expressly directed to perform that duty by the Committee. (d) City Staff
City staff shall:
(i) Support the Committee’s work by ensuring that appropriate resources are made available to the Committee in a timely manner, in consultation with the Co-Chairs.
(ii) Offer suggestions and recommendations in a collaborative manner with the Committee.
Article V. Work Plan
The Committee will agree on a work plan. This will include an early agreement about the form of the work product and timeline for reports and recommendations to the public and/or City Council.
3 31.195 1.114
Article VI. Decision-making process
(a) General Decision Process
The Committee’s decision-making processes will differ from the Council or City Commissions in that it is intended to reach consensus through a collaborative process (See glossary.) Therefore, the Committee will use this hierarchy of decision tools:
(i) The preferred decision tool is for the Committee to arrive at a “sense of the meeting.”
(ii) Consensus is highly desirable.
(iii) Informal voting may only be used to explore the decision space. (iv) Formal voting may be used as a fallback when consensus fails. Passage of a motion shall require a 2/3 majority of the members present and voting. (v) Mediation may be used in the event that the Committee, utilizing the agreedupon General Decision-making Process as stipulated in Article VI a (i-iv), reaches impasse.
Article VII. Meeting Procedures
(a) Committee Meetings will occur at least monthly or as agreed upon by the Committee. Subcommittees may meet more often and if desired have city staff support when available.
(i) Committee members who cannot attend should notify the Co-Chairs and City staff in advance.
(b) The meeting times shall be posted on the Committee’s website and shall be given public notice similar to City Council meetings through e-mail notification, and notification shall be sent on the same timeline to homeless service providers, nonprofit, faith-based, and community organizations, within the City.
(c) City staff will coordinate meeting materials.
(i) assemble the agenda with the Co-Chairs, and post the agenda 5 days in advance of any public meeting of the Committee, when feasible, 4 31.196 1.115
(ii) ensure that the agenda is posted on the Committee website, shared on an email notification system, and shared with the same organizations noted in Article VII (b)
(iii) maintain action-only meeting minutes for the Committee’s review at the following meeting. Staff shall have projector available to show real time motions and amendments for Committee Members to see and vote on, and will ensure that there is a call-in number for Committee Members who are unable to attend in-person.
(iv) meeting minutes will include an ongoing record of attendance, including Committee Members and those members of the public who choose to identify themselves.
(d) Involvement of the Public in Meetings
Each session will include an opportunity for public comment/oral communications regarding Committee-related matters with time allotted to comment decided by Committee vote. The Committee recognizes the need to accommodate members of the public that may have limited time and access to meetings and thereby will provide opportunities to comment at the beginning and end of each meeting. 5 31.197 1.116
Glossary
Action only minutes: these are the minutes that show the actual decisions and forward actions.
Consensus: consent of all the parties. Consensus can include “standing aside,” in which one or more parties can say “I am not going to block this, but I am willing to let it go. However, I want my non-agreement to be noted.”
Sense of the Meeting: After discussing an issue, often at some length, there is a palpable feeling in the room that a wise and stable decision has been reached the facilitator or Co-Chair will confirm with the group that a sense of the meeting has been achieved. 6 31.198 1.117
ATTACHMENT 5: FOCUS STRATEGIES HOMELESS SYSTEM BASELINE ASSESSMENT REPORT
31.199 1.118
Santa Cruz County
Homeless System Baseline Assessment Report
Prepared for Santa Cruz County
by Focus Strategies
August 2019
31.200 1.119
Santa Cruz County Baseline System Assessment | Prepared for the County of Santa Cruz by Focus Strategies | August 2019 | Page i Santa Cruz County Baseline System Assessment
Prepared by Focus Strategies for Santa Cruz County
August 2019
Table of Contents
Executive Summary...........................................................................................................................................ii I. Background and Purpose .......................................................................................................................... 1 II. Information Sources and Methodology .................................................................................................... 2 III. Community Context: Homelessness in Santa Cruz County ...................................................................... 3 A. Numbers and Characteristics of People Experiencing Homelessness in Santa Cruz County............... 3 B. Trends in Recent Years.......................................................................................................................... 5 IV. Framework for Assessment: A Homeless Crisis Response System........................................................... 8 V. Assessment of Community Response to Homelessness: Current Efforts, Strengths, Challenges........ 11 A. Leadership and Governance ............................................................................................................... 11 B. Strategies to Reduce Inflow ................................................................................................................ 16 C. Homeless System Interventions.......................................................................................................... 17
1. Emergency Response.................................................................................................................... 18
2. Homeless Targeted Housing Interventions.................................................................................. 22
3. Coordinated Entry System (CES)................................................................................................... 25 D. Exits: Affordable Housing ................................................................................................................. 28 E. Data and Evaluation Capacity........................................................................................................... 31 F. Other System Components and Topics............................................................................................ 32 VI. Implications of Assessment and Interim Recommendations................................................................... 34 Appendix A List of Interview Participants...................................................................................................... 40 Appendix B List of In-Person Community Engagements and Focus Groups................................................. 41 Appendix C List of Documents Reviewed ...................................................................................................... 42 Appendix D List of Data Reviewed ................................................................................................................. 43 Appendix E Homeless Crisis Response System Flow Chart ........................................................................... 44 Appendix F Total System Capacity - 2019 HIC Beds...................................................................................... 45
31.201 1.120
Santa Cruz County Baseline System Assessment | Prepared for the County of Santa Cruz by Focus Strategies | August 2019 | Page ii Executive Summary
The County of Santa Cruz has engaged Focus Strategies to assist community leadership and key stakeholders to evaluate, align, and improve the countywide response to the local crisis of homelessness.
This report is the first step in a phased technical assistance project that will ultimately result in a design for a coordinated systemwide response to homelessness and an action plan to implement it. The purpose of this initial assessment is to describe current efforts to address homelessness in Santa Cruz County, identify strengths and gaps of the current approach, and make some interim recommendations for steps the community can take to improve its response to homelessness in the short-term, including recommendations related to system governance. This initial baseline assessment draws primarily upon qualitative data, collected through review of local documents, available data, and a thorough stakeholder engagement process, including in-person and by-phone interviews with key stakeholders, community engagement meetings, and focus groups.
Following this baseline assessment, Focus Strategies will conduct additional work to reach a more complete understanding of the existing homeless system in Santa Cruz county and assist the community in moving to a more effective response to homelessness. Drawing upon local data, Focus Strategies will conduct a quantitative systemwide analysis to understand local homeless system performance at the project and overall system level using our System-Wide Analytics and Projection (SWAP) suite of tools.
The SWAP analysis, which is already in progress, will measure the results the current system is achieving and inform the development of strategies to improve performance results through predictive modeling.
Focus Strategies will engage stakeholders in a discussion of the SWAP results and a collaborative process to develop a new homeless system design that is data-informed. The final product of our work in Santa Cruz will be an actionable plan to implement a more coordinated, community-wide and systematic response to homelessness, to be delivered by April 2020. The following graphic shows the general flow and projected timeline of each phase, including this baseline assessment, that comprise Focus Strategies’ engagement with Santa Cruz County.
However, forward movement to improving the community’s response does not have to wait until all the technical assistance is completed. Focus Strategies has also developed a Short-Term Action Plan as a companion to this baseline assessment. The Short-Term Action Plan lays out our recommended steps for implementation of the interim recommendations in this report, including suggested activities, timelines, and lead entities. Based on the community’s needs, Focus Strategies will provide technical assistance to support implementation of the interim recommendations as part of this broader project. Currently planned implementation technical assistance includes:
31.202 1.121
Santa Cruz County Baseline System Assessment | Prepared for the County of Santa Cruz by Focus Strategies | August 2019 | Page iii • Develop and facilitate implementation and learning collaboratives with key community stakeholders to advance interim recommendations from this report, or to support other learning objectives (beginning in September 2019); and
• Design and lead meetings with the reconvened Homeless Governance Study Committee to reach an agreement on revised governance, planning, funding, and implementation structure (also beginning in September 2019).
Assessment Findings
Overall, Focus Strategies’ baseline assessment has found that the Santa Cruz community has a significant homeless problem relative to its population. Funding, functioning, and the size of the homeless crisis response system are not at the scale or level of alignment and coordination needed to begin to reverse current trends. However, many essential system elements are in place and function fairly well, giving local stakeholders a good foundation to build upon. System strengths include a range of emergency responses (outreach, emergency shelter and services) that respond to the basic needs of people experiencing homelessness and, in some cases, operate with strong housing-focused intention. Rapid re-housing inventory is increasing. Permanent housing interventions targeted to people experiencing homeless are few but seem to be relatively well designed and targeted. Coordinated entry for most system resources is established and largely accepted within the community and has led to improvements in the availability of data on people experiencing homelessness. The Homeless Action Partnership (HAP) is recognized as a valuable forum for stakeholders to engage in dialogue on homelessness and has been successful in its role as coordinator of HUD Continuum of Care (CoC) mandated data gathering and planning. There is a strong track record of collaboration between stakeholders.
A few key programmatic pieces are missing or underdeveloped in the current approach. Most notably, the community lacks a strong and fully integrated diversion/problem-solving practice that deploys problem-solving as an important tool to be used at multiple touchpoints in the community.
Diversion/problem-solving is an intervention that can work with people seeking assistance to help some identify immediate housing alternatives and reduce the inflow of people into homelessness. Other programmatic areas that could be strengthened are shelter and outreach; which could be more strongly coordinated and enhanced with housing-focused strategies, training, and resources.
At the system level, well-informed members of the community actively participate in efforts to reduce homelessness and many examples of successful coordination exist. However, robust system-wide alignment around priorities and goals, capacity for data-driven decision making, and a more refined and empowered governance and implementation structure are needed. This aligned system will also need increased staffing capacity to support the system structure and see goals to fruition. Without these elements in place Santa Cruz cannot be said to have a fully realized homeless crisis response system in which all the parts work together toward a common set of measurable goals. And without such a system, progress on reducing homelessness will remain elusive.
31.203 1.122
Santa Cruz County Baseline System Assessment | Prepared for the County of Santa Cruz by Focus Strategies | August 2019 | Page iv Next Steps and Interim Recommendations
In the next phase of this technical assistance project, underway beginning in July 2019, Focus Strategies will prepare a quantitative analysis of homeless system performance using our Systemwide Analytics and Prediction (SWAP) suite of tools. Over the next several months, Focus Strategies will engage the community in a process of preparing, reviewing, and understanding the SWAP results, conduct predictive modeling, and develop data-informed strategies to re-design and improve the overall community response to homelessness.
The upcoming SWAP analysis and data-driven system planning will result in a long-term strategy and action plan to establish an effective, coordinated system to reduce homelessness. In the shorter-term, however, the community can move forward with system improvement efforts even as this longer-term work is underway. While the next phase of analytic and system re-design work is taking place, this baseline report provides the community with initial suggestions about recommended key strategies that may be developed and implemented immediately to help jump-start improvements to the homeless crisis response.
Suggested short-term system improvements are:
1. Implement a Systemwide Diversion Practice to Reduce Inflow. To begin reducing the numbers of people entering homelessness, we advise fast-tracking existing plans to launch diversion and scale up these efforts as rapidly and at as many appropriate service locations as possible.
Diversion provides practical support and, in some cases, small amounts of flexible funding to people who are experiencing homelessness to help them self-identify a housing solution, such as moving in with a friend, finding a shared housing situation, or returning to family. Standing up a community-wide diversion practice will require regular and ongoing training, as well as peer-topeer learning (such as a learning collaborative) and a method for collecting data on diversion to track impact. Improvements to the Coordinated Entry System (CES), aligned with the diversion approach, can also help reduce inflow.
2. Build Capacity of Emergency Shelters to Deliver Housing-Focused Services and Supports. Our assessment shows that the existing shelter providers in the community are already taking steps to integrate services that help residents move from shelter to housing. While the community is working to establish new navigation centers, building the capacity of existing shelters to provide more housing-focused services and supports would yield immediate impact. We recommend convening a working group of shelter providers and funders to identify elements that are working well and those that can be expanded or improved to increase the rate at which people leave emergency shelters for housing.
3. Coordinate and Standardize Outreach Efforts: In Santa Cruz county, several entities conduct outreach to unsheltered people; however, there is currently no formal coordination of these efforts, agreed upon goals, shared protocols, consistent data collection, or common outcome measures. Over the long-term, the Santa Cruz community needs a proactive strategy for addressing unsheltered homelessness and encampments as part of the creation of a systematic response to homelessness. This will be a significant undertaking that requires an updated
31.204 1.123
Santa Cruz County Baseline System Assessment | Prepared for the County of Santa Cruz by Focus Strategies | August 2019 | Page v governance and implementation structure to be successful. In the interim, we recommend that stakeholders begin working immediately on coordination and alignment of outreach efforts – bringing the different outreach teams and their funders together to develop agreements on a shared approach, purpose, outcomes, and geographic coverage. Ensuring that outreach is efficiently deployed and connected to the rest of the system will help prepare the way toward a more comprehensive approach to unsheltered homelessness.
Governance Recommendations:
Focus Strategies has reviewed the work of the Homeless Governance Study Committee convened by the County (CAO) in 2017-2018. This group made great strides toward developing a revised Governance structure based on the existing HAP that we believe it is important for the community to complete and implement. The recommendations from that effort propose a workable structure that could act as a backbone for a new system approach. However, key questions about its authority, relationship to other entities, and how it will make and communicate decisions remain to be answered. We recommend that this group be reconvened,” with the County CAO’s office continuing to serve as the convener, while bringing in Focus Strategies to develop agendas, facilitate the discussions, and help guide the group to a final set of recommendations.
This process will answer critical questions about how the revised structure will operate, what purview it will have, and what resources and efforts it will jointly oversee. We recommend a series of four to five meetings between September and November 2019. Focus Strategies will design and facilitate a set of agendas to address specific topics, building from each meeting to arrive at agreement on a new governing structure, how it will function and make decisions, what specific funding sources it will oversee or coordinate/align, and how it will communicate decisions to the larger membership and the public. The meetings will focus on fleshing out and documenting how the new structure will accomplish key system planning functions; particularly: (1) setting strategic direction and priorities, (2) aligning funding to advance identified priorities, (3) creating a structure for public and private funders to work together, (4) ensuring the new structure complies with Federal requirements for Continuums of Care (CoC), and (5) building in communication protocols to ensure transparency. The end result of this reconvened governance process will be agreement on the new structure, including protocols and procedures for the items noted above. Focus Strategies will document the agreements in a written governance proposal to be presented to and approved by all relevant decision-making bodies (e.g. HAP, BOS, city councils, others).
Conclusion
This baseline assessment identifies some significant strengths in the existing homeless response in Santa Cruz County, including strong collaborative relationships, a broad array of necessary programs and services for people experiencing homelessness, and a desire to improve overall coordination of efforts toward a shared strategic direction. Focus Strategies has recommended some areas for immediate action to begin filling some of the identified gaps while we move into the next phase of deeper data analysis, modeling, and community engagement to develop long-term strategies and an action plan for a coordinated, systematic community response to homelessness. Steps for implementing the interim recommendations are laid out in a companion Short-Term Action Plan.
31.205 1.124
Santa Cruz County Baseline System Assessment | Prepared for the County of Santa Cruz by Focus Strategies | August 2019 | Page 1 I. Background and Purpose
The County of Santa Cruz has engaged Focus Strategies to assist community leadership and key stakeholders to evaluate, align, and improve the countywide response to the local homelessness crisis. As a first step in this process, Focus Strategies has conducted this initial baseline assessment of the state of homelessness in Santa Cruz County and the effectiveness of the community’s response. The baseline assessment primarily draws upon qualitative information gathered from a review of available documents and a wide range of individual interviews and group engagements with key stakeholders. The purpose of this assessment is to describe current efforts to address homelessness in Santa Cruz County, identify strengths and gaps of the current approach, and make some recommendations for interim steps the community can take to improve its response to homelessness in the short-term, including recommendations related to system governance. This assessment also lays the groundwork for the next phases of Focus Strategies’ technical assistance, in which we will engage the community in a deeper dive into system performance measurement and system planning.
As a companion to this initial baseline assessment, Focus Strategies has also produced a suggested set of action steps that the community can take to implement the interim recommendations over the next several months (August to December 2019), with our technical assistance. The Short-Term Action Plan also details the next steps in the broader system assessment and redesign that Focus Strategies will be undertaking in collaboration with community stakeholders, which include:
• System Performance and Predictive Modeling (July 2019 to February 2020): Focus Strategies has already begun the next phase of this technical assistance, which is a quantitative analysis of homeless system performance using our Systemwide Analytics and Prediction (SWAP) suite of tools. SWAP uses the community’s local data (from the local Homeless Management Information System (HMIS) and other sources) to develop an assessment of performance on key outcomes at the project and system levels and model the impact of system changes. These performance outcomes include the rate at which people experiencing homelessness are rehoused and whether they become homeless again, as well as other key outcomes that assess the how well the system targets its resources to those with the highest needs and longest histories of homelessness.
• Homeless System Design (August to December 2019): In parallel with the data analysis work described above, Focus Strategies will engage the community in a process to envision and design a fully-realized homeless crisis response system. The ultimate goal is for Santa Cruz County to move from having a collection of coordinated but still largely independent programs and projects serving people who experience homelessness to an aligned homeless crisis response system in which all the individual efforts work together to advance a shared set of clear objectives. Across each part of the system, roles and connections are clearly defined, and each player maintains shared accountability for results of the entire system. All stakeholders in the system work towards the common goal of assisting all people to exit homelessness into permanent housing, prioritizing those with the highest needs for homeless system resources. The system also works towards making homelessness rare, brief, and non-recurring, per the goals of Home, Together, the federal strategic plan to end homelessness.
31.206 1.125
Santa Cruz County Baseline System Assessment | Prepared for the County of Santa Cruz by Focus Strategies | August 2019 | Page 2 Technical assistance Focus Strategies will provide to guide the system design include:
o Presentations and discussion of this Baseline Assessment Report including the interim recommendations (August-September 2019)
o Formation and launch of one or more Implementation and Learning Collaboratives facilitated by Focus Strategies to support implementation of Interim Recommendations, and foster system-wide learning and improvement, as detailed in the Short-Term Action Plan (September-December 2019)
o Restarting the Homeless Governance Study Committee and reaching agreement on a new governance, funding, planning and implementation structure, as detailed in ShortTerm Action Plan (September to December 2019) o Presentations and discussion of the SWAP system performance and modeling results (November - December 2019) to develop a homeless crisis response system design that is strategic and data-informed
o Development of a recommended Administrative Structure (staffing plan) for the proposed system (November-December 2019)
• Action Plan Development (January to April 2020): Creating an actionable plan to implement the homeless crisis response system that the community has designed.
