REALTIME FILE

Meeting ‑ CCSWW Tacoma‑Pierce County 
Coalition to End Homelessness

Friday, April 17, 2020

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>> All right.  We are going to let folks come into the meeting and we are going to get started in about three or four minutes here, so welcome, everybody.
	Welcome, everybody.  So glad to see you all on this beautiful Friday morning.  It's going to be 70 degrees outside again.  I don't know, I am not leaving my house.  [Laughs].  Yeah.  That's how we are going to roll today.  Fridays I do get to leave my house, so it's nice to see the outside world again, even if it is a little upsidedown.  I got my upsidedown from stranger things filter here because I feel like everything is just a little bit different.  I hope everybody is doing well.  It field like the weirdness of COVID‑19 kind of keeps flowing on.  My wife's aunt passed away about a week ago, which is a bummer, not COVID related, just crappy cancer, but one of those things like the whole grieving process is completely like screwed up with us not being able to plan a memorial service and not knowing when we are going to be able to get to San Diego, and just that kind of sense of a challenge in something that, you know, isn't easy to start with, and COVID‑19 just makes it a little bit worse.  So if you are feeling that blah, I think a lot of us are, and we just need a little happiness.
	Kind of lots of other things, I know some folks that are pretty sick right now, and it just kind of weighs on you.  In the selfish thing I live, if I could fix one thing, maybe I could go get a hair cut.  I would really like a hair cut.  Until such a day as I get myself a hair cut, I will have to have a whole new set of filters.  I can wear a cat on my hat to make up some of the limitation of personal care.  And with that I asked Delmar Algee to provide a little bits of anchor for us as we get going for our meeting.
>> Awesome.  What an amazing segue.  Thank you, Mr. Nyland.  Just the other day Gerrit and I were having a conversation, and actually my wife and I even before that were having a conversation just about the tone of not just the world that we live in, but also even homeless services and how everyone has just been kind of ‑‑ it's as if we started off with this moment, we are getting prepared to work from home and everyone is excited and revved up and ready to take on this new challenge, and it seems as though we have hit a bit of a slump.
	So Gerrit asked that I just say a few words today, not in prayer, so I am not going there, even though I can, but just say a few words just to kind of inspire.  So I actually put something together that I would like to share with everyone.  
	Fight or flight.  The option is yours.  It's been said that the times that we are living in are unprecedented, unique, unparalleled and petrifying.  The virus has been a catalyst for change of how we treat ourselves and others we care for.  A singular disease that we have never seen before has completely altered the way we live, in a time where churches, businesses and profitable entities have chosen to substitute bottom lines and financial statements for a bit of hope and a wishful prayer.  
	We have learned that humankind has had a marital like vow to one another, through richer, for poorer, sickness and health, we shall care for and love one another.  Faith is described as something that we cannot see, but have a firm belief in, and most of us often think of faith in a positive manner.  But not this time.  This virus can't be seen by the naked eye, but we have witnessed its power.  But because we have never seen anything like this, I am sure it hasn't crossed any of our minds that a deadly virus could serve as uniting a knighted force to be reckoned with.  
	The history books of our children and great grandchildren may give a definitive number of people that succumb from the virus of 2020, but we must control this narrative to the best of our abilities.  We need to make sure our collective story reflects how Maureen Howard cared for those less fortunate than she, how the Nativity staff sacrificed their health to be there for the ailing, how the Tacoma Rescue Mission put their lives on the line in order to make sure needs were met for the vulnerable folks that we have developed relationships with, how the Pierce County outreach teams stared a fog of disease in the eye, pushed it out of the way and came to the rescue of the county's most defenseless human beings.  
	The story will tell how on every Friday morning the worlds of philanthropy, health, community and the boots on the ground came together for what seemed to be an imperishable monster.  Just south of King County in Washington State lies a population of fighters.  It's in our DNA.  We will rise up and be victorious because it's who we are.  Keep the faith, keep fighting.
>> Thank you, Delmar.
>> Of course.
