The dire effects of unsheltered living on impoverished people are often ignored, but the Orange County Partnership to End Homelessness is paying attention and taking action.

Speaking in her capacity as the homeless program coordinator of the partnership, Corey Root briefed the Chapel Hill Town Council on vulnerability and other internal assessment criteria.

“What we mean by that is, quite frankly, vulnerability to death; there are high stakes involved here,” she explained. “Also, the length of time someone has been homeless and whether they’re living sheltered or unsheltered — we use all those three factors to have a prioritized list to try to get folks into housing.”

The partnership is a coalition of local government officials and community members seeking to fulfill an ethical mission that Root summarized last week for board members.

“That’s really our overall goal when we talk about ending homelessness, is that anyone who is experiencing homeless, or folks that are waiting for housing — they are housed,” she affirmed. “And if someone becomes homeless, we can get them back into stable permanent housing just as quickly as possible.”

According to Root, the partnership has developed an online tool in their fight against homelessness called OC Connect, which is part of a larger resource coordination effort.

“It will help us standardize a number of different things,” she announced. “It’ll standardize the way people enter the homeless system, it’ll standardize how people are assessed for services, and it’ll standardize the referral that they get.”

Referrals and programs for homeless people in Orange County vary based on a variety of circumstances, but Root noted that an immense degree of support is available to those who are truly in need.

“We’ve got an intervention that’s very good for people who are chronically homeless, so that’s people who have been homeless for a long time and also have a disability, and that’s like our Cadillac of interventions; it’s […] called permanent support of housing,” she relayed.

Root also explained that a variety of options exist for chronically homeless people who may be more comfortable with unsheltered living than with immediate interventions.

“They’re not looking for a bed tonight […] but we still want to get those folks into permanent housing as quickly as possible, so we look at different solutions that go directly to the program referral piece,” she stated.

With the partnership having received less than six percent of its six-figure budget in federal funding last year, Root stated that steps are being taken to increase that percentage.

“[The US Department of Housing and Urban Development] says in order to get the federal funding — so, this year, it’ll be about $750,000 — in order to get that money, which goes directly to agencies, you have to have this coordinating work that the partnership does,” she noted.

The partnership claims to have housed 20 of the “most vulnerable people” in 2016, bringing its total number of individuals given permanent shelter to 64 since 2012.

Photo by John D Simmons & Robert Lahser/Charlotte Observer.

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