II. Information Sources and Methodology
The purpose of this assessment is to determine the strengths and challenges of the existing community response to homelessness and begin identifying strategies for improvement. In conducting this assessment, our “north star” is a fully realized “homeless crisis response system” that efficiently supports people who are experiencing homelessness to secure housing as quickly as possible and avoid returning to homelessness. A homeless crisis response system manages the “flow” of people from homelessness into housing using a consistent, communitywide strategy in which all the programs and services are aligned to common objectives. Section IV provides an explanation of the features of a homeless crisis response system and how it manages system flow in such a way that the community can measurably reduce the numbers of people experiencing homelessness.
To inform the findings and recommendations of this baseline assessment, Focus Strategies gathered and reviewed information from the following sources:
• Phone interviews with more than 20 key stakeholders representing different sectors, including local government staff, philanthropic funders, non-profit housing and service providers, advocates, and others. A complete list of interviewees and the agencies they represent is included as Appendix A;
• In-person meetings with representatives from the County of Santa Cruz, cities of Santa Cruz, Watsonville and Capitola, the Homeless Action Partnership (HAP), housing and service providers in both North and South County, two focus groups held with people with lived experience of homelessness, and site visits to two provider agencies (Homeless Service Center and Salvation
31.207 1.126
Santa Cruz County Baseline System Assessment | Prepared for the County of Santa Cruz by Focus Strategies | August 2019 | Page 3 Army). A complete list of meetings attended and facilitated by Focus Strategies staff with key Santa Cruz County stakeholders is included as Appendix B; • Review of local reports and other documents regarding system planning, governance, funding and allocations, previous evaluations and analyses, and performance reports. Documents reviewed as part of this assessment are listed in Appendix C; and • Review of available data on homelessness in Santa Cruz county, including the Housing Inventory Count (HIC), Point in Time (PIT) Count, and Santa Cruz’ results on HUD’s System Performance Measures. These are standard reports that HUD requires from each Continuum of Care and are prepared in Santa Cruz by the staff and consultants that support the Homeless Action Partnership (HAP). Focus Strategies reviewed HIC and PIT data from 2015 to 2019 and system performance measures from 2017 and 2018. Data reviewed as part of this assessment are listed in Appendix D.
III. Community Context: Homelessness in Santa Cruz County A. Numbers and Characteristics of People Experiencing Homelessness in Santa Cruz County The most recent annual Homeless Point in Time Count in Santa Cruz County, conducted in January 2019, found 2,167 people experiencing homelessness on any given night. These 2,167 people were part of 1,440 distinct households experiencing homelessness. Around 78% were unsheltered (living outdoors, in cars, and other places not meant for human habitation). According to local stakeholders, most of these individuals are living in encampments, primarily concentrated in the City of Santa Cruz. The remaining population was staying emergency shelter (15.5%) or transitional housing (6%) on the night of the count.
The PIT data shows that most of the homeless population in the community is comprised of single adult households, at around 89%. Only 8% of the population counted in 2019 were members of families with children. Santa Cruz County is also home to large number of transition aged youth (TAY) - defined as those who are age 18 to 24. In the 2019 count, youth ages 18 to 24 comprised around 27.5% of Santa Cruz’ homeless population while unaccompanied children (under age 18) comprised 2.3% of the population (around 30% total). Santa Cruz is known as a tourist destination, as well as a beach and surfing community. Some local stakeholders believe that among new arrivals to Santa Cruz County are some persons who are experiencing homelessness; however, the PIT count shows that a majority of those experiencing homelessness were residents of Santa Cruz County before they became homeless.
Total People Experiencing Homelessness in Santa Cruz County in 2019 Sheltered
Unsheltered TOTAL
All persons Emergency Transitional
Number of Children (unaccompanied) 24 1 26 51
Number of Children (with families) 79 37 133 249
Number of TAY (age 18 to 24) 13 4 577 594
Number of Adults (over age 24) 221 88 964 1,273
TOTAL PERSONS 337 130 1,700 2,167
31.208 1.127
Santa Cruz County Baseline System Assessment | Prepared for the County of Santa Cruz by Focus Strategies | August 2019 | Page 4 Total Households Experiencing Homelessness in Santa Cruz County in 2019 The table below presents the numbers of people experiencing unsheltered homelessness in Santa Cruz County by jurisdiction, based on Point in Count data from 2017 provided by Applied Survey Research. 2 As
shown, around half of the total unsheltered population were found in the City of Santa Cruz. The unincorporated areas of the County are home to around 27% of the total unsheltered population. The City of Watsonville follows with 19% of the total unsheltered population.
Total Unsheltered Persons by Jurisdiction
Jurisdiction Unsheltered in 2017 Percent of Unsheltered Population
Total Incorporated 1,314 73%
City of Capitola 21 1.1%
City of Santa Cruz 934 51.9%
City of Scotts Valley 19 1%
City of Watsonville 340 18.9%
Total Unincorporated Confidential
Scattered Site 485 27%
2019 Homeless Subpopulations3
Sheltered Unsheltered TOTAL
Percent of
Total
Population
Chronically Homeless Individuals 123 280 403 18.6%
Persons in CH Families 32 17 49 2.3%
Veterans 23 128 151 7%
Severely Mentally Ill 71 249 320 14.8%
Chronic Substance Abuse 32 249 281 13%
Persons with HIV/AIDS 5 24 29 1.3%
Victims of Domestic Violence 20 59 79 3.6%
1 “Children Only Households” is defined as a household in which everyone is under the age of 18. It is not the same as a household composed of transition age youth (TAY).
2 Data on the geographic breakdown of the 2019 PIT Count is not yet available. 3 Subpopulation categories are not mutually exclusive, so these figures do not sum to the total homeless population.
People may be represented in multiple categories.
Sheltered
Unsheltered TOTAL
All Households Emergency Transitional
Number of Single Adult Households 183 61 1,036 1,280
Number of Children Only Households1 17 1 20 38
Number of Families w/Children 42 21 59 122
TOTAL HOUSEHOLDS 242 83 1,115 1,440
31.209 1.128
Santa Cruz County Baseline System Assessment | Prepared for the County of Santa Cruz by Focus Strategies | August 2019 | Page 5 In addition to a large proportion of single adults, the data shows that 403 of these individuals met the federal definition of chronic homelessness (18.5% of the total population).4Forty-nine people in family households were also chronically homeless, per the HUD definition. As shown in the following section (“Trends in Recent Years”), this represents a significant reduction in the total number of people experiencing chronic homelessness in recent years.
A significant concern raised throughout our stakeholder engagement process was the perceived prominence of behavioral health challenges (mental illness and/or substance use disorder) among the population of people experiencing homelessness in Santa Cruz county. The 2019 PIT data shows around 15% of people self-reported that they had a severe mental illness while 13% report they experienced chronic substance abuse. While it should be noted that local PIT data is based on individuals voluntarily disclosing any disabling conditions and may thus underestimate the prevalence of these issues, the rates of behavioral health issues reported in the Santa Cruz county PIT is comparable to that of surrounding communities.5
B. Trends in Recent Years
Over the past four years, Santa Cruz County has seen an overall growth in the total number of people experiencing homelessness – from a reported 1,960 people in 2015 to 2,167 people in 2019 (a 10% increase). The community did, however, experience an upsurge in homelessness in 2017 (a 33% increase in unsheltered homelessness and 14.5% increase in total homelessness), followed by a slight decrease in 2019. Stakeholders of all types who participated in interviews and other engagements with Focus Strategies continually reported that the prominence and visibility of homelessness in the County has grown in recent years. Many believe that the rate of unsheltered homelessness has simultaneously skyrocketed. However, recent PIT data in fact shows slight decreases in the total and unsheltered population over the past two years, as shown in the following graph. Between 2017 and 2019, unsheltered homelessness decreased by 5.5% with overall homelessness down 4%. At the same time, neighboring Bay Area communities with similar high-cost, low vacancy housing markets to Santa Cruz County have experienced major growth in overall and unsheltered homelessness. Santa Clara County saw a 31% increase in homelessness in the last two years, while Alameda County had a 43% increase and homelessness in San Francisco rose 17%.6
The following graphs show additional trends in homelessness in Santa Cruz County among various subpopulations from 2015 to 2019. It should be noted that these trends are based on PIT data, which, due to complexities of homelessness and PIT methodology, provide only a limited understanding of population dynamics.
4 Chronic homelessness is defined as having a disabling condition and more than a year of continuous homelessness, or 4 episodes over the past 3 years totaling to a year or more of homelessness. 5 In 2018 PIT Counts (the most recent year for which all data is available), Santa Clara County reported 21% of people with SMI and 24% with CSA; San Mateo County 19% SMI and 10% CSA, Monterey County 16% SMI and 18% CSA, Alameda County 27% SMI and 16% CSA.
6 https://www.apnews.com/41b8393c7a434695985cde2a9852e786
31.210 1.129
Santa Cruz County Baseline System Assessment | Prepared for the County of Santa Cruz by Focus Strategies | August 2019 | Page 6 As previously mentioned, in recent years, Santa Cruz County has achieved progress towards reducing the number of people experiencing chronic homelessness. The graph below demonstrates the number of people who met the federal definition of chronically homeless from 2015 to 2019. Individuals or households are considered chronically homeless by HUD’s definition if they have been experiencing homelessness for one year continuously or four times in the past three years, and an adult in the household has a disabling condition.7The graph shows dramatic reductions in overall chronic homelessness (33% reduction) and significant reductions in the rate of chronically homeless individuals who were living in unsheltered situations (46%) in the past two years. Chronic homelessness dropped around 21% over the entire four-year time period. The number of people who were identified as chronically homeless living in sheltered situations declined steeply between 2015 and 2017 but has since risen to close to 2015 levels.
Additionally, during our interviews, community members reported that the community has made great strides towards ending homelessness amongst Veterans of the U.S. Armed Forces. Recent PIT data supports this perception, showing that Veteran homelessness was reduced by almost 40% between 2017 7 https://files.hudexchange.info/resources/documents/Defining-Chronically-Homeless-Final-Rule.pdf 610
450 467
1,354
1,799
1,700
0 500
1,000
1,500
2,000
2015 2017 2019
Total Homeless Persons 2015 - 2019
Sheltered Unsheltered
137
77 123
375
523
280
0 100
200
300
400
500
600
2015 2017 2019
Chronically Homeless Individuals 2015 - 2019
Sheltered Unsheltered
31.211 1.130
Santa Cruz County Baseline System Assessment | Prepared for the County of Santa Cruz by Focus Strategies | August 2019 | Page 7 and 2019, though it is still more than two-and-a-half times higher than reported in 2015. Unsheltered homelessness among Veterans also fell around 41% over those two years. Stakeholders attributed these recent reductions in Veteran homelessness to significant and effective housing resources from the VA and HUD targeted towards the subpopulation, as well as highly competent Veteran-focused providers in the community. (See Section V for more on the community’s efforts to reduce Veteran homelessness).
Also consistent with stakeholder reports of unusually high rates of youth experiencing homelessness in Santa Cruz County, the PIT count shows that the rate of youth experiencing unsheltered homelessness in Santa Cruz County increased 117% from 2015 to 2019. Since 2013, the community has conducted a separate, supplemental count of youth experiencing homelessness, using a separate methodology that takes into consideration the unique characteristics and trends of youth homelessness. The youth-specific methodology has been refined slightly each year to improve accuracy of the count.
According to PIT results, both TAY (ages 18 to 24) and unaccompanied minors accounted for around
29.8% of the total homeless population in 2019 and 26.4% of the population in 2017. The County’s rates of homelessness amongst youth is higher than most neighboring high-cost, low-vacancy communities, including San Francisco where 18.8% of the population counted in 2018 was unaccompanied youth (both youth under 18 and TAY ages 18 to 24) and Alameda County were 17% of the population was youth. In San Diego County, which bears similarities to Santa Cruz with its high-cost housing market and beach culture, youth represented only 10.2% of the population. However, Santa Clara County, Santa Cruz County’s most easterly neighbor, saw significantly higher rates of youth homelessness last year at around
34.6%.
As shown in the graph below, sheltered youth experiencing homelessness decreased slightly over the four years but the number of unsheltered youth has grown rapidly. From 2015 to 2019, the number of unsheltered youth experiencing homeless increased 145%. Meanwhile, community attention on and conversation around the issue of youth homelessness has increased. Santa Cruz County was one of the few communities nationally to be awarded the federal Youth Homelessness Demonstration Program (YHDP) grant, a new funding stream from HUD for communities to develop and implement strategies to prevent and end youth homelessness.
14 19 23
46 217
128
0 50
100
150
200
250
2015 2017 2019
Homeless Veterans 2015 - 2019
Sheltered Unsheltered
31.212 1.131
Santa Cruz County Baseline System Assessment | Prepared for the County of Santa Cruz by Focus Strategies | August 2019 | Page 8 Based on the PIT data, the findings from the quantitative portion of the baseline assessment indicate rates of homelessness similar to large California communities, including San Francisco, Santa Clara, and Alameda Counties. The community has also seen some growth in homelessness (both overall and unsheltered) in recent years, though these increases are lower than that of other California communities, especially in the Bay Area region. As a community, Santa Cruz County has made significant progress on reducing chronic homelessness, despite youth homelessness appears to be on the rise (though this may be partly attributable to changes in counting methodology for the supplemental youth count).
Note, the information presented in this section is all based on Point In Time Counts (PIT) conducted by the HAP as part of their responsibilities as the CoC Board. PIT counts only provide a snapshot of the population of people experiencing homelessness. As people flow into and out of homelessness over time, more people experience homelessness over the course of a year than are counted on a single day. Many communities use their PIT data, along with information gathered from HMIS, to develop an annual estimate of the numbers of people experiencing homelessness. There is no annualized estimate currently available for Santa Cruz County, however, Focus Strategies plans to produce one as part of the SWAP work that will occur in the second half of 2019.
IV. Framework for Assessment: A Homeless Crisis Response System A key purpose of this assessment is to determine how the community of Santa Cruz county (including the cities, the County, HAP, providers, funders and other stakeholders) is responding to the problem of homelessness. The guiding framework for this assessment is the concept of a homeless crisis response system. Experience from jurisdictions around the country, federal policy direction, and research all point to the need for communities to create a system to effectively end homelessness. While individual programs and initiatives may yield results with a subpopulation or group, making progress on the overall size of the homeless population requires a systematic approach.
A homeless crisis response system treats a loss of housing as an emergency that must be responded to quickly and effectively with a housing solution, targeting resources to this end. To achieve this system approach, all resources and programs are aligned around a consistent set of strategies and work toward shared, measurable objectives. The system’s work is shaped by data – continuous analysis shows what is 39 37 17
235
434
577
0 200
400
600
800
2015 2017 2019
Homeless Youth (18-24) 2015 - 2019
Sheltered Unsheltered
31.213 1.132
Santa Cruz County Baseline System Assessment | Prepared for the County of Santa Cruz by Focus Strategies | August 2019 | Page 9 working and where improvement is needed. The leaders and funders – both public and philanthropic – of the system hold all stakeholders accountable for results.
A homeless crisis response system is composed of three main programmatic components:
1. Strategies to Reduce System Inflow: System “inflow” refers to the phenomenon of people becoming homeless (i.e. moving from a housed situation into a literally homeless situation such as living outside or in an emergency shelter). Effective homeless response systems employ a variety of strategies to prevent homelessness and help people avoid entry into homeless programs by identifying alternative housing solutions. Examples of strategies to slow system inflow include:
• Targeted prevention, which targets financial, legal, and other supports to preserve the existing housing situations of people who are at the highest risk of housing loss.
Prevention traditionally provides assistance to households that self-identify as at-risk of homelessness and typically have a source of income or minimal barriers to housing stability. Research shows that most traditional prevention programs do not target households at high risk of homelessness, however, targeted prevention programs employ a set of criteria to identify households who are most likely to become homeless, which can be developed using local data;
• Diversion or housing problem-solving, which helps people who are seeking shelter or other homeless services to remain housed or identify an alternative housing solution outside of the homeless response system. Generally, diversion specialists assist households that have already lost their housing or living in an informal shared housing situation (doubled up) to move directly to alternative housing, often with family or friends, avoiding a shelter stay or other homeless system response. Ideally, housing problem-solving should be attempted with each household seeking assistance from the homeless system and can be built in as a function of coordinated entry prior to assessment. Diversion should be strengths-based in its approach to help households brainstorm and identify next-step solutions to their housing crisis; • Cross-system efforts to reduce rates at which people are discharged from institutions such as hospitals, jails, and foster care without an identified place to live or stay.
Communities are encouraged to examine and refine discharge practices within other systems of care to prevent people exiting other institutions into homelessness.
2. High Performing Homeless System Interventions – Every homeless crisis response system has an array of programs and interventions designed to meet the needs of people experiencing homelessness – including mobile outreach, drop in services, emergency shelter, transitional housing, rapid rehousing, and permanent supportive housing. The effectiveness of these interventions is measured by how quickly they help people who are experiencing homelessness to secure housing and not return to homelessness. To achieve strong results, homeless system interventions should be aligned with evidence-based practices and have no or low entry barriers, provide services that concretely support people to develop and implement a housing plan, not require service participation as a condition of helping people secure housing, and operate using
31.214 1.133
Santa Cruz County Baseline System Assessment | Prepared for the County of Santa Cruz by Focus Strategies | August 2019 | Page 10 client-centered and trauma informed principles. The community’s CES should also play a key role in facilitating the seamless movement of people from homelessness to housing by moving people quickly to the available resources intended to end their homelessness.
3. Housing Exits: Successfully reducing homelessness requires that a community have an adequate supply of appropriate, affordable housing for people to exit from homelessness. This includes efforts to expand the supply of rental housing that is affordable to people at the lowest income levels through construction of new rental units as well as acquisition and rehabilitation of existing housing. Expanding the availability of housing exits also includes strategies to assist people to access housing that already exists in the housing market, such as providing either short- or longterm rent subsidies, recruiting landlords to accept subsidies, or providing housing search and navigation services to help people locate and secure housing.