>> I asked John Barbee from the county if he would be able to spare a little time and come and talk a little bit about the funding that came out of the Department of Commerce, but a little bit more about the way the county is thinking about the needs in the community and how it's working with its partners to kind of prioritize where that funding needs to go.  So I am going to hand it off to John.  If you haven't had a chance to meet him yet, I think the pleasure will be all yours.
>> Thank you, Gerrit.  Thanks for allowing me a few minutes just to talk a little bit about the commerce dollars, the 1.6 million that the county was awarded and how we prioritized, how we have ‑‑ how the funding has gone out this week.  I want to thank Delmar.  What a great story, fight or flight.  You are a great storyteller, so I appreciate those words, and I want to echo what you said about taking the time to thank the people who are doing this work.  I see it every day.  I am at the EOC center as we speak and there is a lot of people behind the scenes that are doing amazing work and there is agencies and providers coming on this call, and it's pretty amazing and inspiring to see, and I think it goes unrecognized a lot, so thank you for all of the agencies and the providers and the frontline people who are doing this work and risking themselves to help others, so thank you.
	I want to talk a little bit about the funding.  The Pierce County COVID emergency response plan is ‑‑ was set forth and the priorities were identify there, so when we went through this funding we prioritized agencies and applications around three areas.  And those areas were emergency shelter expansion, that will either increase capacity to serve more, and allow for social distancing, as well as day centers and outreach teams and programs, and then the last one was supplies related to the COVID‑19.  The committee was comprised of members of Pierce County Human Services, the City of Tacoma and the Pierce County Health Department, and those are the three entities or jurisdictions that also put together the plan and had to approve the plan that was submitted to Commerce.  We received 20 applications, seven of them were funded during round one.  I do want to say that application is open continuously, so that was just the initial round of funding.
	So I want to talk about the 13 agencies that weren't funded.  Many of them, there is potential money in other areas, and that was one of the things the committee really tried to focus on, is not to duplicate any type of funding that we may be able to get somewhere else, for example, through Pierce County Connections and what some of their priorities were.  When we talk about the collaboration it was more about how we can come together with other entities that have funding to make sure that we are stretching this 1.6 million because it's not very much money at the end of the day.  But how can we stretch it to go as far as possible?
	That was kind of the process.  We also wanted to get it out very quickly, so I think we did a great job of making recommendations and getting those funding letters out.  All agencies should have been notified by now and have a chance to obviously talk to the committee and representatives to figure out what they need to do, and/or reapply as they feel fit.  So that is kind of the process.  It was a five‑question application.  We tried to make it as quick as possible so that folks didn't have to spent a lot of time, being respectful of their time, but we wanted to make sure we were addressing some of the concerns that needed to be addressed.  I will open it up for questions if folks have particular questions around this process.
>> Oh, did you ‑‑ I'm sorry.  Did you give out all of the money that was allocated from Commerce?
>> Good question.  Round one we awarded about 1.1, actually 1.75 of the 1.6 million, so we have a little over 500,000, 565,000 left, and so that is available for folks to reapply for.
>> And do you have a timeline for when you are sort of hoping to get that money out into the community?  Is it something you are sort of wanting to hold a little bit onto in case things come up, or ‑‑
>> No.  We know there is a need now.  We would like to get rid of it as soon as possible.  But we also have more CARES funding coming, but we had ESG/CDBG dollars coming and we preliminarily have some estimates.  We probably have in the area of 3‑ to $4 million coming that will go out.  We just don't have the contract yet from the higher ups.  We want to get rid of this half million dollars because we have it, as quick as possible, and moving forward we will have some more funds.  Again, this is just round one, and we are not saving anything.  We know there is a need now and we want to be able to meet the need right now.
>> Can you kind of go on a little bit about the FEMA money?  Is that through the Emergency Management or Health Department or will that have connection with the funding that you are doing?
>> The funding we are doing is not related to the FEMA dollars.  That's going to be separate.  So if there was any of the eligible ‑‑ if people are applying that would be eligible for FEMA dollars, that's where we would refer them over there.  We want to stick to strictly to really what we are working on is the shelter expansion, the social distancing and meeting the supply demand.
