Commitments to Action

At the October 3, 2019 Water Quality and Homelessness Workshop, participants were asked to commit to taking action. Participants and Water Board staff provided the following commitments to action.

 

Central Coast Water Board Commitments to Action

  • Central Coast Water Board Vice Chair Jane Gray will provide quarterly updates to the Board on our actions, collaborations, funding opportunities, and other topics related to homelessness and water quality. She will deliver the first update at the December 12th Board Meeting.
  • Nonpoint Source Program (NPS) staff will report annually to the USEPA on Central Coast Water Board program actions that could prevent, reduce, and/or correct impacts from trash and fecal bacteria discharges to surface waters from homeless encampments. Annual reporting to the USEPA is required for all priority NPS program initiatives identified in NPS Program five-year plan.
  • Grants Program staff will identify potential funding sources that could support actions to prevent, reduce, and/or correct impacts from trash and fecal bacteria discharges to surface waters from homeless encampments and make this information available to interested parties on website and through our email subscription lists.
  • Central Coast Water Board staff will organize and provide an informational item for the Board on homelessness and water quality in 2020.

 

Summary of Workshop Participant’s Commitments to Action

  • Collaborate with decision makers to develop specific standards for delivering water and sanitation
  • Advocate with decision makers to include people experiencing homelessness in counts of populations without water and sanitation.
  • Organize larger collaborative action between agencies, non-government organizations, community organizations, and others.
  • Emphasize homelessness awareness within communities so members feel obligated to offer volunteer time (billboards, advertisements).
  • Explore opportunities for new tax revenue (i.e. AirBnB) that may be utilized to provide services for unsheltered individuals.
  • Continue to advocate for expansion of affordable housing and tenant protections.
  • Incorporate homelessness into Environmental Justice and Human Right to Water programs.
  • Develop water quality monitoring program focused on tracking sources and evaluating the improvements associated with source management strategies.
  • Identify funding for new staff at regional Water Board offices that can focus on working with DACs, tribes, Human Right to Water, and Environmental Justice issues.
  • Identify opportunities and provide support for organizations interested in using AmeriCorps to address various homelessness issues.
  • Follow up with Water Board grants program and Monterey County Continuum of Care to initiate collaboration and explore solution-based strategies.
  • Develop a patrol and clean up strategy for staff who work along the lower San Lorenzo River.
  • Present a "legacy" cleanup event to local neighborhoods and developers of adjacent property and businesses along Perfumo Creek before winter rain events. Include outreach effort for sheltering services.
  • Present a Human Right to Water Resolution to the my local Water Board for adoptions and implementation.
  • Offer incentives to landlords to allow for pets (i.e., tax write-offs, etc.).
  • Support and partner with services such as Recuperative care center in Salinas, Diocese of Monterey, Clinica de Salud de Valle, Natividad Medical Center, Salinas Valley Memorial Healthcare System, Dorothy's Place and Central Coast Center for Independent Living.
  • Use my position as a biologist to assist in bringing affordable housing projects to fruition (e.g. permitting and biological surveys for housing organizations such as Habitat for Humanity).
  • Work with local non-profits to identify resources and networking opportunities.
  • Contact Partnership for Sustainable Communities to see if they should play a role in next steps.
  • Permit low-income units with wrap-around services in San Luis Obispo (i.e., proximity and access to public transit routes, schools, job centers, and shopping).
  • Network with workshop participants (and others) to promote Downtown Streets Team in an effort to provide more opportunities to potentially start a Team in their community.
  • Extend CAB (Community Action Board) initiatives beyond grant terms (i.e., Downtown Street Teams).
  • Become more involved with local organizations working to prevent and end homelessness.
  • Educate population on the environmental impacts of homelessness.
  • Determine if the State Water Board’s Trash Amendment staff are connected to the Homeless/Water Quality folks. This is a potential unfunded mandate that could be steered toward homeless and cleanup.
  • Better connect outreach services with clean-up and enforcement actions with the goal of preventing camps from moving jurisdiction to jurisdiction.
  • Follow San Diego's model for clean-up (i.e., promote accountability of public agencies and private property owners).
  • Advocate for the designation of a Planning and Oversight Committee for each problem area with the support of Governor Newsom’s office. Make committee staff full time positions.
  • Organize a group of friends to participate in regular service projects.
  • Volunteer to support a local outreach effort.
  • Work to more effectively integrate/focus on integration of people experiencing homelessness into existing programs.
  • Work to include vulnerable populations in the decision-making processes that address water related challenges (e.g., IRWM's, DAC, and Tribal Community Involvement Programs).
  • Talk more with the mayor of San Diego.
  • Facilitate municipalities becoming more motivated to address homelessness and water quality.
  • Conduct outreach to others doing similar work and ask "what's working" and what is needed to achieve more success.
  • Work with county to engage AmeriCorps chapter in community.
  • Do not shy away from potentially difficult conversations with people experiencing homelessness. If the occasion arises naturally converse about strained family relationships and available resources to assist them with reunification.