In addition to these client-focused approaches, the homeless crisis response system requires three key structural elements that support its effectiveness, including:
1. Leadership and Governance: The most crucial element of a homeless crisis response system is a unified governance structure that brings together the community leadership and key system funders – both public and private – within a single entity or coordinated set of entities. This structure must do more than just support collaboration across the different parts of the system.
To be effective, the system governance must be empowered to guide system-level planning and decision-making – bringing decision-makers together to develop, adopt, implement and evaluate a single shared set of strategies and policies, including policies governing how funds are invested.
2. Planning, Policy Development, Data and Evaluation Capacity. A homeless crisis response system must have the infrastructure and staffing to support ongoing assessment of performance at both the project and overall system levels. This includes having a robust Homeless Management Information System (HMIS) data system that achieves high participation rates and data quality.
Expertise and strong data analysis capacity are also needed so that leadership and key stakeholders can use the data regularly and (as much as possible) in real time to understand system inflow and program and system level performance and use this information to shape strategies that will lead to reductions in homelessness.
3. Staffing Capacity. As noted above, developing and implementing a homeless crisis response system requires that there be not only strong leadership but an implementation and administrative structure to support implementation. This means that the functions of system planning, policy development, data analysis and evaluation all must be included as responsibilities of the system’s administrative structure and have dedicated staffing assigned to them.
Appendix E provides additional information on homeless crisis response systems, including a system diagram.
31.215 1.134
Santa Cruz County Baseline System Assessment | Prepared for the County of Santa Cruz by Focus Strategies | August 2019 | Page 11 V. Assessment of Community Response to Homelessness: Current Efforts, Strengths, Challenges This section describes how the Santa Cruz community is currently responding to homelessness and presents Focus Strategies’ preliminary assessment of the strengths and challenges of the current approach, which is guided by the framework described above. As noted previously, this initial assessment is largely based on qualitative information, stakeholder input, and readily available data from the Point in Time count and other sources. Deeper targeted data-gathering and analysis will take place in the next phase of this technical assistance engagement, which will allow Focus Strategies to more fully understand some of the issues raised in this initial assessment. This deep-dive analysis will also enable stakeholders to work with the data to create more specific approaches and models for change.
This section presents the different elements of the homeless response in Santa Cruz County. In each section, we briefly describe the current conditions “on the ground,” based on available information, as well as our initial assessment of strengths and challenges. In many areas, we do not yet have enough information to make a thorough assessment. As we shift to the quantitative analysis in the next phase of this work, more in-depth assessment will be possible.
The assessment findings are organized as follows:
A. Leadership and Governance
B. Strategies to Reduce Inflow
C. Homeless System Interventions
1. Emergency Responses: Outreach, Shelter, Encampment Response
2. Homeless-Targeted Housing
3. Coordinated Entry
D. Housing Exits
E. Data and Evaluation Capacity
F. Other System Components and Topics
A. Leadership and Governance
As described above, a key element of any crisis response system is a system governance and oversight structure that holds the authority to make plans and investment decisions, as well as to evaluate progress against goals that the community has set. Governance and oversight of the community’s response to homelessness has been a significant topic of conversation in Santa Cruz County over the past several years. As new State funding sources, such as HEAP and CESH, have flowed into the community in 2018 and 2019, the issue has gained even greater urgency. This section briefly describes the existing governance structure(s), recent efforts to redesign the structure through a Governance Study Committee and identified strengths and challenges of the current and proposed structure. Focus Strategies’ recommendations relating to governance, as well as other short-term recommendations are presented in Section VI.
31.216 1.135
Santa Cruz County Baseline System Assessment | Prepared for the County of Santa Cruz by Focus Strategies | August 2019 | Page 12 i. Historical Background and Description of Homeless System Governance and Structure The Homeless Action Partnership (HAP) is the Continuum of Care (CoC) lead for Santa Cruz County. HUD defines the CoC as the primary structure for system planning, funding alignment, and implementation of a coordinated community-wide response to homelessness. Specific responsibilities include coordinating the annual CoC funding application, implementing the community’s HMIS system, complying with HUD’s data collection and reporting requirements (PIT count, Housing Inventory, system performance, etc.), and strategic planning and homeless system development. The HAP has been meeting regularly since 1996.
The current HAP structure consists of:
• A general membership (the HAP), which meets six times per year. Its broad membership includes County and city staff, non-profit housing and service providers, victim service providers, faithbased organizations, advocates, school districts, social service providers, mental health agencies, research organization, affordable housing developers, and Veteran-serving agencies. The HAP has a wide range of responsibilities including appointing the Collaborative Applicant for CoC funds, appointing working committees, developing CoC policies and procedures, implementing coordinated entry, overseeing HMIS, conducting the PIT, and overseeing the CoC application to HUD.
• The HAP Governance Board, which meets at least two times per year and is made up of selected/seated membership that includes city representatives, the County’s Homeless Services Coordinator, selected funders and service providers, and a person with lived experience of homelessness. The Governance Board is primarily responsible for reviewing and ranking CoC funding applications, developing any changes to the CoC Charter, and acting as the primary policy decision-maker for the HAP.
• A Jurisdictional Executive Committee, which by charter meets two times a year in spring and fall but has met more frequently in recent years. Membership includes city representatives and County department representatives. Its role is to coordinate inter-jurisdictional activity on homelessness, as well as to review and approve jurisdictional cost sharing for homelessness activities (HAP staffing, PIT, winter shelter, etc.).
The HAP is a collaborative planning body that does not hold legal status as an entity (i.e. it is not a nonprofit organization or formally seated governmental Board). Since 2008, it has been staffed by the Santa Cruz County Planning Department, which also serves as the Collaborative Applicant for CoC funding. A CoC consultant provides technical and strategic support to the HAP and the Planning Department. As of July 1, 2019, the CoC Collaborative Applicant and system planning role is shifting to the Homeless Services Coordinator within the County Administrative Office (CAO), with continued support from a CoC consultant.
Other entities in the community have also played a role in homelessness system planning and development. These include:
• Smart Solutions, which was formed in 2011 to develop a collaborative, community-wide discussion on homelessness involving the broader community. This group held a Homelessness
31.217 1.136
Santa Cruz County Baseline System Assessment | Prepared for the County of Santa Cruz by Focus Strategies | August 2019 | Page 13 Summit in 2012 and in 2014-2015 partnered with the County, HAP and United Way to develop the All In Strategic Plan to address homelessness.
• South County Homeless Steering Committee, which has been meeting regularly to coordinate and plan the response to homelessness in Watsonville and South County area to implement strategies in the All In Plan.
• County Homeless Coordinating Committee, which was convened by the County of Santa Cruz as an internal group of departmental County representatives tasked to work on developing a more coordinated response to homelessness among County departments (CAO, Human Services, Health, Behavioral Health, etc.).
• City Coordinating Council, which include individual sets of strategies developed by the four cities in the community (Santa Cruz, Watsonville, Capitola, Scotts Valley). The City of Santa Cruz has developed a 20-point homeless plan and has recently launched plans to convene a Homeless Advisory Committee.
In 2017-2018, the County convened a Homeless Governance Study Committee to analyze existing coordinating structures and make recommendations for possible restructuring or creation of a new governing entity. Identified problems the Committee set out to address, as reflected in materials developed by the Committee, were:
• Lack of a regional decision-making body and structure with sufficiently broad representation from all necessary stakeholders and responsibility and authority to establish shared priorities, plan, and make decisions on a broad range of issues facing the region: no central authority or decisionmaker to set regional priorities, HAP scope too narrowly focused on CoC funding, and HUDmandated planning requirements • Lack of overall coordination. There are multiple competing initiatives launched by different entities and stakeholders, lack of clear and sufficient communication and information sharing. • Insufficient capacity and resources, insufficient staffing for homeless system planning and implementation (including system assessment, performance measurement, data analysis, developing strategic priorities), insufficient local funding, and lack of capacity to compete for funding.
After meeting over the course of about 18 months and considering options ranging from creation of a new formal entity, such as a JPA, to maintaining the current structure, the Committee put forth a set of recommendations for restructuring the existing HAP. The main elements of this proposed restructure were to retain the basic structure of the HAP and incorporate the following changes:
• Restructure the existing HAP Board into an Interagency Policy Council (IPC) tasked with being the primary decision-maker for the homeless system and not limited to HUD activities.
Responsibilities would include setting policy, allocating funding, and setting performance targets.
31.218 1.137
Santa Cruz County Baseline System Assessment | Prepared for the County of Santa Cruz by Focus Strategies | August 2019 | Page 14 The IPC would serve as the central coordinating body for the full range of homelessness programs, services, and initiatives. The existing Board would be expanded, and the IPC would consist largely of high-level community leadership and funders. • Retain the Jurisdictional Executive Committee but rename it to “the Jurisdictional Coordinating Committee” and continuing to coordinate interjurisdictional budgeting and cost sharing for homeless activities, such as winter shelter.
• Retain the existing HAP but rename it as the General Membership/Operations group.
While the recommendations were generally welcomed by most stakeholders, the work of the Committee was paused in 2018 before the recommendations could be finalized and adopted. As new funding streams were rolling out into the community from the State, there were some questions about appropriate membership for the IPC as envisioned, and whether this was the right approach for allocating these or other new resources. Some members of the HAP raised a question as to whether the proposed structure would need refining to ensure compliance with HUD CoC Governance requirements. People involved in the process also became very busy with preparing for the new resources, and lack of adequate staffing capacity made it impossible to proceed on both action areas at the same time. ii. Assessment: Strengths and Challenges in System Planning, Governance and Structure Strengths: The existing “CoC-centric” governance structure of the HAP is a common way in which California communities have organized their response to homelessness – a volunteer board with a governmental lead agency, primarily focused on managing the federal CoC funding stream. In this regard, the HAP appears to be very high functioning. They are ensuring HUD’s planning and data collection requirements are met and expanding federal resources for homelessness, such as through the Youth Homeless Demonstration Program (YHDP) grant. Stakeholders we spoke to largely hold positive views of the HAP, pointing to the benefit of having a forum in which all the homeless-dedicated entities in the community come together to share information, coordinate their work, and stay abreast of changes in the field.
The All In Plan, developed jointly by Smart Solutions, HAP, County and the United Way, reflects this collaborative spirit and identifies a set of strategies that are well-aligned with federal policy priorities and the latest thinking in the field. The All In Plan sets goals to transform the crisis response system by implementing coordinated entry, increasing prevention and diversion, increasing access to affordable housing, ensuring people maintain housing after exiting homelessness, and integrating the homeless system with mainstream benefits, among other goals. The plan sets the goal to end chronic homelessness and other adult homelessness as well as family homelessness by 2020. It also articulates a priority of addressing the needs of South County, initiating a response to youth homelessness and ending veteran homelessness.
The work of the Homeless Governance Study Committee is another strength, reflecting a recognition among stakeholders of the need to further develop the homeless system governance structure to be less narrowly focused on CoC funds. Instead, they recognize the need to be more broadly responsible for devising a system and strategy to address homelessness throughout the community and aligning funding
31.219 1.138
Santa Cruz County Baseline System Assessment | Prepared for the County of Santa Cruz by Focus Strategies | August 2019 | Page 15 to achieve shared objectives, including the many non-CoC funding streams. As the State begins to release more funds that must be allocated using a local structure and process, revisiting of this structure is even more crucial. The County of Santa Cruz creation of a dedicated position for a Homeless Services Coordinator within the CAO and shifting the CoC functions to that office is an important step towards creating a dedicated countywide planning and coordination function.
Challenges: In our assessment, while the governance redesign efforts are on the right track and should continue, the work needs to focus in particular on joint decision making about investments and oversight.
Specifically, the next phase of governance work should flesh out in greater detail how the new governance structure will ensure there is a strong and well-understood set of roles and processes for setting funding priorities and ensuring coordination and alignment of funding, particularly given the expectation that new State funding sources are likely to continue flowing into the community.
The proposed new structure sets up some proposed roles for the new IPC and the Jurisdictional Executive Committee in setting priorities and making funding decisions. However, it remains to address the importance and complexities of who will make key funding decisions and how they will ensure that these decisions are transparent, fair, and inclusive while also strategic and focused on maximizing impact. Due to the idiosyncrasies of the CoC funding stream in which funds flow directly from HUD to providers, the HAP has historically avoided getting directly involved in making awards and managing funding. However, now, as new funds like HEAP and CESH are flowing from the state to the CoC, tensions have arisen. The HAP, which is tasked with making HEAP and CESH funding decisions, is comprised of agencies that are also recipients of funding – raising concerns that their involvement in funding decisions creates conflicts of interest. Additionally, since the HAP is not able to accept funds or enter into contracts, the County is playing the role of funding administrator (issuing the RFP, managing the application and contracting process), but is not the decision-maker. This had led to a perception of confusion around roles and concerns about fairness and transparency.
The community’s community-wide plan All In sets some key strategic goals and a direction for the homeless system, however, a clear set of overarching funding priorities are lacking and compound the problems identified above. In the absence of a clearly articulated strategy, the funding priorities that the HAP and County developed for HEAP and CESH were very broad, and the award process ended up spreading funds thinly to many providers and projects, rather than investing significantly in specific, prioritized strategies and gaps to make the greatest measurable impact. Focus Strategies heard concerns from stakeholders who were disappointed in the process, and this was not limited to those who might have been disappointed by their own results. Several stakeholders reported spending significant time reviewing and rating applications but, in the end, felt it was not clear why certain projects were funded and not others. Funders interviewed (private and public) expressed a desire to see a more coherent and comprehensive community strategy to guide their investments. They recognize a need for strategic thinking and leadership to tell them where funds can be best spent to have the biggest impact.
In general, our information gathering revealed concerns among stakeholders about a perceived lack of transparency in decision-making relating to homelessness. In our view, the problem is not primarily a lack of transparency per se on the part of decision-makers, but rather that there are many fragmented and uncoordinated planning and decision-making processes in Santa Cruz county. The absence of a well31.220 1.139 Santa Cruz County Baseline System Assessment | Prepared for the County of Santa Cruz by Focus Strategies | August 2019 | Page 16 understood and clear decision-making process generates a sense among some stakeholders that the process is mysterious or intentionally obscured.
Although the current HAP structure includes an interjurisdictional coordination committee, the County and the four cities tend to operate independently and make many decisions on their own, though some of these decisions are based on city-specific context or issues. Jurisdictions have worked together through the HAP to jointly fund winter shelter, but the day-to day response to homelessness within their jurisdictions, as well as planning for any other local investment and evaluation of investment impact do not seem to be taking place within the existing HAP structure and therefore lacks shared objectives and coordination. For example, some cities view their role primarily as responding to the immediate problem of people living outside by deploying a law enforcement and public works response, while looking to the County to address the housing and service needs of people experiencing homelessness. However, this view hasn’t translated into agreements about explicit roles or how to handle mutual problems, allowing for a certain amount of finger-pointing. This is not unusual in California where counties are the nexus for most service needs and cities are the holders of law enforcement, public space, and development decisions in incorporated areas.
Some stakeholders are concerned that people with lived experience are not well-represented in planning arenas and this aligns with what Focus Strategies has observed. The community culture does not seem to strongly involve people with lived experience in planning or feedback. To illustrate this point, Focus Strategies struggled to even convene focus groups with people experiencing homelessness, as there are fairly few existing groups consisting of people with lived experience that meet regularly. Nevertheless, we observed strong participation from youth with lived experience of homelessness on the Youth Advisory Board (YAB). The YAB serves as a model for inclusivity and meaningful participation in system planning by people who are currently or formerly experiencing homelessness.
B. Strategies to Reduce Inflow
Strategies to reduce the rate at which people enter homelessness is a critical element of a community’s efforts to reduce homelessness. Our assessment found that in Santa Cruz County these types of efforts are relatively under-developed.
• Diversion: Diversion (sometimes also known as problem-solving) is a practice designed to “catch” people at the point at which they have just entered homelessness or right before (such as when they are seeking a shelter bed) and engage them in a strengths-based conversation to identify a no-cost or low-cost housing solution if at all possible (such as living with a friend, securing a shared housing situation, or returning to family members). It is a highly effective practice that can reduce the growth of the homeless population and particularly for people who have recently become homeless. In Santa Cruz County, diversion is not a fully built-out component of the system, though there are plans to incorporate diversion activities into the CES system.
Stakeholders we interviewed noted that some providers try to divert people who approach their programs, but this activity tends to be inconsistent. Some system providers offer light-touch services and/or financial assistance to households to facilitate a quick connection to permanent housing. In addition, the Homeward Bound program, which is funded by the City of Santa Cruz, provides bus passes for people who have identified alternative housing opportunities outside of
31.221 1.140
Santa Cruz County Baseline System Assessment | Prepared for the County of Santa Cruz by Focus Strategies | August 2019 | Page 17 the City/County. More expansive, flexible diversion assistance – such as flexible financial assistance to help people maintain their own unit or remain living with friends or family; mediation with landlords, roommates, or family members; and staffing to engage in housing problem-solving conversations – are limited.
• Targeted Prevention: Targeted prevention programs attempt to identify people who are still housed but who are either facing eviction or otherwise will lose their housing. To be maximally effective at reducing homelessness, these types of programs must use very strong targeting criteria to identify those households most at risk of becoming homeless after eviction. Evidence shows that many households that suffer a loss of housing do not become homeless but rather use their family and social networks to identify alternative housing. Traditional prevention programs which do not target in this way typically assess whether the household seeking assistance can independently sustain their rent and other expenses after the assistance period ends as a basic eligibility criterion. As a result, these prevention programs typically serve households that have a source of stable income and minimal barriers to housing stability.
Targeted prevention programs, on the other hand, utilize a set of screening criteria to identify households facing a housing crisis who are most at risk of becoming homeless. For example, qualifying households may have previously been homeless, have no income, experience a disabling condition, and/or be a young parent, all factors that have been shown to be more highly correlated with homelessness. Targeting criteria for effective prevention should be specific to the community and can be developed using local HMIS data or can draw from existing community data related to which households are most likely to become homeless. Currently in Santa Cruz County, there are a number of eviction prevention and rental assistance programs, but our assessment has not explored how well targeted these programs are. We did not hear that these were specifically aligned with the goals of the homeless system. • Coordinated Entry System (CES): Santa Cruz has recently launched and is currently expanding the reach of a coordinated entry system for homelessness. While some inflow reduction practices relate closely to CES, the primary purpose of coordinated entry is to connect people to housing programs; we have addressed CES in the next section.