>> All right.  I am ‑‑ let's see.  Question from Maureen, how about the ‑‑ I asked that question.  Thinking the same thing, Maureen.  No?  Does that answer your question?  No, we are not thinking the same thing.  I do see hands up.  I've got Jenny has a question.
>> Oh, no, no question.  That was a clap for Delmar.  He did such an amazing job.
>> Absolutely.  Totally me unable to use Zoom.
>> That is okay.  [Laughs]
>> I do see Maureen's message here.  Maureen, yes, please follow up with me.
>> Great.  It looks like that's the questions for you.  You got off easy there, John.
>> I really think I did today, Gerrit.  Are you sure you don't have any more questions?
>> I wrote a few down, but you covered stuff.
>> Okay.  Do I get a parting cat on the head?
>> Let's see, what do we got going on here?  What's possible.  Oh, wait, I've got more, I've got more.  How about the ‑‑ yeah.
>> Oh, there you go, there you go.
>> And I think I've got for someone to examine something in detail I can get my ‑‑ yeah, I can get my magnifying glass out and sort of look it over.
>> Currently the Zoom wizard right here.  You are the Zoom wizard.
>> Taking tips from 20‑year‑olds.  That's what I am doing.
>> Gerrit, thanks for having me on.  If folks have other questions that they want to take offline, e‑mail myself and we will definitely get back to you.
>> Great.  And that e‑mail is on the agenda, so we will be able to track you down.
>> Okay.  Thanks, Gerrit.
>> Thanks so much.  And we will slide over from the county to the city.  I saw Erica is on.  Erica.
>> Hi.  Can you guys hear me?
>> Yes.
>> Hello.  How is everybody doing?  It's very exciting to see everyone because I have been out for awhile, so I am planning double, triple catch‑up, so, yeah.  So it's been very busy at the city and we are grateful for the partnerships that we have had with the county and Health Department.  As stressful as the situation has been, I think it's really been advantageous for us to kind of force us to really work well together on identifying shelters and different innovative strategies as cohesive partners, so I think that's something that we have been continuing to do outside of Human Services, but there is partnerships with the city, county and Health Department on multiple levels, so that's pretty exciting, and we are seeing a lot of progress and movement.  Like John was saying we were involved with some of the decisionmaking and review, so that's been really nice, you know, to see that partnership evolve and grow.
	As a lot of you know we are executing our rental assistance program, and that is moving forward.  I think we still have a couple of scope components that we are trying to iron out, and so I want to say thank you to them for being so wonderful as I inundate them with e‑mails and phone calls.  [Laughs].  Into the evening and first thing in the morning.  So please be on the lookout for more details around that.
	And we are ‑‑ you know, we have been hearing like everyone else the increased need for resources at our food banks so we have been reaching out to assess needs to be more supportive for that and to be able to increase support for people needing the resources and we are engaging with them and seeing what we can do on the city level.
	And I think that's what I have.  I will open the chat box up because I know there is going to be some questions for me.  Maybe.  If not, that's fine.  I think ‑‑
>> I've got questions.  Can you talk a little bit about some of your funding sources?  So with the homeless prevention money, have you been able to kind of leverage state or federal money coming in, or is the city basically using money out of the general fund?  Can you kind of talk ‑‑
>> We are using both.  We are having to be as creative as we can.  We have our mental health and general fund and access to HUD dollars, just like the county.  We do ‑‑ we will have access to the CARES Act dollars, and so we will be utilizing those.  So I think when we do have some solid kind of ideas of where those funds will be directed, FEMA dollars don't come to me, I think they go to Emergency Management, but at a moment like this we are trying to use as many resources as we can to address the increased need.  Yeah, we are evaluating multiple revenue sources.
>> And there was kind of a nice RFP process that the county put into place.  I mean it was a short turnaround which was impressive.  Is that something the city will be looking at if it does have some additional funding?