• Institutional Discharge: Typically, a portion of the homeless population enter or re-enter homelessness from institutional settings such as hospitals and jails. In Santa Cruz County, some initiatives and pilot programs to reduce discharge from institutions into homelessness are in early development to identify and address the needs of people who are homeless who cycle in and out of institutions. These include the re-entry program currently operated by the Sherriff’s Department, the HUGS frequent user initiative, and some preliminary work being done on crosssystem data matching which could identify people who are found in multiples systems of care including the homeless system. But as of yet there is no overarching County strategy to reduce inflow from mainstream systems of care into homelessness.
C. Homeless System Interventions
This section describes the community’s primary homeless system interventions. In each area, we have assessed the extent to which these interventions appear to be high performing and aligned with known
31.222 1.141
Santa Cruz County Baseline System Assessment | Prepared for the County of Santa Cruz by Focus Strategies | August 2019 | Page 18 evidence-based practices. Our primary metric for assessing these interventions is how well they appear to be creating solutions that help people transition from homelessness to housing.
1. Emergency Response: Mobile Outreach, Drop-In Services, Emergency Shelter, and Encampment Response
All communities, particularly those in which there is significant unsheltered homelessness, have a range of emergency or crisis response interventions that make up the “front end” of the homeless system.
These interventions typically include street-based contacts and services to those living outside, such as outreach and engagement, as well as temporary places for people to stay during the day (drop-in and day centers) and at-night (shelter.) Given that unsheltered homelessness creates a range of community health and safety issues, it is important that the crisis response focus on addressing the immediate health and safety needs of people experiencing homelessness and the community in which they are living.
However, in a highly functioning homeless crisis response system, the emergency response should not only address these immediate concerns – it should be part of an overall strategy to reduce homelessness by offering temporary places for people to stay safely without excluding those who need them and effective interventions that provide a pathway to housing. Our assessment of the emergency response to homelessness in Santa Cruz County considers current efforts through this lens. Currently, Santa Cruz County has a promising opportunity to move towards a systemwide emergency response approach that is grounded in these principles (i.e. a focus on housing, and use of low-barrier, evidence-based practices) through the addition of new State dollars.
i. Description of Current Emergency Response
Santa Cruz county has several emergency response programs intended to address or at least ameliorate the immediate crisis of homelessness for those living outside. These program types include outreach, day services, shelter, safe parking, and encampment response. The following section provides an overview of the community’s existing emergency response components of the homeless system. • Outreach: There are five CoC-funded and a few other non-CoC funded mobile outreach programs operating in Santa Cruz County. Some of the community’s outreach workers are deputized to conduct immediate, in-person assessments to connect individuals to Smart Path, the community’s CES, which provides a front door to homeless system resources (see more in section below entitled “Coordinated Entry System”). Throughout the CES process, outreach workers attempt to remain engaged with clients to provide communication and assistance, and, when possible, facilitate successful housing referral and placement through Smart Path.
The community’s other outreach services are mostly focused on helping individuals meet basic and health needs (both mental and physical and include both Continuum of Care (CoC) and non-CoC funded programs such as Homeless Persons' Health Project (HPHP), Encompass Downtown Outreach Worker Team, Homeless Outreach Proactive Engagement & Services (HOPES), Maintaining Ongoing Stability through Treatment (MOST), Youth and Veterans Outreach, and the Downtown Streets Team.
The County of Santa Cruz, City of Santa Cruz, and the City of Watsonville fund mental health workers, through the Mental Health Liaison Program, who accompany police officers and provide engagement and support to people who are unsheltered. Services under this program are offered countywide as
31.223 1.142
Santa Cruz County Baseline System Assessment | Prepared for the County of Santa Cruz by Focus Strategies | August 2019 | Page 19 part of outreach. Outreach programs provide valuable resources and connections for people experiencing homelessness, but these programs operate outside of an overall systematic approach and therefore are not designed to connect people to other parts of the system or to the resources needed to access permanent housing as a primary objective. • Drop-In and Day Services: Drop-in centers typically are places where people who are unsheltered can receive some essential services (e.g. showers, laundry, mail) and access social services on a drop-in basis. Offering drop-in centers can be an effective strategy for engaging with people who are living outside and who need a significant period of engagement before they will access social services or housing. Effective drop-in programs have staff who are adept at engagement and services available to support people to transition to housing. Currently, there appear to be a limited number of homelessspecific drop-in programs in Santa Cruz County. The Homeless Service Center (HSC) offers some basic hygiene services, but they are primarily a provider of shelter, housing, and case management. The Salvation Army in Watsonville provides a variety of drop in services such as showers and meals. Our initial assessment did not explore the depth or quality of engagement taking place at these drop-in centers or whether clients accessing drop-in services are being connected to shelter and housing. • Emergency Shelter: As previously mentioned, slightly less than one-quarter of people experiencing homelessness were staying in emergency shelter on the night of the 2019 PIT. As shown in the following data derived from annual Housing Inventory Count (HIC) provided to HUD, the community’s shelter inventory has declined slightly over the past five years, with current capacity at 439 beds.
Appendix F provides a list of the shelters that make up these 439 beds.
Total
Capacity
2019 HIC
(Beds)
Total
Capacity
2018 HIC
(Beds)
Total
Capacity
2017 HIC
(Beds)
Total
Capacity
2016 HIC
(Beds)
Total
Capacity
2015 HIC
(Beds)
Emergency Shelter 439 435 387 475 481
The majority of the community’s shelter inventory is in the northern region of the County, mostly in and near the City of Santa Cruz. There are far fewer shelter services in the southern part of the County, though the relative need is also smaller. Many South County shelter beds were seasonal until very recently when some year-round shelter beds came online. Leveraging new State dollars (HEAP and CESH), the community is currently working on creating two new sites that will act as navigation centers in both the North and South County; both of which would provide year-round low-barrier emergency shelter and access to housing-focused services. At this point, a working site has been identified in South County but not in North County. In the interim, due to a lack of immediately available sites for new navigation centers, key features of the navigation center model are being introduced into existing shelters so that they may begin to fill the role of navigation centers.
Most of the community’s shelter beds operate on a year-round basis (64%) though greater than onethird of the beds operate seasonally – typically during the winter months only. However, the community’s seasonal beds will expand to being year-round soon. The following table shows the total number of year-round and seasonal beds in the community this year.
31.224 1.143
Santa Cruz County Baseline System Assessment | Prepared for the County of Santa Cruz by Focus Strategies | August 2019 | Page 20 Year-Round
Capacity 2019
(Beds)
Seasonal
Capacity 2019
(Beds)
Emergency Shelter 279 160
• Safe Parking: Safe Parking is relatively new component of the emergency response system, offering a network of church parking lots and public facilities to provide spaces for specific people experiencing homelessness to park their vehicles and access hygiene services. Currently, there are seven locations and 33 participants in the program, which has a dedicated coordinator that seeks to match people to an accessible, appropriate church parking lot as an alternative to street parking, with more capacity to come online in the near term. This program is still new and will be further explored in the next phase of this TA project.
• Encampment Response: While not a formally named or intentionally designed system element, responding to encampments of tents and temporary structures has been a current focus in Santa Cruz County, particularly at the city level. Thus, we have included our assessment and understanding of these practices in this baseline report. As previously mentioned, a majority of Santa Cruz County’s homeless population (around 78%) are living in unsheltered locations. This includes both sanctioned and unsanctioned encampments. Historically, the largest encampments have emerged along Highway 1, as well as River Street and Downtown Santa Cruz, however, smaller ones have appeared in locations throughout the county. Public entities throughout the county have generally responded by asking encampment participants to disburse and cleaning up large unsanctioned encampments perceived to pose safety, health, or environmental threats to the community. The primary response is to offer encampment residents a referral to emergency shelter (though openings are limited), other emergency services and/or, in some cases, an option to move to a sanctioned encampment. There have been a limited number of sanctioned encampments, including the current 1220 River Street site. The River Street site is a tent-based shelter. 1220 River Street is fully-staffed and the services follow a short-term shelter model. However, the practice of permitting sanctioned encampments has been variably implemented; resulting in the opening and closing of encampments due to a lack of ability to sustain them. River Street, for example, is only currently planned to remain open until spring 2020 and plans for what will happen next are unresolved. ii. Assessment: Strengths and Challenges of the Emergency Response Strengths: The community’s existing emergency response employs a wide range of strategies to assist people to meet their basic, health, and mental health needs. Diverse and wide-reaching outreach programs exist to engage people experiencing homelessness in homeless system and mainstream resources, while a variety of shelter programs are offered to those in both the northern and southern area of the County. In general, stakeholders who were engaged reported that emergency shelter and service providers are skillful and committed to assisting those experiencing homelessness. Shelter providers we interviewed appeared to be doing good work to support residents to secure housing solutions, within the constraints of available resources. Further, with the roll-out of new State Homeless Emergency Aid Program (HEAP) program, the community has a significant opportunity to leverage these dollars towards low-barrier, evidence-based emergency response strategies. Strategic use of HEAP funds
31.225 1.144
Santa Cruz County Baseline System Assessment | Prepared for the County of Santa Cruz by Focus Strategies | August 2019 | Page 21 also provides an opportunity for the County to fill gaps in both geographical and seasonal shelter availability.
Challenges: Based on our assessment of the local system and conversations with key stakeholders in Santa Cruz County, the community’s emergency response strategies are small in scale for the size of the population and appear to lack sufficient connection to strategies that help people secure housing. While some shelters have services in place to support clients to develop housing plans or provide case management, these types of interventions are not available systematically at all shelters. Mobile outreach teams largely are focused on meeting immediate health and safety needs and have not been equipped with training or information on how to engage clients in a “housing problem-solving” or “diversion” conversation to discuss possible housing solutions that may be available within someone’s natural pool of resources or how to connect them to another potential housing pathway. There is also a lack of sufficient locations in the community where people who are unsheltered can access housing-specific services, such as housing resources/information, diversion, or housing-focused case management, on a drop-in basis.
Many stakeholders are focused on a perceived need to increase emergency shelter inventory. Given the high rate of unsheltered homelessness and the fact that over one-third of shelter beds only operate seasonally, additional shelter capacity could be useful, however, we believe that a more strategic and immediate use of system efforts would be focusing on ensuring existing shelter options are more housing-focused and accomplish the goal of assisting those with the highest needs exit homelessness to safe, stable housing.
The navigation centers in South County and addition of North County Navigation Center include both emergency shelter and day services, has drawn a great deal of attention and been met with mixed opinions. Navigation centers are a new intervention type and additional work in the field to define what makes this model distinct is needed. However, typically, the centers are extremely low barrier shelters that allow people to enter with pets, partners, and/or significant personal belongings, which often are not permitted in traditional shelters. They are also typically highly staffed and open 24/7 with residents being permitted to come and go, and they are often intended to be used for very high need/high priority persons who are expected to be “navigated” to a housing solution. While many stakeholders believe the navigation centers would provide a crucial opportunity to increase shelter inventory and engage a greater number of people, others expressed skepticism about the effectiveness of the proposed programs. In our assessment, the community seems to lack a solid, shared understanding of what the purpose, goals, and functions of these navigation centers will be. Additionally, much of the conversation has been centered around identifying a physical location and siting of the centers and lack focus or clarity on the proposed service model. To be effective, navigation centers should provide low-barrier shelter with strong connections to permanent housing to serve those with the highest needs and barriers to housing.
Community conversation should also shift towards ensuring all shelter in the community is low barrier, while employing a housing first approach and other best practices.
Focus Strategies does not yet have the information needed to assess whether additional shelter capacity is needed. Data to help us answer this question will be gathered in the next phase of work. Once we have completed the initial round of system and project performance assessment, we will be in a better position to advise on the potential need for and impact of additional shelter beds and housing specific services.
31.226 1.145
Santa Cruz County Baseline System Assessment | Prepared for the County of Santa Cruz by Focus Strategies | August 2019 | Page 22 Our assessment found that efforts to address and resolve encampments to date appear largely aimed at moving people away from existing sites due to legitimate health and safety concerns but without an articulated plan for where people will go, other than to a new encampment or possibly to shelter. To be effective, encampment resolution efforts must connect as many people as possible to a pathway out of homelessness – through diversion/problem-solving to find an immediate housing solution, placement into shelter or navigation center where they receive housing focused-case management, treatment beds for those who articulate a desire for treatment, direct placement into housing, and/or connection to mainstream services that can help support the acquisition of income. Absent a housing strategy, people who are unsheltered will likely simply move from one encampment to another or disperse onto streets and other locations not meant for people to live.
Some stakeholders we interviewed noted that in recent years the unsheltered population seems to have become increasingly “aggressive” and many appear to suffer from mental health and substance use challenges. This has led to a focus by some on the need for treatment options as a primary solution to unsheltered people’s homelessness. Some people experiencing homelessness who we spoke with also mentioned concerns about others on the streets, but few talked about seeking or needing treatment. All spoke primarily about their need for income opportunities and housing solutions. Evidence from the field suggests that treatment needs to be available quickly when people are ready to take it up but that for many people, their interest and success in treatment is greater once they have a stable, permanent place to live. Offering health and behavioral health care to people in encampments is not likely to yield strong results absent a housing strategy. As noted above, the community already has mobile outreach programs devoted to providing health and behavioral health services to people outside. Some stakeholders also noted that outreach workers that work with people in encampments need increase information and improved training, with a focus on trauma-informed care and connecting people to appropriate system resources.
2. Homeless Targeted Housing Interventions: Transitional Housing, Rapid Rehousing, and Permanent Supportive Housing
In a high functioning homeless crisis response system, housing interventions should be designed to help people move from literal homelessness to housing as rapidly as possible. Interventions should be allocated based on need, with the highest need individuals receiving permanent supportive housing. Our assessment considered the size of the inventory of these interventions, how they are targeted and how they are accessed by people experiencing homelessness, as well as the alignment of the program models with national best practices.
i. Descriptions of Existing Homeless Targeted Housing Interventions Existing housing interventions in Santa Cruz County include transitional housing, rapid rehousing, and permanent supportive housing. The following table shows the inventory of available housing interventions. Appendix F provides a detailed list of the programs in each of these program types.
31.227 1.146
Santa Cruz County Baseline System Assessment | Prepared for the County of Santa Cruz by Focus Strategies | August 2019 | Page 23 Program Type
Total
Capacity
2019 HIC
(Beds)
Total
Capacity
2018 HIC
(Beds)
Total
Capacity
2017 HIC
(Beds)
Total
Capacity
2016 HIC
(Beds)
Total
Capacity
2015 HIC
(Beds)
Transitional Housing 182 223 201 228 247
Rapid Rehousing 204 191 185 167 131
Permanent Supportive
Housing 580 560 638 457 409
Transitional Housing: Transitional housing (TH) programs offer a temporary housing placement with onsite supportive services (usually in a group living environment) for up to two years with the goal of helping people obtain and maintain permanent housing upon exit. In recent years, a wealth of evidence from around the country has demonstrated that this program model tends to be very expensive and does not yield strong results – households tend to have long lengths of stay in programs (meaning continued homelessness during that time) and many do not secure housing upon exit. For this reason, HUD has encouraged communities to evaluate their transitional housing inventory and reduce investments in this approach if programs are underperforming. Santa Cruz County has followed this guidance, reducing the supply of TH from 247 beds in 2015 to only 182 in 2019, a 36% decrease. Since Transitional Housing does not provide a permanent housing solution, it should more appropriately be considered part of the community’s emergency response. However, in Santa Cruz County, stakeholders tend to view TH as a housing intervention, thus, we have included it in this section.
Rapid Rehousing: Rapid rehousing (RRH) provides households with short-term rental subsidies and timelimited case management to help them secure a rental unit in the private housing market. At the end of the term of assistance, most households take overpaying 100% of the rent (unless another subsidy is secured). Evidence from around the nation shows that RRH is more cost effective and yields better results than transitional housing, consequently HUD has encouraged communities to expand this intervention.
The All In Plan calls for an increase in RRH supply. As seen in the table above, largely as a result of HUD CoC grant dollars being reallocated away from transitional housing towards rapid rehousing programs, rapid rehousing beds have increased from 131 in 2015 to 204 beds in 2019, an overall increase of 73 beds (56% increase overall).
Permanent Supportive Housing: PSH provides long-term rental subsidies or permanently subsidized housing units coupled with intensive services for people who have the most intensive needs – generally those who are chronically homeless. As shown in the table above, the amount of permanent supportive housing in Santa Cruz County has grown steadily since 2015, with some fluctuations. Much of the PSH inventory is funded through CoC grants. There are also some highly successful and innovative non-CoC funded PSH efforts in place, including:
• Disabled and Medically Vulnerable (DMC) Program: The DMV program, operated by the Housing Authority of the County of Santa Cruz, sets aside 120 vouchers on a rolling basis for those experiencing homelessness. The program allows persons experiencing homelessness to bypass traditional Section 8 waiting lists and receive a voucher through a specific pipeline created to aid those experiencing homelessness and work to get those individuals into housing. As part of
31.228 1.147
Santa Cruz County Baseline System Assessment | Prepared for the County of Santa Cruz by Focus Strategies | August 2019 | Page 24 helping clients maintain their housing, the program also requires these voucher holders have case management for at least one year through a provider of housing supportive services. The DMV program will automatically “graduate” voucher recipients that have been stably housed for two years into more traditional voucher when funding and resources allow, freeing up the vacated DMV vouchers for another person experiencing homelessness. • 180/2020 Initiative: Coordinated by the Homeless Services Center, the original 180/180 Initiative was a collaborative launched in 2012 that worked in conjunction with the National 100,000 Homes Campaign. By 2014, the 180/180 Initiative had exceeded its goal to house at least 180 of the community’s most medically vulnerable and chronically homeless by placing 200 individuals into housing. To build upon this success and momentum, Santa Cruz County renamed the 180/180 to be the 180/2020 Initiative with the goal of housing more of the same, highly vulnerable population. In doing the work, the collaborative expanded the scope of work to include the DMV program mentioned above, housing workshops aimed at assisting those experiencing homelessness, a multi-agency Housing Work Group to collaborate on housing for the vulnerable, and the addition of three permanent supportive housing case managers. The 180/2020 Initiative has continued to house individuals and as of September 2017, 750 people have been housed.
ii. Assessment: Strengths and Challenges of Homeless-Targeted Housing Interventions Strengths: This area appears to be a community strength, considering that the community has been slowly shifting its inventory of interventions in the right direction – decreasing transitional housing and increasing rapid rehousing and permanent supportive housing. The assessment process did not encompass looking at specific program policies and procedures, so we were not able to assess the degree to which these programs are aligned to best practices. In general, providers seemed well-versed in housing first concepts such as low barriers to program entry, strengths-based and voluntary services, and client choice. For example, the Disabled and Medically Vulnerable (DMV) program administered by the Santa Cruz Housing Authority works very flexibly with households to help them secure and maintain housing and graduates clients to a regular Housing Choice Voucher (HCV) subsidy without having to change units. Stakeholders also reported that the 180/2020 initiative has helped the system embrace housing first approaches and bridge the gap for housing between landlords and tenants through relationship building and housing navigation.
As part of Focus Strategies’ continued work in the community, we will assess the performance of the communities homeless-targeted housing programs using the System-wide Analytics and Projection (SWAP) suite of tools, which will enable us to better understand how they are contributing to the overall goal of reducing homelessness.
Challenges: While some programs are well-versed in best practices, one challenge we observed is that other providers, as well as many in the broader community of stakeholders, do not seem very familiar with these program models. Additionally, many do not seem to connect the problem of unsheltered homelessness to the need for more targeted and specialized housing interventions. For example, some providers expressed concerns about the effectiveness of housing first models due to unsheltered people being “too hard to house” and the unavailability of affordable units. Many stakeholders cited the need for
31.229 1.148
Santa Cruz County Baseline System Assessment | Prepared for the County of Santa Cruz by Focus Strategies | August 2019 | Page 25 more treatment-based and “housing in transition” programs over housing-focused interventions as a way to resolve unsheltered homelessness. As noted in the previous section, the encampment response and emergency response components of the system (i.e. shelter, outreach) do not seem to be well-connected to the system’s housing interventions (i.e. RRH, PSH). There also seems to be a shared narrative among some providers and system-level stakeholders alike that due to the challenging high-cost, low-vacancy housing market, implementing a systemwide housing first approach is extremely difficult in Santa Cruz County. However, it should be noted that despite these commonly held notions, communities across the nation have shown that a housing first orientation works when system strategies to open the door for people experiencing homelessness to the private rental market are consistently employed. These strategies and practices include (but are not necessarily limited to) implementing robust housing navigation, search, and placement, as well as landlord recruitment and engagement.
Once the SWAP work is complete, Focus Strategies will be in a better position to assess the degree to which the inventory of targeted housing interventions is appropriately sized to support the community’s efforts to end homelessness. Yet, even without this analysis, we believe it is likely that the rapid rehousing and PSH inventory is not scaled to the level needed and there is a need for more resources and scaling-up of housing-focused case management, housing navigation, and landlord engagement efforts.
3. Coordinated Entry System (CES)
i. Description of Existing Smart Path Coordinated Entry System (CES) In recent years, HUD has required that communities implement coordinated entry systems (CES) that create a single, standardized process for people who are experiencing homelessness to be assessed for and gain access to the targeted housing interventions available in the system. In accordance with federal coordinated entry requirements, Santa Cruz County implemented the Smart Path to Housing and Health (Smart Path) system. In 2018 Smart Path, people seeking assistance at a variety of different places within the homeless system are assessed using the Vulnerability Index - Service Prioritization Decision Assistance Tool (VI-SPDAT), a commonly used assessment tool, then prioritized for available homeless-targeted housing assistance. Implementation of Smart Path represents a shift away from a previously “fragmented” system where people accessed services and housing assistance programs on a first-come, first-served basis, by personal or provider advocacy, or via a waitlist. The system is managed by the Santa Cruz County Human Services Department with oversight by the HAP.
The system design is intended to be “no wrong door,” though in effect it is really a “many right doors” approach, in which about 25 agencies countywide act as access points by conducting CES assessments for some or all homeless populations. These agencies include shelter and service provider locations, mental health clinics, libraries, domestic violence and Veterans assistance programs, and public administrative offices. The system deploys around two-hundred trained assessors – a majority are not full-time assessors but have this function built into their existing role. Smart Path also integrates mobile outreach for people who are unable or unwilling to visit physical access points and recently hired four mobile assessors dedicated to specific subpopulations and geographic regions (families and transition-age youth, North and South County). Although CES policies state that people seeking assistance can access CES by calling 2- 1-1, by-phone assessment is not currently available.
31.230 1.149
Santa Cruz County Baseline System Assessment | Prepared for the County of Santa Cruz by Focus Strategies | August 2019 | Page 26 The VI-SPDAT generates a numeric “score” which is used to determine people’s level of vulnerability or need in order to match and refer them to system resources, as they become available. Referrals are made based on program type, eligibility criteria, and individuals’ assessment score and processed through the system’s Homeless Management Information System (HMIS). People who are referred to permanent supportive housing (PSH) programs must meet the federal chronic homelessness definition and receive a VI-SPDAT score between 8 and 17 for adults and TAY or 9 to 22 for families. Rapid rehousing (RRH) and transitional housing (TH) referrals are made to those who score between 4 and 7 for adults/TAY or 4 and 8 for families. Households with the longest histories of homelessness and who score on the high-end of these ranges are prioritized for the respective interventions, in an effort to reserve resources for those with the highest need. Once referrals are made, agencies must contact the referred household within 5 business days to begin the program entry process. Emergency shelter and other emergency response interventions are not yet integrated into Smart Path at this point; however, these components are planned to roll out in the near-term.
ii. Assessment: Strengths and Challenges of the Coordinated Entry System (CES) Strengths: Overall, community response to the implementation of the Smart Path system has been positive. In interviews and other engagements, stakeholders reported that there is growing momentum and buy in around CES and many expressed a desire to build up and strengthen CES as a key element of the broader homeless system. Although Smart Path is still relatively new in Santa Cruz County and providers acknowledge that there are growing pains that come with the implementation of a new system (noted in the “Challenges” section below); most people seemed confident that issues will be resolved over time and that CES has been a beneficial addition to the suite of tools in the homelessness crisis response system. CES has helped the community identify and prioritize people with the highest needs for services and housing, in a way that was not previously occurring. This has resulted in households accessing system resources they had previously been unable to (when services and housing were accessed on a “a first-come, first-serve basis”). Stakeholders acknowledged that providers are “serving people [they] haven’t before,” and aligning the regional system towards policy goals to prioritize vulnerable populations.
The establishment of the Smart Path system has also given providers and system planners a better sense of who is in the system and how they are or are not accessing resources, a key element in developing a more effective and targeted response to homelessness. This represents a shift towards a system that is increasingly focused on helping those with the highest needs and barriers to housing – people who previously weren’t served or “creamed out.” Stakeholders said this has led to greater collaboration among system players. For example, housing work groups and front-line staff have increased communication and are now coordinating on how to best serve high-needs populations and fill gaps where services are identified as deficient. When apparent gaps in service emerge, system partners now collaboratively examine how to best serve underserved and/or high-needs people or groups and work to address these issues. Stakeholders have also pointed out that data is now more available and useful as a result of CES. The creation of Smart Path has standardized the way data is collected and reported, leading to more data that can be used to analyze efficacy and understand system performance. Increased data also provides the system a better idea of who is – and in some cases, who is not – accessing the system.
Some stakeholders representing other systems of care and institutions that overlap with the homeless
31.231 1.150
Santa Cruz County Baseline System Assessment | Prepared for the County of Santa Cruz by Focus Strategies | August 2019 | Page 27 system also recognized CES as an opportunity to increase collaboration and coordination of services across systems.
Challenges: In our assessment, the current implementation in Santa Cruz County is very similar to the design of coordinated entry in other communities, but would benefit from a re-design to better align with best practices in the field and improve its ability to efficiently connect people who are homeless with a housing intervention. Based on our conversations with CES staff, it appears some of these improvements are in the works. Areas in need of refinement or improvement include:
• Diversion is not yet a component of CES. Integrating a diversion step into Smart Path will create opportunities to help people secure a no-cost or low-cost housing solution without having to go to shelter or enter a rapid rehousing or permanent housing program; thereby helping the system reserve these interventions for those who have no other options. Plans are currently underway to build diversion into CES as part of the initial assessment step. Diversion trainings for CES “line staff” are already in the works.
• Emergency Shelter Not Integrated into CES. Smart Path is not currently being used to fill emergency shelter beds. Integrating shelters into CES to help ensure beds are filled with people with the highest needs is planned to occur in the coming 2019/2020 Fiscal Year; which has the opportunity to be an important element of an improved unsheltered/encampment strategy. • Lack of Dynamic Prioritization/ Bucketed Lists. The Smart Path system currently uses “static prioritization” in which people are assessed and then placed onto lists for specific interventions. It places people either on a list for RRH or for PSH based on their score and these lists are not permeable (i.e. people cannot move from one to the other). People who have been on the list the longest and have the highest scores are served first. This results in lists becoming stale and full of people who cannot be located, so it tends to match and refer people who are good at staying in touch with coordinated entry staff and not necessarily those with the greatest needs. Because there is not enough PSH supply to meet the needs of everyone on the PSH list, many of those households are never assisted. Meanwhile, households with lower needs and lower priority scores who are on the RRH list are receiving RRH. This leads to a situation where lower needs households are assisted before those with higher needs.
A preferred alternative would be a dynamic prioritization strategy in which the number of prioritized people matches the availability of inventory in rapid rehousing and permanent supportive housing. Households are not matched to interventions based solely on their score, but by eligibility criteria and sometimes using a case conferencing process. This results in a much shorter list of people to manage and ensures that those who are prioritized represent the highest needs households, have been recently assessed, and are easier to locate. It also eliminates long waiting lists “to nowhere.” Dynamic prioritization also allows for adjustments over time as people’s needs may change and may not be reflected in a single score. For this form of prioritization to be effective, however, a strong diversion component is needed to ensure that everyone in the system is offered some sort of assistance rather than being placed on a list.
31.232 1.151
Santa Cruz County Baseline System Assessment | Prepared for the County of Santa Cruz by Focus Strategies | August 2019 | Page 28 • Program Entry Barriers. Stakeholders reported that Smart Path struggles with getting all programs to lower their barriers to entry so that highly vulnerable households can be served. Our assessment did not encompass reviewing program entry requirements, so we cannot definitively state whether this is the case. However, this is a common problem in most CES implementations.
A systematic review of those program entry requirements can be an important part of coordinated entry improvement. Barriers can be too high, keeping large segments of the population from entering the programs designed to service them. They can be equally nonstandard resulting in a coordinated entry that requires significant time to make placements that could be reduced with reduction in barriers and alignment of requirements. As part of the next phase, Focus Strategies can support coordinated entry staff to analyze the existing program eligibility requirements and develop a plan to lower barriers systematically. • Funding Challenges. Stakeholders reported that Smart Path is underfunded. It’s primary funding source is HUD CoC grant dollars and reportedly has little local investment. We are not able to independently assess whether this is the case, however.
D. Exits: Affordable Housing
To be effective, the homeless crisis response system needs a supply of housing that is affordable for people who are experiencing homelessness, and strategies to ensure they are able to access that housing.
This includes a robust development pipeline that consistently adds to the affordable housing inventory through new construction and acquisition/rehabilitation of existing units. In addition, communities need a range of strategies to expand access to the existing supply of rental housing for people experiencing homelessness, such as through landlord engagement and outreach and housing search services. Housing programs and interventions specifically designed for and targeted to people experiencing homelessness to housing –rapid rehousing and permanent supportive housing– are discussed in the previous section on Homeless System Interventions. This section focuses on whether the community’s supply of existing built units is sufficient given the size of the homeless population. i. Descriptions of Existing Affordable Housing Inventory The existing stock of affordable housing in the Santa Cruz community consists of properties developed by non-profit affordable housing developers, inclusionary units created by market-rate developers, and some public housing units operated by the County’s Housing Authority. The Housing Authority also has a Housing Choice Voucher (HCV) program providing tenant-based rental assistance to about 4,500 households.
Like most communities in California, the community has a significant gap in the inventory of affordable housing, particularly for people at the lowest income levels. Affordability is generally defined as paying no more than 30% of income for housing related costs. Additionally, Santa Cruz County was identified as the fifth most expensive metropolitan county in the country, requiring households to earn $46.90 per hour to afford a two-bedroom apartment listed at the local Fair Market Rent (FMR). The County’s FY 2019-20 & 2020-21 Operational Plan cites that 62.3% of renters in Santa Cruz County are rent burdened, spending 30% or more of their income on rent each month. The table below summarizes data on housing affordability drawn from the National Low-Income Housing Coalition.
31.233 1.152
Santa Cruz County Baseline System Assessment | Prepared for the County of Santa Cruz by Focus Strategies | August 2019 | Page 29 Housing Affordability in Santa Cruz County8
Hourly
wage
necessary
to afford
2 Bedroom
at FMR
Local 2
Bedroom
at FMR
Annual
income
needed
to
afford 2
BMR
FMR
30% of
Area
Median
Income
(AMI)
Monthly
Rent
Affordable
at 30% of
AMI
Total
Renter
Households
(2013-
2017)
% of Total
Households
in County
(2013-
2017)
Average
Estimated
Hourly
Wage of
Renters
(2019)
Monthly
Rent
Affordable
at
Average
Renter
Wage
$46.90 $2,439 $97,560 $29,400 $735 38,544 40% $14.48 $753 The data below is from HUD’s Comprehensive Housing Affordability Strategy (CHAS) database, which was most recently updated using 2010 Census data. Though this information is not as current as the data presented above, it still provides some perspective on the unaffordability of housing in Santa Cruz county.
Available Rental Housing in Santa Cruz City by Percentage of AMI9 Household Income
Level
# of Affordable Rental
Units
Total # of Renter
Households
Shortage/Excess of
Affordable Units
30% AMI 945 3,980 -3,305
50% AMI 2,190 2,135 -55
80% AMI 6,785 3,420 3,365
100 AMI No available data 2,235 NA
Total 9,920 11,770 NA
Overall, the community lacks inventory of affordable rental units, especially for renters at 30 to 50% AMI.
As shown above, in the City of Santa Cruz – where most unsheltered homeless people reside – there is a severe shortage of housing at the lower end of the rental market and a surplus of housing starting at the 80% AMI level. Comparably, rents generally are somewhat lower in South County, but there is still a shortage of units affordable to people below 30% AMI.
ii. Assessment: Strengths and Challenges of Affordable Housing Inventory Currently, Santa Cruz County’s housing market poses significant challenges to creating new affordable housing. Barriers include the County’s historic “no growth” policies, implemented to preserve much of the open space in the County and reserving building for areas that are already urbanized; loss of Redevelopment which was the primary source of local financing for affordable housing development; community resistance to development (“NIMBY”); and a general lack of awareness in the community that affordable housing is the solution to widespread homelessness and housing instability among people at the lowest income levels. Additionally, development in north parts of the county is reportedly more difficult than in the south.
8 Data sourced from the National Low-Income Housing Coalition’s annual “Out of Reach” report. https://reports.nlihc.org/sites/default/files/oor/OOR_2019.pdf 9 Data sourced from the HUD 2007-2011 Comprehensive Housing Affordability Strategy, https://www.huduser.gov/portal/datasets/cp.html.
31.234 1.153
Santa Cruz County Baseline System Assessment | Prepared for the County of Santa Cruz by Focus Strategies | August 2019 | Page 30 Despite these growth challenges, the City of Santa Cruz, under its former Redevelopment Agency, was able to add 552 affordable housing units to the market before dissolution and continues to work towards increasing affordable housing stock with its Affordable Housing Trust Fund and by leveraging State and federal financing. The City also has an inclusionary housing ordinance that recently changed from 15% to 10%. Also, notably, Watsonville’s housing is generally more affordable, and the City of Watsonville has been instrumental in creating new affordable units. Watsonville maintains a local Affordable Housing Ordinance that requires new developments to include 15% to 20% of units for low-to-moderate income level households. Additionally, the County’s Measure J and the City’s Measure O were voter-approved initiatives that enforce inclusionary housing for all new developments countywide.
Advocates in the community attempted to pass Measure H, a housing bond that would have brought in $140 million (roughly $8 million annually) in cash infusions to invest towards local affordable housing projects or to leverage additional state funding for affordable housing. The measure failed in November 2018, falling short of the two-thirds majority vote needed. If passed, the Measure would have divvied funds among the four cities and unincorporated areas of the County to fund affordable housing – including units designated for people experiencing homelessness and in need of supportive services. As various bills work their way through the State and local legislature, community players are looking at opportunities to leverage potential funding to build and expand affordable housing options in the community.
Our conversations with affordable housing developers and housing providers revealed an appetite for building affordable units for people experiencing homelessness and a willingness to work with local government to move towards solutions to increase supply. Similarly, conversations with funders indicate that many agree with the need to increase affordable housing stock. Some funders noted their willingness to put dollars towards efforts to increase housing options for low-income households, if more clear direction and strategic planning were undertaken. Even as the local jurisdictions are faced with restrictions around expanding housing, players crucial to the development and funding of affordable units express a willingness – and in some cases, eagerness – to make strides towards positive social impact and housing solutions for those at the lowest income levels or who are experiencing homelessness.
Tackling the lack of affordable housing will be critical if Santa Cruz County is to end or significantly reduce homelessness. Ultimately, creating a pipeline of new development affordable for those at the lowest income levels will require significant political will, in addition to resources. In our assessment, mustering this level of political commitment will be challenging. Some stakeholders we talked to expressed some optimism that as homelessness becomes increasingly visible and high-priority for community members, there has been some increasingly palpable “YIMBYism” in the community. As homelessness has become an ever-more visible crisis, people are reportedly becoming more open to the idea of affordable housing development and recognizing the link between increased affordable housing and reductions in homelessness. However, other stakeholders were more pessimistic about the possibilities for increased affordable housing production. Many said that NIMBYism and negative stereotypes towards people experiencing homelessness drive community perceptions and are “baked into” local politics, ultimately preventing affordable housing projects from being approved. At least one city we talked with was disinterested in playing a role in expanding housing, seeing this as a potentially infinite need.