>> I will have to get back to you on that one to see what we are able to do, so stay tuned.
>> I listened into the mayor's sort of address last week around homelessness, and one thing that was mentioned was some potential expansion of the TEMS Shelter that LIHI was operating, maybe a move or a possible expansion.  Can you talk a little bit about that?
>> I can't.  I am just getting back in the office this week.  [Laughs].  So like I said I am planning some major, image catch‑up.  Like everyone knows with the TEMS it's currently MLK, it's temporary so we will be making plans to relocate it, so that's the kind of what I know for now, but if I do get more information I will come back next week and update you guys.
>> The call was probably weeks ago now with Sharon from LIHI, and she seemed very interested in trying to put more of that type of a shelter into play, like she can build those tiny houses with electricity for around 3,000, or something like that, and seemed really eager to put more into play.
>> Yeah.  They have been an incredible partner as we have had discussions, you know, about how we can identify additional shelter opportunities, and with getting up and operating the current site we have, so, yeah.  They have been great.
>> Cool.  So nothing is solid in play.
>> Nothing solid, but, yeah, we will definitely keep everyone abreast of all of those things.
>> I've got one thing before I hit the chats here.  There has been some discussion of safe parking.
>> Yes.
>> And that is something the city is open to but nobody has ever really driven that type of a project to completion, and I am just thinking like the city wanted to do TEMS or the Stability Site, you guys made it happen, and this is something that doesn't feel like any provider or agency is making happening, and so is that something that you could foresee the city sort of driving a little bit harder at at some point?
>> I think we are always trying to identify any kind of emergency shelter in whatever form it comes just to address their needs.  That's something that we are all of a sudden doing.  That's a project we have been continually doing.  As we discuss with any prospective partner, we are talking about safe parking.  Just the ones we were able to execute didn't happen to be.  If anyone knows of any organization who has the space and has the ability to operate and wants to kind of discuss what that would look like with us, please send them our way.  I know even prior to me coming on board with the city there has been multiple efforts and outreach that's been made to meetings and individuals seeing what can be done, and when we partnered with MDC to try to see if there is any other options out there, so we are definitely open to it.  It's allowed under our code.  If you know of anyone, please send them our way.
>> A question from Janet.  I don't know if this was something I missed earlier, but would the armory be available for day sheltering using social distancing with extra logistical support help to use that site?  
>> I don't know what the armory is.
>> [Laughs].  Ooh.  The armory is the interesting brick building just uphill from the county‑city building across the parking lot.
>> Oh, okay.
>> If you are not familiar with the armory, it's been around since ‑‑
>> Longer than me.
[Laughter]
>> Yes.  Sherri Jensen replied to that about the ownership.  So, Sherri, are you here?
>> Where are we?
>> Hello.
>> There she is.
>> Armory is part of the Tacoma Arts complex.
>> Okay.
>> Sherri, take it over.
>> They are owned by Roberson who also happens to be our landlord, so Matt Shaw is the manager.  Roberson also owns the Harmon just as a side note, and half of the rest of Tacoma I think.
>> I do know they owned the Harmon because I have spoken to them before about that building.
>> We've got a great relationship with them.  They also own Recovery Cafe's building.
>> Got it.
>> If there was funding for additional shelter options, I would be happy to reach out to our connections there.
>> You are kind of going in and out, fading.  I couldn't hear some of what you were saying.
>> That sounds like a facility.  Typically when we talk about operating day shelters or overnight shelters, the city is challenged with finding operations, typically an operations problem more than it is a facility problem, although that would certainly be something interest, if somebody wanted to put a package together, that's sort of a site that fits well in terms of proximity to other services in the community.
	We have a comment that the mayor made during her address about LIHI possibly using the old ‑‑ the old Tacoma Avenue shelter.
>> About LIHI using the old Tacoma Avenue shelter?
>> As a possible expanded ‑‑
>> I will have to check with that one, too.  I will be sure to ‑‑ let me get these down in my notes so I can be prepared next week.