31.235 1.154
Santa Cruz County Baseline System Assessment | Prepared for the County of Santa Cruz by Focus Strategies | August 2019 | Page 31 Other topics that surfaced during the assessment process were questions about whether private vacation rentals are reducing the availability of market-rate rental units. Some feel local governments must take a stronger position on retaining housing supply for residents – particularly, low-income residents – and curb the number of vacation and second homes. Some stakeholders also expressed a belief that UC Santa Cruz is a major contributor to the shortage of market-rate housing at the lowest income levels. Our assessment did not extend to delving into these issues, so Focus Strategies is not able to say with any certainty how much either of these factors are impacting the availability of rental units.
E. Data and Evaluation Capacity
i. Description of Data and Evaluation Systems
The primary data system supporting analysis of the homeless system in Santa Cruz County is the Homeless Management information System (HMIS). The HAP, as the CoC governing body, has selected Community Technology Alliance (CTA) as the HMIS lead entity. CTA is the system administrator and contracts with the HMIS vendor, Bitfocus. In addition to serving as the central database for targeted homeless system programs (shelter, housing), the HMIS is used to manage most of the CES functions, including assessment, matching, and referral. Historically, the Santa Cruz CoC has struggled to have strong participation of homeless system providers in the HMIS. The addition of CES spurred more providers to enter data into HMIS; however, the HMIS coverage rate remains below national standards. In the most recent CoC competition, the community lost points in the scoring of the application due to problems with HMIS coverage.
The County has been a key leader and supporter of the countywide CORE Investments initiative, which included developing standard outcome measures to track the impact of a range of social services and community factors. “Housing and homelessness” is one of the categories for which CORE will establish high level multi-year outcome tracking. The County’s CAO office has been participating in these conversations and efforts are being made to align the factors that will be tracked on homelessness with the type of goals that are expected to be part of the homeless system improvement process. ii. Assessment: Strengths and Challenges of Data and Evaluation Our assessment of Santa Cruz’ homeless system data and evaluation capacity points to it as one of the community’s most significant challenges and an area in need of significant improvement. While the community has a HUD-compliant database, it appears that to a great extent required data goes into the HMIS but there is little capacity for using the data to understand system performance, inform planning, and develop strategic direction. The focus of activity appears to be on meeting HUD requirements for data collection and general reporting (e.g. generating required Annual Performance Report (APRs) and system performance reports), but not on using performance measurement for local program or system improvement.
A key factor underlying the lack of using data for system planning is structural. The HAP currently performs many data-driven duties including looking at data and using it for evaluation, system planning and design, developing funding priorities, and communicating statuses to the community. However, data responsibilities are divided between the HAP (as CoC governing body), the County (as CoC lead and Collaborative Applicant), CTA, and Bitfocus – with the respective roles and responsibilities of each entity
31.236 1.155
Santa Cruz County Baseline System Assessment | Prepared for the County of Santa Cruz by Focus Strategies | August 2019 | Page 32 somewhat unclear. The community looks to CTA as the “lead” for issues relating to data, but CTA is not a decision-making or policy-setting entity. These structural issues tie back to the same problems the community has identified with its overall governance structure – the lack of a clear single entity or set of entities responsible for overall homeless system planning. Should an entity be identified to take on this role, appropriate staffing capacity within that agency/organization is critical. Bolstering data and evaluation capacity will likely require hiring additional staff to ensure sufficient bandwidth exists to fulfil the responsibilities of a system planning lead.
Data analysis, evaluation, and performance measurement are all critical components of system planning – activities that currently do not have an identified home in the homeless system structure. In our discussions with providers, it also appears that many are unfamiliar with data-driven performance measurement – only a few appear to be using any of their own HMIS data to assess their project performance and to inform changes to their programs.
Additional data challenges that were surfaced during our interviews and conversations include that the HMIS system is under-funded. Our assessment work did not include a review of the HMIS budget, but it does seem clear that a perceived lack of funding resources to support HMIS is a source of concern and tension in the community. A recent shift in policy to requiring participation fees from providers has been difficult to implement because of difficulty collecting the agreed upon fees. Another concern that came up repeatedly is the perception that the data in the HMIS is of poor quality. Focus Strategies will be assessing data quality as part of the SWAP work in the next phase.
The CORE effort to track outcome-related data on a variety of social and community indicators is likely to support the need for improved data collection and utilization within the homeless arena, though at the time of this baseline assessment, the CORE outcomes were focused at a community (population) level.
Focus Strategies will continue to provide guidance and recommendations to the CORE consultants as they identify program-level outcomes and indicators that will be used to improve outcomes and direct investments. Such performance measures may include the rate of entry into programs from unsheltered situations (targeting), the rate that people return to homelessness after a housing placement, or cost effectiveness of homeless system programs (e.g. cost per permanent housing placement). Alignment between CORE’s higher-level indicators and the more detailed measures to be used by the homeless system itself will be important to ensure that public messaging is consistent, and that funders and providers are in agreement about the most important factors to evaluate the community’s impact.
F. Other System Components and Topics
Additional topics that have surfaced as part of this baseline assessment phase are described below.
1. Geographic Equity
A frequent theme of our interviews and conversations with stakeholders was the issue of geographic disparities – both in terms of where people experiencing homelessness are living as well as where programs and services are located. The general view is that the overall system is “Santa Cruz centric,” meaning that the northern area of the county, particularly the City of Santa Cruz, receives a disproportionate share of resources due to the large and visible homeless population there. Some stakeholders expressed that homelessness in South County receives less attention due to the population
31.237 1.156
Santa Cruz County Baseline System Assessment | Prepared for the County of Santa Cruz by Focus Strategies | August 2019 | Page 33 being less visible. There is also a feeling that the South County is “disconnected” from the larger region due to the County functions all being in Santa Cruz. South County has a somewhat separate network of providers who meet and collaborate independently on local efforts. For the past three years, the County Homeless Services Coordinator and the City of Watsonville have co-convened a South County Steering Committee to begin to more formally address the needs in South County.
Focus Strategies has heard two different sets of opinions about the allocation of resources between north and south counties. Some stakeholders feel there should be more equity in how resources are allocated, advocating that the South County needs more services and more shelter beds to serve people experiencing homelessness in the area, and that they are underfunded relative to their need. However, others expressed concerns that adding more resources and shelter beds will create a “magnet” effect and draw more people to the region. Some expressed a view that the recent transition of the Salvation Army shelter to a year-round operation (it was formerly seasonal) has already led to an increase in the numbers of people experiencing homelessness in South County. We do not have enough information to objectively assess whether there are geographic equity issues – this will be further explored in the next phase of this project. The County’s Operational Plan, however, sets goals to expand resources including homeless navigation and supportive housing in both the north and south regions of the county.10 The plan states, that “by June 2021, Homeless Services Coordination will work with the Homeless Action Partnership to plan and open year-round homeless services centers in North and South County” and “Health Services will increase the number of supported housing beds sited throughout the county for homeless adults with mental illness by 20 beds from the baseline calendar year 2018.” Another geographic disparity issue relates to the availability of housing. Rents are significantly lower in South County and there are more landlords willing to accept rent subsidies, so many of the households that can secure rental subsidies are living in South County. We also heard that South County is more open to development but also bears more of the burden of affordable housing development than the north – though we have not analyzed any data to assess the validity of this perception.
2. Homeless Subpopulations
This baseline assessment is primarily focused on the overall homeless system and does not delve deeply into the specific subpopulations of people experiencing homelessness. As part of the next phase of work, we will gather information that will allow us to look at the system’s performance in relation to different subpopulations, and in particular the difference in performance for programs serving families with children versus programs serving adults and transition age youth (TAY).
Two themes that emerged from our information gathering that warrant further exploration in the next phase include:
• Homeless Youth – Stakeholders generally expressed positive views of recent efforts to address youth homelessness and are optimistic that the Youth Homeless Demonstration Program grant will yield positive results. This is an area where we observed that there is a strong effort to integrate the voices of people with lived experience into the planning of the YHDP 10 https://sccounty01.co.santa-cruz.ca.us/Operational_Plan_2019-21/Operational_Plan_2019-21_complete.pdf
31.238 1.157
Santa Cruz County Baseline System Assessment | Prepared for the County of Santa Cruz by Focus Strategies | August 2019 | Page 34 implementation. The HAP recently voted to add a Youth Advisory Board (YAB) member to the HAP Board. Specific efforts to address youth homelessness is a strength, as youth experiencing homelessness follow somewhat different patterns from adults and often report feeling unwelcome or uncomfortable in services designed for adults. However, we caution that the efforts to address youth homelessness should not become disconnected from the broader system picture and that connections between youth and adult providers and programs are essential. Elements of the YHDP planning process may be able to be built upon in the creation of a more coordinated overall system.
• Veterans – Stakeholders expressed that there is a well-coordinated system for addressing veteran homelessness and a wealth of resources for veterans. The PIT count shows that veteran homelessness has gone down significantly since 2017, though there was also a significant rise between 2015 and 2017. As with the youth focused work, some of the coordination effort that has been made to better address Veteran homelessness may be useful to build upon in the development of further collaboration across the system and for other populations.
3. Homeless System and Mainstream Service System Collaboration The County of Santa Cruz oversees most mainstream service systems, including health, behavioral health, foster care, criminal justice, employment, and public benefits. All these systems are serving people experiencing homelessness. We heard of a number of County-led initiatives designed to better serve this population and the countywide Operational Plan outlines key goals and strategies for addressing homelessness, which are largely focused on expanding emergency response and prevention services. The plan sets the overarching goal of expanding “services to reduce homelessness and increase housing stability” by expanding emergency shelter capacity, supporting “transition to permanent housing,” and focusing on “proven prevention and housing stability strategies.” Other objectives outlined in the countywide plan include bolstering homeless crisis response through new State dollars, conducting assessments through Smart Path for at least 1,600 people countywide, increasing the rate at which people exit the homeless system to permanent housing, and reducing the three-year recidivism rate for the AB 109 population (those on probation).
Additionally, the County CAO has been convening a County Homeless Coordinating Committee to begin aligning the work of these different departments around a shared strategy to address homelessness. This work is still in its initial stages and the Committee is looking to this technical assistance process with Focus Strategies as an opportunity to set some strategic direction for their work. Key issues they have identified include strategies to reduce institutional discharge into homelessness, expanding housing and other placement options for people with behavioral health issues, and cross system data matching.
VI. Implications of Assessment and Interim Recommendations The primary purpose of this baseline assessment is to identify the “current state” of the homeless crisis response system in Santa Cruz County and serve as a starting place for the next round of analysis and system planning.
Overall, we found that the Santa Cruz community has a significant homeless problem relative to its population. Funding, functioning, and the size of the homeless crisis response system is not at the scale or
31.239 1.158
Santa Cruz County Baseline System Assessment | Prepared for the County of Santa Cruz by Focus Strategies | August 2019 | Page 35 level of alignment and coordination needed to begin to reverse current trends. However, many essential system elements are in place and function fairly well, giving local stakeholders a good foundation to build upon. System strengths include a range of emergency responses (outreach, emergency shelter and services) that respond to the basic needs of people experiencing homelessness and, in some cases, operate with strong housing-focused intention. Rapid re-housing inventory is increasing. Permanent housing interventions targeted to people experiencing homeless are few but seem to be relatively well designed and targeted. Coordinated entry is well-established and accepted within the community and has led to improvements in the availability of data on people experiencing homelessness. The HAP is recognized as the primary forum for stakeholders to engage in dialogue on homelessness and has been successful in its role as coordinator of HUD CoC mandated data gathering and planning. There is a strong track record of collaboration between stakeholders.
A few key programmatic pieces are missing from the system – most notably a strong diversion/problemsolving practice that can work to reduce inflow of people into homelessness. At the system level, wellinformed members of the community actively participate in efforts to reduce homelessness and many examples of successful coordination exist. However, a much more robust system-wide alignment around priorities and goals, capacity for data-driven decision making, and a more refined and robust governance and implementation structure is needed. This includes increased staffing capacity throughout select areas of the system to see goals to fruition. Without these elements in place Santa Cruz cannot be said to have a fully realized homeless crisis response system in which all the parts work together toward a common set of measurable goals. And without such a system, progress on reducing homelessness will remain elusive.
The work Focus Strategies will conduct over the next twelve months will deepen the understanding of what is currently working and can be built upon, identify where there are important investment gaps, and define a homeless crisis response with clear goals, structures, and measurable outcomes. Leadership and key stakeholders will use this information to develop a strategic direction and action plan for homeless system efforts moving forward.
In the short-term, Focus Strategies is providing the community with suggested initial strategies that could be developed and implemented immediately to help jump-start improvements to the homeless crisis response while the next phase of analytic and system re-design work is taking place. These include three improvements targeted at a programmatic gap or need, and the launching of the new governance structure. Focus Strategies is also developing a suggested set of implementation steps that the County, cities, providers, and other stakeholders can undertake immediately to begin acting collaboratively to implement these interim recommendations – in a Short-Term Action Plan that accompanies this report.
Implementing any of these interim recommendations will take time as well as human and financial resources to support. One of the main obstacles to date that has prevented the Santa Cruz community from undertaking a more system-focused response is the lack of dedicated staffing and infrastructure to support system level work. Focus Strategies can and will provide consulting and technical assistance to support the implementation of the interim recommendations, should the community choose to move forward with some or all of them. However, leadership will need to prioritize either the time of existing staff to drive implementation or identify resources to increase staff capacity to carry these out.
31.240 1.159
Santa Cruz County Baseline System Assessment | Prepared for the County of Santa Cruz by Focus Strategies | August 2019 | Page 36 A. Recommended Short-Term System Improvements
1. Implement a Systemwide Diversion Practice to Reduce Inflow. As noted, the homeless crisis response system in Santa Cruz County currently lacks a robust effort to reduce inflow through diversion or problem-solving practices. Some efforts are underway to add diversion to CES and begin training providers in this approach. We would advise fast-tracking implementation of a diversion/problem-solving approach and scaling it up as rapidly as possible. Ideally, the initial implementation will include availability of a pool of flexible funding for households that are able to identify an immediate housing solution that requires some level of financial assistance to enact. This can include traditional expenses such as application fees and security deposits or more flexible uses of resources for things such as grocery cards or furniture that can allow a person to make a contribution to the household hosting them. Other essential elements of standing up a systemwide diversion practice include regular and ongoing training, as well as peer-to-peer learning (such as a learning collaborative) and a method for collecting data on diversion to track impact. Diversion should be practiced at any place where people experiencing homelessness or a housing crisis contact the system seeking support, which includes at least the CES system and shelters, as well as offered on a mobile basis by training outreach teams in this approach.
To complement the work on diversion, we also recommend moving forward quickly with efforts to re-tool Smart Path and shift toward dynamic prioritization. Currently, Smart Path puts everyone on a list to wait for a housing intervention, which tends to incentivize people to wait, believing they will someday receive a long-term housing subsidy, even when the likelihood for most is very small. Shifting to dynamic prioritization and letting people know in real-time whether or not they will be prioritized for a housing intervention will be critical to making diversion/problem-solving the primary intervention that the system has to offer to people who are not among the highest need group. It will also streamline the rehousing process for those who are prioritized, as the number of people who are designated as priority aligns with the inventory available. This will shift the system away from one in which nearly everyone is waiting to one where prioritized people and households move quickly to a homeless system-provided resolution and others are supported to find an alternative with the understanding that they will not receive a subsidy or other deep resource from the homeless crisis response system.
2. Build Capacity of Emergency Shelters to Deliver Housing-Focused Services and Supports. Our assessment shows that the existing shelter providers in the community are already taking steps to integrate services that help residents move from shelter to housing. Given that the siting issues relating to new navigation centers will likely be protracted, a good short-term strategy will be to identify ways to build up the capacity of existing shelters to become more housing-focused and speed up the rate at which they are helping residents exit to housing. A good first step would be to convene a shelter working group with representation from the shelters and primary funders of shelter to identify what is already working and needs expanding, as well as to develop common standards and approaches for shelters and navigation centers. This could include: (1) inventory of entry requirements in place at shelters currently; (2) developing plans to lower barriers or align practices; and (3) identifying what resources and training shelters need to help more people with self-resolution, lighter touch housing support, and/or connections to RRH/PSH. Products from this work could include the creation of a shared set of shelter practice guidelines, a training curriculum for shelter staff, and/or seeding a new pool of flexible resources available either within shelters or accessible by shelters for immediate housing solutions.
31.241 1.160
Santa Cruz County Baseline System Assessment | Prepared for the County of Santa Cruz by Focus Strategies | August 2019 | Page 37
3. Coordinate and Standardize Outreach Efforts: Santa Cruz has a number of entities conducting outreach to unsheltered people but there is currently no formal coordination of these efforts, agreed upon goals, shared protocols, consistent data collection, or common outcome measures. Over the longterm, the Santa Cruz community needs a proactive strategy for addressing encampments and unsheltered homelessness as part of the creation of a systematic response to homelessness. Such a strategy would target a reduction in unsheltered homelessness and reduce the impacts on the people living outside as well as on the broader community. This will be a significant undertaking that will need the new governance and implementation structure to be in place in order to be successful. In the interim, we recommend that stakeholders begin working immediately on coordination and alignment of outreach efforts. The agencies with outreach teams and their key funders should come together to share information about how they currently function, who they typically see, and develop agreements on a coordinated approach to the purpose, methods, desired measurable outcomes and geographic coverage across all outreach efforts. This will be a useful interim step that will ensure outreach is efficiently deployed and connected to the rest of the system and prepare the way toward a more comprehensive approach to unsheltered homelessness.
B. Governance Recommendations
As noted in the assessment section of this report, Focus Strategies has reviewed the work of the Homeless Governance Study Committee. In our view, this group was grappling with a set of questions that it is critical for the community to resolve. The recommendations from that effort propose a workable structure that could act as a backbone for a new system approach. However, key questions about its authority, relationship to other entities, and how it will make and communicate decisions remain to be answered.