>> And I think Stuart had a question.  Has anyone looked at the closed Gualt Middle School for a shelter?  That would be a good question for Rob if Rob is on.  Rob is not on.
>> I think that came up as ‑‑ someone brought that to our attention I want to say like a year and a half ago when we first started looking at some temporary shelter sites, and I can't remember the details on why we weren't able to complete, but I know that has been one that we have explored.  I will have to look back at our spreadsheet of sites we have looked to.
>> There is a note from Maureen she believes Tacoma Housing Authority has control of Gualt Middle School at this time.
>> That may be who I was talking to, so that makes sense.
>> Al, did you have another question?
>> I'm wondering if it's possible that the city ‑‑ you have this ordinance that if you are living in your car parked on the street, you have to move it every three days, or whatever that is.
>> Uh‑huh.
>> I am wondering if the city could mercifully ease that for people who are parking peacefully, not creating litter and chaos in their immediate neighborhood.
>> It came up yesterday in an e‑mail that folks don't have gasoline sometimes to move.
>> Sure.  I know that, Gerrit, you spoke to the captain about that.  Do you want to speak about your conversation about the police's role really quick?
>> Sure.  I did have a conversation with the police captain.  I will give an update on that once we are done drilling Erica.  I see we have a question from Theresa.
>> Hi.  So this is the followup about the safe parking.  That's the same sort of response I have heard for quite awhile, and somebody who is in one of the neighborhoods Al is talking about, we already do that.  We don't have the police have people move on who are parking peacefully, but at the same time we have our neighborhood just full of vehicles that the police have to keep coming and moving off and then we deal with the garbage that is left afterward, and we deal with all of the noise and problems that surround that, and part of it is that there isn't a structure ‑‑ we have talked as a neighborhood at times about could we offer some kind of structure where we have criteria under which people could say, but it's hard when it's a street.
>> Right.
>> So what I ‑‑ I don't understand why there is not a big push to get safe parking.  There are so many people who are only going to live in their cars or their vehicles.  That's all they are going to do, and you can create all the housing in the world and there is going to be a certain group of people who are living in their cars, so to not have a place for that means that our neighborhoods are the ones that are doing the unsafe parking lots year after year.  So instead of saying let's wait until somebody comes up with a plan, I think we should really focus on this as a community, and the city has a role in some leadership of sending out a request for proposals, saying this is what we want, this is how we are willing to support it, who can do it.  Instead of saying somebody come up with a plan for something we have never done here before.  The city, I know you all have been studying what's been happening in other places.  I know there is a lot of information out there about the ups and downs of safe parking, but I just want to ask instead of comparing the problems of a safe parking lot to not having the problems of a safe parking lot, that's not the equation I am asking you to look at.  I am asking you to look at the problems of a coordinated safe parking lot versus all of these unsafe parking lots that all of our communities are absorbing day after day, and we are really ‑‑ it's not for lack of compassion.  It's just that it's so dang hard to live in a neighborhood where there is that sort of stuff.  And I think if you had a safe parking lot, yes, you could have ‑‑ there are lots of creative ideas that have been talked about in this group, and it would be really smart before you put out an RFP to talk with this group specifically about it.  I keep hearing we don't have time, we don't have time.  If you don't take the time to plan it well, we are not going to have a good solution.  So I really want to pitch that have hard.  Please, please, please, take some leadership in creating safe parking lots.  We need them desperately.  The people not having gas to move, there are lots of people who just want a place to stay, and if you had a safe parking lot with some structure around it it would keep those people safe, give them water and the safety they need especially during COVID, and the people who are just not going to follow any community behavior standards.  They will be the only ones left, and I am okay with those people having some problems with not having enough gas.  I mean we still need to kind and compassionate with people, but at least we have a smaller group of people to deal with.  That's it.
>> I appreciate that, Theresa.  Thank you for that.  I appreciate your commentary.
>> Theresa, I was thinking more in terms of until we have a safe parking program, throughout the city ease up a little on just making people move because it's three days.
>> Sure.
>> The other thought I had, is anybody really looking at the Tacoma Mall?  There is this very large and very empty parking lot.
[Talking simultaneously]
>> Pardon?
>> K‑Mart would be a better choice than the Tacoma Mall.  That's a short‑term thing hopefully.  But also, Al, I wanted to say what people may not be recognizing is that the police are doing a really excellent job of not harassing the people who are calmly parking, honestly.  I have seen more compassion with the police officers who come down here than I could even describe given a lot of time, so get that picture in your head out of your head of them coming and just harassing everybody.
>> I am not saying the police is evil, but I have seen a couple of messages recently that people had to move and they weren't causing any problems.  I am long familiar with TPD.
>> They are great in our neighborhood anyway.
>> I am going to go on to a few other questions here.  And I have one question about the status of YMCA's opening for showers.  Is that something you are in the loop on, Erica?
>> Opening showers for everybody?
>> Opening showers, I think mostly around supporting the Young Adult Shelter.
>> That was a partnership, and, James, I see you are on the call so you can probably speak to that a little bit more, but from what I understand the YMCA and the young adult Youth Shelter has had use of that for awhile.
>> No.  The YMCA hasn't been able to accommodate us.  Before the COVID they had open time for showers, but it was open to any person with criteria during certain times and using your ID and people like that.  People's Center at Metro Parks is opening for two hours a day partnering with us, but the Y has not.  
	I understand Carrie can give some information.  They are opening one downtown on First for homeless response, but nothing to do with the shelter.  We will try to partner when they open it to the public.  I will have Carrie Ching take the lead on that answer.
>> Good morning.
>> Yep, you are good.
>> Okay.  Good morning, everyone.  So yes.  The YMCA we are working on getting the necessary equipment, meaning thermometers and masks so it can open.  It is ready to go, so we are hoping to get that facility up and running next week.  So with that being said, it is for the downtown YMCA.  We also are in conversation about Lakewood, Puyallup and Sumner facilities as well.  So that's more to come.  We have to create the plan once we get the downtown as priority.  Sorry.  So anyway, that's the YMCA situation.  So as soon as we get that up, we will let you know.  But it's for the community as well as ‑‑ because as James stated, he has the People's Center showers as well, so it will be open for the community.
>> Is it okay to continue?
>> I am going to loop back into Erica, so we will come back to you.  Erica, we had a question from Megan Cates with the Democratic Socialists of America asking will the city be pursuing porta‑potties and sanitation with known encampments to comply with the CDC guidelines for unsheltered persons.  
>> So we were actually working on a project that with the Health Department and the county, and I don't know where we are at with that.  Carrie, do you have an update with the work that we have been kind of collaborating on?
>> Yes.  So when we circle back to the Health Department and EOC, we will go ahead and give a report on that.
>> Great.  Thanks so much.  All right.  Erica, I think that looks like it for you.
>> All right.  If anybody has anything else, please feel free to e‑mail me.  It was good to see everybody.  I hope everyone is enjoying the sunshine.
>> Cool.  I did have a conversation with Captain Stringer yesterday of the Tacoma Police Department, and the purpose of the call was because some of the concerns that the coalition e‑mail thread had eventually made its way to his desk, and he had a few messages for me.  The first one was City of Tacoma police department is doing no sweeps, so they are doing no encampment clearings.  Their only engagement with encampments is related to law enforcement calls and health and safety, and he said there are a couple of encampments, tent encampments, that are growing in size around 40 people, which that's kind of a point at which it starts to cause some significant health and safety, you know, illegal activity type of stuff, but he said they will do no encampment clearing unless they get direct orders from the city manager.  Right.  So their rules of engagement currently are not to clear encampments.  
	The second was with vehicles, not to ask vehicles to move, and they have a kind of big exception on this one, and that is some areas in the city that have had a great deal of crime that they believe is connected to some significant ‑‑ he called them equal encampments, and those mostly South Tacoma, so Adam street and Burlington, general plastics if you are familiar with that area.  Outside that area, if it's illegal activity they are going to engage, like drug dealing, prostitution, things that community members are bringing forward.