We recommend that this group be “reconvened” in the Fall. The original membership had representation from all the essential sectors (County, cities, HAP, providers, business community), so it could reconvene with the original members (depending on their availability) or a similar group. The only sector not represented in the original Committee was private funders and there was no one with lived experience of homelessness – these are two slots that we would recommend be added. The County CAO’s office should continue to serve as the convener as it is the agency currently resourced to serve as the staffing support for the HAP (the existing governance structure) and because the County is the only public entity whose work relating to homelessness spans the entire county geography. However, to address concerns that the governance work is not overly County-centric, we recommend designating Focus Strategies as the outside expert and facilitator of the work. Design and facilitation of the work group meetings, preparation of materials in between meetings, and helping guide the group to a set of decisions about the proposal structure is all within the scope of our TA engagement.
To ensure that the process does not halt again or cease to make progress, we recommend a set of facilitated meetings designed to pick up from the work of the study group, including building out the basic recommendations for a leadership body (IPC), a funder coordination entity (likely a restructured Jurisdictional Coordination Group), and broader membership group (built on the current HAP).
This process will answer critical questions about how the structure will operate, what purview it will have, and what resources and efforts it will jointly oversee. We recommend a series of 4 to 5 meetings taking
31.242 1.161
Santa Cruz County Baseline System Assessment | Prepared for the County of Santa Cruz by Focus Strategies | August 2019 | Page 38 place between September and November 2019. We will design and facilitate a set of agendas to address the following topics, building from each meeting to arrive at agreement on a new governing structure, how it will function and make decisions, what specific funding sources it will oversee or coordinate/align, and how it will communicate decisions to the larger membership and the public.
1. Policy Setting/Strategic Direction/Establishing Priorities. Using currently proposed changes to the landscape, such as the need to made decisions about the interim recommendations we have outlined above, work through the development of a decision-making process for the IPC/leadership entity.
This will include determining how local data on current system performance is brought in to develop strategic direction and set policy priorities, how HAP and other community input - particularly from those experiencing homelessness - is gathered in a timely fashion and integrated in decision making, as well as setting the boundaries of how such strategic directions and policy decisions are or are not binding on leadership members (such as the county or cities). This step will result in parameters for decision making at the leadership level that drive toward well-defined priorities and buy-in to a strategic direction with mutual accountability.
2. Funding Alignment and Funder Coordination Structure. Building from the progress made to establish strategic priorities, the process will need to identify the resources and funder entities that will work together to invest in the strategic changes. This includes establishing a specific funder coordination body and determining the shared process for either pooling funding or aligning funding processes and folding in identified priorities to the funding process of the County, cities, and philanthropy. This should also include creating a process and structures to ensure all funding decisions are targeted and strategic, made by non-conflicted parties, are clearly understood by all stakeholders to be fair and transparent. Proposals making their way through the State legislature might result in new funding being divided among the County, the City of Santa Cruz or other cities, and the HAP as the CoC. This part of the process should consider how a proposed funder coordination structure and funding alignment approach will ensure that those dollars are spent strategically and in alignment with each other. The process should ensure new resources compliment and leverage other resources currently in the system and refine the recommendations for a coordinated funder structure to reflect this.
3. CoC Compliance. Once the strategic direction, parameters of leadership roles, and funder coordination are outlined, Focus Strategies will facilitate a discussion designed to resolve any potential CoC compliance issues raised by the proposed structure. Some current HAP members noted that the previously proposed membership for the IPC does not necessarily meet all of HUD’s requirements relating to broad representation of stakeholder groups. The final structure needs to ensure that the CoC-specific functions, as well as other decisions, are reviewed by a broader-based group such as the HAP general membership or a subset of that entity. At the same time, leadership should ensure that the overarching governance body, which is tasked to make decisions about a broader set of resources (not just the CoC), can act and is non-conflicted.
4. Communication and Transparency. Ensuring that considerations are shared, and decisions are communicated to the broader community is essential to the new structure and its ability to create buy-in from stakeholders. The funder group should launch by creating a funding inventory report that
31.243 1.162
Santa Cruz County Baseline System Assessment | Prepared for the County of Santa Cruz by Focus Strategies | August 2019 | Page 39 lays out all the funding sources currently going into addressing homelessness, the resulting amounts, what they are expended on, how those decisions are made, and the results (if known). This could be a baseline report that then helps inform system planning going forward and will help with refining the governance structure. In addition, agreements about how decisions will be captured, disseminated in a timely fashion to interested parties, and how results will be evaluated over time must be made as well.
The end result of this reconvened governance process will be agreement on the new structure, including protocols and procedures for the items noted above. Focus Strategies will document the agreements in a written governance proposal to be presented and approved by all relevant decision-making bodies.
Ultimately supporting the final governance structure will require dedicated staffing. One key question for the system’s leader and funders will be about what they can provide to support the structure and system.
As work proceeds on the administrative structure, Focus Strategies will help produce estimates of staffing needs and methods to support them.
C. Issues for Further Exploration in the Next Phase of TA As noted throughout this report, the information gathering process surfaced several questions that Focus Strategies is not yet equipped to answer without further information and analysis. Below we list a few topics that are high priorities to explore in the next phase of TA; when the results of the SWAP project performance and system performance analysis are complete:
• Does the community have enough year-round shelter?
• How much RRH and PSH is needed to right-size the system? • If more RRH and voucher-based PSH/AH is created, is there enough rental inventory to absorb it? • What is the quality of the data in the HMIS system?
• Are there significant barriers in housing and shelter programs? And, if so, can these be lowered and entry requirements standardized?
31.244 1.163
Santa Cruz County Baseline System Assessment | Prepared for the County of Santa Cruz by Focus Strategies | August 2019 | Page 40 Appendix A
List of Interview Participants
Name Title Organization Interview Date
Cynthia Chase Manager, Division of Re-Entry Sheriff’s Office, County of Santa Cruz May 22, 2019
Peter Connery Consultant Applied Survey Research May 13, 2019 Julie Conway CoC Lead Agency,
Collaborative Applicant County of Santa Cruz May 17, 2019 Joseph Crottogini Homeless Persons Health
Project Manager County of Santa Cruz May 9, 2019
MariaElena De La
Garza Executive Director Community Action Board May 31, 2019 Tony Gardner CoC Consultant Tony Gardner Consulting May 29, 2019 Serg Kagno Community
Advocate/Consultant Community Volunteer May 15, 2019
Don Lane CoC Board Member Smart Solutions to
Homelessness May 20, 2019
Harold Laubach Winter Shelter Operator Salvation Army May 24, 2019 Kathleen McCarthy Funder, Health Care Systems Central California Alliance for Health May 28, 2019
Brooke Newman Program Manager Downtown Streets Team May 21, 2019 Jennifer Panetta Executive Director Santa Cruz County Housing Authority May 20, 2019
Kalyne Renda Executive Director Monarch Services May 10, 2019 Erik Riera Director, Behavioral Health
Services County of Santa Cruz May 31, 2019
Bob Russell CoC, HMIS Lead Agency Community Technology Alliance May 13, 2019 Jessica Scheiner CoC, Coordinated Entry Lead
Agency County of Santa Cruz May 17, 2019
Jon Showalter Chair of the Board Association of Faith
Communities May 10, 2019
Christine Sippl YHDP Lead Encompass May 28, 2019
Susan True Executive Director Santa Cruz Community
Foundation June 5, 2019
Melisa Vierra Executive Director Families in Transition May 17, 2019 Betsy Wilson Executive Director MidPen Housing May 15, 2019 Jessie Woolf Regional Site Director Veterans Resource Center May 23, 2019
31.245 1.164
Santa Cruz County Baseline System Assessment | Prepared for the County of Santa Cruz by Focus Strategies | August 2019 | Page 41 Appendix B
List of In-Person Community Engagements and Focus Groups Group/Organization Participants Interview Date
Homeless Action Partnership Homeless Action Partnership Members April 17, 2019 Community Organizations
Meeting Representatives of Organizations April 17, 2019 City of Santa Cruz City Staff May 1, 2019
County of Santa Cruz County Staff and Executive Leadership May 1, 2019 Homeless Garden Project People with Lived Experience, Homeless Garden Project Staff May 7, 2019
North County Service Providers Service Providers in North Santa Cruz County May 7, 2019 Homeless Service Center Homeless Service Center Staff May 7, 2019 CORE Project Nicole Young and Rayne Marr May 7, 2019
Salvation Army Salvation Army Staff May 8, 2019
Salvation Army People with Lived Experience May 8, 2019 South County Service Providers Service Providers in South Santa Cruz County May 8, 2019 City of Capitola City Staff May 23, 2019
City of Watsonville City Staff May 24, 2019
City of Scotts Valley City Staff June 27, 2019
31.246 1.165
Santa Cruz County Baseline System Assessment | Prepared for the County of Santa Cruz by Focus Strategies | August 2019 | Page 42 Appendix C
List of Documents Reviewed
To understand the work accomplished, currently in place, and planned in Santa Cruz County to reduce homelessness, Focus Strategies requested and received the following documents from the County of Santa Cruz. The documents help establish a baseline understanding of Santa Cruz County homelessness reduction efforts prior to Focus Strategies engaging in work with the community.
A. System Overview
The following documents relate to system workflow including strategic plans, policy manuals, procedures, reports, surveys, and program materials.
Program Information and Background Documents: All In Strategic Plan, Youth Homeless Demonstration Program Plan, 2019 HEAP and CESH Awards, 2019 YHDP Awards, CESH Outcomes Logic Model Template, HEAP and CESH Budget Template, HEAP and CESH RFP Scoring Tool.
Program Reports: 2015-17 Performance Measures Report, Homeless System Modeling Discussion Guide, Homeless Census and Survey Comprehension,
Applications and Request for Proposals: SCCYHDP Innovative Proposals, 2018 CoC Application, HEAP and CESH RFP, HEAP and CESH Applications Received, RFP Selection Process, Abode HEAP and CESH Application, MidPen HEAP and CESH Application.
B. Homelessness Governance and Leadership Documents
Focus Strategies has reviewed the following documents relating to responsibilities, inter-entity relations, membership, and desired outcomes related to governance structures in Santa Cruz County.
Responsibilities, Membership, and Organizational Charts: Governance Pyramid, HAP Governance Change Chart, HAP Governance Chart, HAP Organizational Chart, HAP Organizational Tree, Santa Cruz CoC Governance Charter, CoC HAP Governance Charter, IPC Membership Proposals, HGSC Membership.
Visions, Goals, and Workplans for Governance: Ad-Hoc Governance Study Update, Results of Problem Statement Matrix Exercise, Background of Interagency Governance, CoC Draft Charter Comments, CoC Countywide Comparison, Committee Inputs for HAP Executive Review, Enhancing Leadership and Collaboration, Presentation on HGSC Strengths and Weaknesses, Notes to Self on Governance, Success Mapped to HAP Governance, What Success Looks Like for Homeless Governance.
C. Funding and Investment Documents
The following documents highlight funding models and rationale that govern some homelessness investments in Santa Cruz County.
Collective Results and Evidence-based Investment (CORE) Model: Overview of CORE Investments, CORE Results Preliminary Scan Matrix and Strategic Plans, CORE Investments Matrix, CORE Investment Status Report, CORE Impact Report.
31.247 1.166
Santa Cruz County Baseline System Assessment | Prepared for the County of Santa Cruz by Focus Strategies | August 2019 | Page 43 Appendix D
List of Data Reviewed
Quantitative information from Santa Cruz County and other communities was used to provide context and lightly inform our qualitative analysis of the local homelessness crisis response system. The following is a list of data sources to use as part of this assessment report.
Santa Cruz County Resources: 2015-19 Housing Inventory Count, 2015-2019 Point In Time Count, 2007-11 Comprehensive Housing Affordability Strategy, HUD System Performance Measure Results, 2017 Santa Cruz County Homeless Census and Survey.
Non-Santa Cruz County Resources: San Francisco Point In Time Count, Alameda County Point In Time Count, San Diego Point In Time Count, Santa Clara County Point In Time Count, National Alliance on Mental Health (NAMI).
31.248 1.167
Santa Cruz County Baseline System Assessment | Prepared for the County of Santa Cruz by Focus Strategies | August 2019 | Page 44 Appendix E
Homeless Crisis Response System Flow Chart
The following diagram provides an overview of our approach to understanding “flow” through key elements of the homeless crisis response system. It shows that all parts within the system should seamlessly work together to assist people experiencing housing crises into permanent housing, whether that housing be within or outside of the system inventory. Emergency shelter may be an interim “step” along a household’s journey from homelessness to housing, however, it is the primary focus or long-term “destination” of the system and is strongly connected to permanent housing exits. This system framework guides the thinking behind our work and this baseline assessment. As we discuss strengths and challenges, we are reviewing these against what is needed for a high-functioning system model.
31.249 1.168
Santa Cruz County Baseline System Assessment | Prepared for the County of Santa Cruz by Focus Strategies | August 2019 | Page 45 Appendix F
Total System Capacity - 2019 HIC Beds
The following table outlines system capacity in Santa Cruz county as described in the 2019 Housing Inventory Count (HIC) submitted to HUD by the HAP. The table is broken down by service provider, project, and the number of beds available in a specified project. Numbers of beds reflects the point-intime bed count on the night the inventory was compiled in January 2019.
Provider Project # of Beds
Emergency Shelter
Association of Faith Communities Rotating Shelter 20
Encompass Community Services River Street Shelter 32
Front Street, Inc. Paget Center 12
Homeless Services Center
Paul Lee Loft Shelter 40
Rebele Family Shelter 90
Recuperative Care Center 12
Jesus Mary and Joseph Home Jesus Mary and Joseph Home Shelter 12 Monarch Services Domestic Violence Shelter 18
New Life Community Services NLCS Emergency Shelter 5
Pajaro Valley Shelter Services Parajo Valley Shelter 28 Salvation Army North County AFC Winter Shelter 110
South County Winter Shelter 50
Siena House Pregnant Women Shelter 10
Total Emergency Shelter Beds 439
Transitional Housing
Encompass Community Services
FUP Vouchers 13
Perlman House 4
SCAP 6
THP Plus 15
Homeless Services Center Page Smith Community House 40
Pajaro Valley Shelter Services Sudden Street TH & Family TH 64 Transitional Housing Annex 16
Santa Cruz Housing Authority Brommer Street 18
New Life Gemma Residential 6
Total Transitional Housing Beds 182
Rapid Rehousing
Families in Transition
CHAMP 38
ESG Rapid Rehousing 11
First Step-Scattered Housing for Families with
Children 29
Home TBRA Rapid Rehousing 7
Santa Cruz County Planning Home 10
Welfare-to-Work Housing Scholarship Program 11
Welfare-to-Work Short-Term Rental Subsidies 18
Young Adults Achieving Success, YHDP RRH 2.0 3
Homeless Services Center ESG Rapid Rehousing 22
31.250 1.169
Santa Cruz County Baseline System Assessment | Prepared for the County of Santa Cruz by Focus Strategies | August 2019 | Page 46 Provider Project # of Beds
SSVF – HSC 13
Veteran Resource Center SSVF – Veterans Resource Center 42 Total Rapid Rehousing Beds 204
Permanent Supportive Housing
County Mental Health PH for Mental Disabilities 5
Encompass Community Services
Freedom Cottage 4
Grace Commons 14
Housing for Health 2 7
Housing for Health 3 13
Homeless Persons Health Project
Bonus PSH 7
MATCH Housing 42
Nuevo Sol 11
Santa Cruz Housing Authority
Housing Voucher for CH Medically Vulnerable 120
New Beginnings 9
News Roots YHDP 4
S+C Program 41
VASH Santa Cruz County Program 303
Total Permanent Supportive Housing Beds 580
31.251 1.170
Lead/Convener Staff/TA Participant(s)
A. Identify resources for Diversion flex funds Sept. 2019 CAO Focus Strategies N/A Work group has some dedicated
resources/budget to shape their
planning/design work
B. Conduct broad-based education workshops on
Diversion (what it is, why do it, how it advances
homeless system goals)
Sept. 2019 HSD or CAO Focus Strategies
Homeless
providers, other
systems, funders,
others
Help build community understanding
and support for this approach
C. Convene Diversion and CE policy work group -
series of small design meetings Sept. 2019 SmartPath Staff Focus Strategies SmartPath staff Hold 2-3 meetings and conference calls with
SmartPath staff to discuss: establishing goals
for Diversion in SCZ, what would success look
like (define results), how diversion would fit in
Smartpath flow and other places in the
system, develop draft policies and procedures,
diversion conversation guide, training plan,
flex funds procedures,
By. Oct. 15 SmartPath Staff Focus Strategies SmartPath staff Written list of goals/desired results, Flow
chart of SCZ homeless system with
diversion integrated, written description
of diversion as a system practice in SCZ,
written draft of policies, tools, training
plan
In parallel with Diversion work; hold 2-3
meetings or conference calls wit Smart Path
staff to develop proposed CES design
refinements: analyze inventory and numbers
of opening in 60-90 days, develop new
procedures for generating priority list,
identifying and finding top scoring
households, case conferencing; policies for
serving higher need households in RRH, what
resources are needed?, expand fluidity across
program types.
By Nov. 15 SmartPath Staff Focus Strategies SmartPath staff Revised draft CES Policies and
timeline/plan for input, revision and
adoption
Assigned Entities/People/Roles - 3 columns Activities Timeline Deliverable or Result Work Area 1: Systemwide Diversion and CES Refinement
Prepared by Focus Strategies Page 1
DRAFTSanta Cruz County Homelessness Response System TA
Short Term Action Plan
31.252 1.171
Lead/Convener Staff/TA Participant(s)
Assigned Entities/People/Roles - 3 columns Activities Timeline Deliverable or Result D. Convene broader working group and hold 2-3
meetings to refine Diversion and CES plan,
develop implementation timeline, messaging
strategy, etc.
December SmartPath Staff Focus Strategies
Providers, other
TBD
Refined policies and procedures,
messaging materials, implementation
timeline
A. Identify resources for housing-focused services
in shelters Sept. 2019 CAO Focus Strategies N/A
Work group has some dedicated
resources/budget to shape their
planning/design work
B. Convene shelter client input group to gather
input on shelter experience, what would help
them secure housing faster
Sept. 2019 TBD Focus Strategies
People living in
shelters
Recommendations for making shelter
more effective at exiting people to
housing; more responsive to resident
needs
C. Convene shelter work group Sept. 2019
Community
Provider TBD Focus Strategies
Shelter providers,
shelter funders
Meeting 1: Level setting; overview of best
practices in housing-focused shelter; mapping
what currently exists in SCZ, establish goals
and what success would look like for SCZ
shelter system as a whole, performance
measures
By Sept. 15
Community
Provider TBD Focus Strategies
Shelter providers,
shelter funders
Detailed inventory of existing shelter
programs, including their service models,
entry requirements, staffing, etc.
Meeting 2: System design work - What is the
gap between where shelters are now and
where they need to go - staffing needs,
changes to entry requirements changes to
policies and practices, availability of resources
for clients (e.g. flex funds)
By Oct. 15
Community
Provider TBD Focus Strategies
Shelter providers,
shelter funders
Agreement on shared policies, practices,
guidelines for shelter operations;
agreement on performance expectations
Meeting 3: Develop policies, procedures and
training plan (draft common set of
overarching policies for shelters, minimum
training required for all shelter staff)
By Nov. 15
Community
Provider TBD Focus Strategies
Shelter providers,
shelter funders
Written draft of shared policies and
procedures
Work Area 2: Housing-Focused Shelter
Prepared by Focus Strategies Page 2
DRAFTSanta Cruz County Homelessness Response System TA
Short Term Action Plan
31.253 1.172
Lead/Convener Staff/TA Participant(s)
Assigned Entities/People/Roles - 3 columns Activities Timeline Deliverable or Result Meeting 4: Develop "launch" plan to roll out
agreed-upon changes, communications
strategy
By Dec. 15
Community
Provider TBD Focus Strategies
Shelter providers,
shelter funders
Completed "Launch" timeline and draft
communications materials
A. Convene outreach work group Sept. 2019
County Health
Services
Focus Strategies
Outreach team
representatives
and funders
Meeting 1: Level setting; overview of best
practices in coordinated outreach; mapping
what outreach currently exists in SCZ (hours,
team composition, geography, targeting,
services offered, data collected); identify gaps
and duplication
By Sept. 15
County Health
Services
Focus Strategies
Outreach team
representatives
and funders
Written inventory of existing outreach
Meeting 2: System design work/standardizing -
what should all outreach be able to do (e.g.
diversion, CE, connect to other resources,
common messaging about what system has
available); what should be specialized?
By Oct. 15
County Health
Services
Focus Strategies
Outreach team
representatives
and funders
Written summary of agreements about
desired common elements of all
outreach
Meeting 3: Improving operations/coordination
- what should be process/protocol for
deploying outreach to right team gets to right
person? Should all outreach teams collect
common data elements; can data go into
HMIS? Is there a common baseline of training
all outreach should have?
By Nov. 15
County Health
Services
Focus Strategies
Outreach team
representatives
and funders
Write proposal for new operational
procedures and protocols for improved
outreach coordination, common training
standards, data collection plan
Meeting 4: Recommendations - agreed upon
initial steps and timeline to begin shifting
towards more coordinated outreach
By Dec. 15
County Health
Services
Focus Strategies
Outreach team
representatives
and funders
Complete implementation timeline for
agreed upon changes
Work Area 3: Coordinate and Standardize Outreach
Prepared by Focus Strategies Page 3
DRAFTSanta Cruz County Homelessness Response System TA
Short Term Action Plan
31.254 1.173
Lead/Convener Staff/TA Participant(s)
Assigned Entities/People/Roles - 3 columns Activities Timeline Deliverable or Result B. Conduct interviews with unsheltered people;
what outreach teams have engaged them; what is
helpful; what would they like to see differently.
client input group to gather input on shelter
experience, what would help them secure housing
faster
By Oct. 15
County Health
Services
TBD
Outreach team
representatives
and funders
Summary of client input, implications for
design of more coordinated outreach
strategy
A. Re-Convene Governance Study Group
Sept. 2019 CAO Focus Strategies
TBD but similar to
previous group
Meeting 1: Level setting; revisit previous work;
get all participants on same page about where
work is starting from, establish goals for this
work group
By Sept. 15 CAO Focus Strategies
TBD but similar to
previous group
Written summary of work accomplished
to date; written list of goals for rebooted group
Meeting 2: Policy setting, strategic direction,
priorities. Develop decision-making process
for proposed IPC, including how it integrates
performance data, perspective from people
with lived experience; whether/how decisions
are binding on different entities (HAP, County,
cities)
By Oct. 10 CAO Focus Strategies
TBD but similar to
previous group
Written decision-making process and
policies
Meeting 3: Funding Alignment and Funder
Coordination. Identify resources (funding
streams) that will be coordinated, establish or
identify funder coordination body, process for
ensuring funding decisions are targeted and
strategic, fair, transparent; consider how new
funding streams will be integrated
By Oct. 30 CAO Focus Strategies
TBD but similar to
previous group
Written description of funder
coordination structure, process, policies
Meeting 4: CoC Compliance. Map new
propose structure to CoC governance
requirements, identify areas that need
refining to ensure compliance.
By Nov. 15 CAO Focus Strategies
TBD but similar to
previous group
Revised/refined Governance structure
chart and description (membership of
entities, roles of entities) to align with
CoC requirements.
Work Area 4: Governance, Funding, Planning and Implementation Structure and Processes Prepared by Focus Strategies Page 4
DRAFTSanta Cruz County Homelessness Response System TA
Short Term Action Plan
31.255 1.174
Lead/Convener Staff/TA Participant(s)
Assigned Entities/People/Roles - 3 columns Activities Timeline Deliverable or Result Meeting 5: Communication and Transparency.
Agreements about how decisions will be
captured and disseminated in a timely way,
and evaluated and adjusted over time. Create
a plan for a regular investment report to the
community.
By Nov. 30 CAO Focus Strategies
TBD but similar to
previous group
Written description of communication
policies and procedures
B. Draft New Governance Charter, Bylaws, Org
Chart, other documents as needed; for approval
by appropriate bodies (HAP, BOS, cities, etc.)
By Dec. 15 CAO Focus Strategies N/A Governance Charter, bylaws, org chart and/or other associated documents
A. Presentations on Baseline Report; begin
identifying shape of new system through
facilitated discussions with stakeholders
(presentations to include HAP, others)
August-October CAO & HAP Focus Strategies TBD
Begin drafting written system design,
flow chart, key strategies, gaps to be
filled
B. Complete system and project performance
analysis (SWAP) November Focus Strategies Focus Strategies System performance reports C. Present SWAP results (system performance),
use results to inform continued development of
system design
November CAO & HAP Focus Strategies TBD
System performance reports
presentation materials
D. Present SWAP results to individual providers
(project performance), opportunity to engage
each provider in system design decisions
November Individual providersFocus Strategies Individual providersProject performance reports (for individual providers)
E. Complete draft of system design (flow chart),
description of new system, identify key strategies
to be implemented, gaps to be filled, develop
proposed staffing structure
December CAO and HAP Focus Strategies TBD
Written system design, flow chart, key
strategies, gaps to be filled
Predictive modeling and action planning
Work Area 5: Overall Homeless System Design
Jan - March 2020
Prepared by Focus Strategies Page 5
DRAFTSanta Cruz County Homelessness Response System TA
Short Term Action Plan
31.256 1.175
Role Definition
Lead/Convenor
Takes ownership and accountability for work area,
convenes work group or other planning body, makes
decisions and/or empowers groups to make decisions,
covers logistics such as meeting locations
Staff/Technical Assistance
Produces work to support implementations steps,
including (but not limited to): research, analysis, draft documents, create agendas, facilitate meetings, build
consensus and support individuals/groups to make
decisions, checks in with Convenor between meetings
Participant(s)
Participate in implementation work group or other
implementation entity, attends meetings regularly,
complete small tasks in between meetings (e.g. review
materials, prepare for discussions)
DRAFT
Prepared by Focus Strategies Page 6
Santa Cruz County Homelessness Response System TA
Short Term Action Plan
31.257 1.176
ATTACHMENT 6: CACH INITIAL WORK PLAN
31.258 1.177
COMMUNITY ADVISORY
COMMITTEE ON HOMELESSNESS
(CACH)
AGENDA REPORT
Sept. 17, 2019
DEPARTMENT: CACH Phase 1 Sub-Committee via the City Manager’s Office SUBJECT: CACH Phase 1 Sub-Committee Recommendations for CACH Phase 1 Work Plan
RECOMMENDATION: The CACH Phase 1 Sub-Committee recommends adopting the following policy areas to be included in the CACH’s Phase 1 work plan:
1. Secure hygiene resources: restrooms and showers.
2. Increase local shelter options, especially identify a new site for the managed River Street Camp, but may also consider effective program modeling for emergency shelter.
3. Identify sites (or acceptable siting criteria) for new outdoor emergency shelter solutions such as transitional encampments or safe sleeping.
4. Modify the camping ordinance.
BACKGROUND: At its September 3rd meeting, the CACH formed the Phase 1 Sub-Committee (Subcommittee) “to develop immediate policy recommendations to be shared with the full CACH for the purpose of defining the Phase 1 work plan, including a high level feasibility analysis.” The goal of the CACH’s Phase 1 Work plan is envisioned to offer specific and actionable policy recommendations to the City Council by the beginning of January 2020 (if not sooner), while also considering additional policy areas which may take more time to develop into actionable recommendations. A Phase 2 work plan is also envisioned to provide final policy recommendations to the City Council by April 2020, however the Subcommittee is not charged with offering recommendations for Phase 2 policy areas at this time. Note that there has not been a consensus around the definition of Phase 1 or Phase 2, or the definition of immediate policy recommendations. Some members of the Subcommittee interpreted “immediate policy recommendations” to mean recommendations that could occur as soon as the next CACH meeting, or by the end of October at the latest.
DISCUSSION: The Subcommittee began working with staff to develop a survey to disseminate to the greater community geared towards identifying the public’s perceptions of homelessnessrelated policy priorities, and to discover gaps in policies under consideration. We expect to have this community survey disseminated after the September 17th CACH meeting, with results available by our meeting on October 1st
.
The Subcommittee also reviewed responses from an internal CACH member poll designed by staff which asked for each member’s top three to five policy area recommendations for consideration during Phase 1, consisting of policies that had been developed by three previous City Councils/task forces/committees between 2000 and 2019. There was not full CACH
31.259 1.178
participation in this poll: at the writing of this report, approximately half of the CACH members had provided input on policy priorities to the subcommittee. The member poll was implemented quickly to foster discussion and provide ample time for responses, however it was designed without a full discussion surrounding the definition of priorities of the CACH.
The Subcommittee acknowledges that individual responses to the internal member poll may have had different perspectives and values in defining what “priorities” meant to them, and that for the purposes of this recommendation, what “priorities” means has not been defined.
The Phase 1 policy areas which were most supported by members of the CACH who responded were:
1. Secure hygiene resources: restrooms and showers
2. Increase local shelter options, especially identify a new site for the managed River Street Camp, but may also consider effective program modeling for emergency shelter
3. Identify sites for new outdoor emergency shelter solutions such as a transitional encampments or safe sleeping
4. Secure storage facilities
5. Modify the camping ordinance
In addition to the well supported policy areas listed above, there was also support expressed by CACH members to consider including: increased outreach services for mobile behavioral health and mental health responses; improving City internal coordination system and protocols; designing and implementing a small scale safe sleeping program; engaging in strategic planning with Homeless Services Center, County and other service partners; establishing ordinance language for transitional encampments; creating safe sleeping zones, and addressing police harassment.
The Subcommittee attempted to come to agreement on policy areas to be further explored by the CACH in Phase 1 after reviewing the results of the internal poll. There was not consensus on the definition of Phase 1, which confused the expected deliverables of the Subcommittee. While policy areas were identified that were supported by respondents to the poll and a majority of members of the Subcommittee, there was not a consensus on the timing of consideration of immediate policy recommendations that would be made by the Subcommittee, and there was limited discussion of feasibility of the Phase 1 work plan with Subcommittee members or with staff. Recommendations were made that attempted to balance urgency of the policy area with feasibility of achieving specific actionable policy recommendations within the scope of the CACH’s work plan. Both technical and political aspects of feasibility were considered, and it is expected staff will provide additional guidance on feasibility.
Apart from the considerations of the Phase 1 work plan, four areas of discussion were raised by the Subcommittee regarding high level functionality of the CACH that, if resolved, could improve communications and expectations around committee work:
1. What is the purpose of the CACH?
a. Policy only or policy with operational details when possible.
2. What criteria are used to prioritize policy? Different criteria options include:
a. Health and safety impacts
b. Immediate feasibility to implement (lower hanging fruit) c. Existing policy (2000 and 2017 recommendations)
2 | Page
31.260 1.179
d. Urgency or emergent needs
e. Whether it needs to be done now, so there is more information for decisions later
3. What is the roll of a subcommittee and what are the expectations of the members? a. How many members of the subcommittee are necessary for each meeting? b. How many meetings might there be and how much homework? c. Does everyone need to agree or can different suggestions get included in the subcommittee’s report?
4. What is the role of staff?
a. Guiding vs supporting
Lastly, in addition to the policy areas being recommended in this document, the Subcommittee considered different approaches to timelines and specific recommendations that could be made in the CACH’s work plan. Two alternative work plan timeline models and a list of possible complementary actions are being presented in an addendum document for further discussion.
The decision to include an addendum to this report for further discussion was not unanimous.
POLICY BACKGROUND:
1. Secure hygiene resources: restrooms and showers
This policy category was previously recommended in the 2017 Homelessness Coordinating Committee’s 20-Point Plan. The following discussion comes from that report. In addition, the City Council deferred the specific issue of Louden Nelson bathroom access policy to the CACH in August, 2019.
Basic human needs and public health requires the availability of restrooms and showers.
While showers are available at the Homeless Service Center and at a few other locations on a limited basis, there is inadequate supply to meet the need. As a result, many homeless individuals use public restrooms to bathe, which adds considerably to maintenance and cleaning and can dissuade other community members from using those facilities. Currently, our public restrooms are in constant use by the homeless community which can wholly exclude the restrooms from other users. At times, the restrooms will be occupied for long durations (hours, if unenforced) or full of bicycles and carts with persons bathing and laundering clothing, preventing others from accessing the facility.
This type of use also prevents staff from cleaning the facilities and requires a large investment of staff time trying to vacate the spaces so that cleaning can occur and others can access the restrooms.
Public restrooms also are in inadequate supply and the City expends tremendous effort and resources to clean human waste across the City. The City launched a pilot temporary toilet program in 2015, which should be evaluated and recommendations formed for consideration of a permanent sidewalk toilet facility.
In addition, other communities deploy hygiene buses or mobile restroom trailers. These buses, with built-in shower and laundry facilities, travel to different locations on a schedule and then park for several hours while clients use the services. This mobile service avoids the cost of permanent infrastructure, enables broader service delivery and provides essential public health services. Also, this service should be coupled with case management or outreach services and integrate with the Coordinated Entry system. 3 | Page
31.261 1.180
ACTION: Explore locations and providers of additional restrooms and showers dedicated for the homeless community. Consider hygiene buses or mobile restroom trailers.
Consider partnership with the faith-based community, homeless advocates, businesses and other organizations to support and host the mobile facilities.
ACTION: Evaluate City’s pilot restroom program and return recommendations to the City Council.
2. Increasing local shelter options, especially identify a new site for the managed River Street Camp, but may also consider effective program modeling for emergency shelter This policy category has emerged in recent years. There are currently two shelter programs scheduled to operate in three facilities in the winter of 2019/2020: the Winter Shelter program, and the 1220 River Street Camp (RSC) emergency shelter. In January 2019, the city’s Winter Shelter program included space at the VFW building on 7th Avenue as well as the Salvation Army building on Laurel Street. The Winter Shelter program at the VFW currently runs from mid-November through mid-April only. The Laurel Street emergency shelter (expanded Winter Shelter) program has remained open year round in 2019 but a long term funding model for this program has not been established, and the facility is generally at capacity. Winter Shelter is currently funded via the Homeless Action Partnership (HAP) with local jurisdictional dollars and a one-time state grant program, the Homeless Emergency Aid Program (HEAP). RSC is a tent camp-style shelter program which in its most recent connotation has been operated by the Salvation Army since May 2019, and is projected to close in March 2020 to accommodate a water infrastructure project. RSC is currently funded similarly to Winter Shelter. There is an urgent need to identify a replacement site to accommodate the residents of this program. Failure to identify a replacement program/site to accommodate the residents of RSC will result in these people being turned out onto the streets if the water infrastructure project proceeds as scheduled.
The CACH may elect to weigh in on effective program modeling for emergency shelter in our community. Winter Shelter operations have evolved over a number of years based on feedback from communities surrounding the facilities where the operations have taken place. An evaluation and recommendation of program modeling, taking into account best practices, community needs, and shelter resident needs could be undertaken in order to improve neighborhood relations, increase accessibility of the program, and ultimately improve outcomes.
3. Identifying a site for a new outdoor emergency shelter solution such as a transitional encampment or safe sleep site
This policy category has emerged in recent years. In February 2019 the City Council began working on an attempt to increase emergency shelter capacity in the City by establishing policy and programming around the concepts of transitional encampments, safe parking programs, and safe sleeping programs. A draft transitional encampment project charter focused on reaching community consensus on the program models for siting such programs in the community. Design of a small scale safe sleeping and storage program began in March 2019, but due to the rush to find a solution to the health and safety issues posed by an unsanctioned encampment near Highway 1/River Street, policies were pushed upon the community without sufficient (if any) outreach or engagement. Design of the program was halted due to a lack of support by the community, specifically neighborhoods where this program was discussed being implemented.
The project charter work for transitional encampments was subsequently delegated to the CACH. 4 | Page
31.262 1.181
Due to lack of available existing building space for indoor shelter programs, the City has identified outdoor emergency shelter solutions as a viable temporary alternative. The CACH may elect to consider program modeling and siting, as well as ordinance language, taking into account best practices, community needs, and shelter resident needs in order to design effective programs that minimize impacts on the community and maximize program outcomes.
4. Secure Storage Facilities
This policy category was previously recommended in the 2017 Homelessness Coordinating Committee’s 20-Point Plan. The following discussion comes from that report:
Many homeless individuals have no safe location to store their possessions. As a result, many carry their possessions—often large and bulky and on a wheeled cart—with them everywhere, which hinders their ability to obtain services, maintain employment and generally participate in the community. In addition, the greater community is impacted with large collections of possessions on sidewalks and public spaces, including the public libraries. The Homeless Services Center previously provided lockers for use but the lockers have since been converted to a different use. There are few to none publicly available resources of this type.