	So those are kind of the two major points around the rules of engagement.  And the third part is that they would like to be responsive when people feel like they are hearing stories where those rules of engagement are being followed.  He ask if those could come through me, so we are going to give that a try.  So I would love it, oh, great, homeless community, if you guys could let me know like, oh, I heard that somebody was asked to move by the police, and I can sort of take that and get with the police and kind of see if they can dig up what happened kind of from their side.  So let's ‑‑ you know, anecdotes, we communicate amongst each other and questions we can bring directly to the police captain.  So let's give that a try and see if that can help us understand a little bit what's going on, so.  Had a good update.
>> Gerrit, can I follow up?  Yes?  So I just wanted to say as well, Gerrit's update about the police department, we are working with Human Services and the Health Department to make the strategy for outreach to all the other rural areas, and Comprehensive has meetings set with Puyallup Police Department, Bonney Lake, Sumner and Fife, to understand their protocols to make sure they are directing us towards encampments ‑‑ or people experiencing homelessness in their regions and districts, and the Health Department gave us some flyers about frequently asked questions for consumers about the COVID, how to get access to testing, and then if they feel a certain way here is a phone number to call, as well as we are bringing like care kits and things like that and asking the questions if they have any basic needs that need to be addressed, food, water, better accommodations in their sheltering options.  So we are just in the inter‑‑ or beginning stages of doing that this week, and we have a lot of meetings set up next week with all of these different police departments, and I am meeting [indiscernible] and meeting with Human Services to talk about where is TRM going, and where is reach and the act team going, if there still out.  But to get all of our flyers and things like that from the Health Department as well as to make sure that the whole county is getting covered, making sure we are getting out to the peninsula side as well as to the rural parts of the county.  All right.  That's all I got.
>> Thanks, James.  All right.  Carrie, I think we are ready to flip into the Health Department, slash, EOC.
>> Ivan, are you there.
>> Thanks, Carrie.  Yes.  So we did establish the handwashing station at the precinct at 495 Shandon right in Parkland, Washington, a combination of ‑‑ homeless outreach will be monitoring the handwashing station and we will be revisiting monthly to assess the need at that location and if not we can research other sites.  And that is the update with the handwashing station.  Back to you, Carrie.
>> Thank you, Ivan.  So on the topic of showers, we are also getting ready the PLU shower, that we are going to ‑‑ we first thought we would have it at the pool site, but they offered a bigger shower facility, and it's going to be at the auditorium, so we are looking at the showers being available Mondays, Wednesdays, Fridays from 9:00 A.M. to 11:00 A.M. for now, indefinitely.  We are hoping to get this open next week.  We are just waiting on one piece of insurance liability to be cleared, and then it will be a go.  So I will let you know via this coalition LISTSERV when PLU opens as well as the YMCA showers.  Any questions on the showers before I move on?
>> Carrie, I see some questions in the chat box.  I could try it address real quick.  Regarding volume of handwashing stations and such, we just ‑‑ the handwashing station was delivered to the site yesterday morning, so we are monitoring its use, and I think together with the homeless outreach and Valeri Knight with the county, we will discuss other sites and those types of options moving forward.
>> Thank you, Ivan.  So I just sent out to the LISTSERV the health and safety at home guide, tips for essential workers, so please take a look at that, and share it.  Let's see.  Oh, yes.  And most of the PPE requests through the ICS 213 forms have been either fulfilled or partially fulfilled, so they are getting to tier four, which we all are in, and our service providers, so that let me know if you have not received anything yet.
	And that's it on my updates.  Thank you, Gerrit.
>> Awesome.  Feels like a lot of our capabilities are limited by a lack of PPE, so that sounds like that's going to I think really enable us to feel comfortable doing a lot of the work we need to be doing.
>> Hay, Gerrit, Ivan with Pierce County DM.  On that subject, just wanted to spread some good news.  We did fill several tier three and tier four PPE requests, and we are fulfilling out of the EOC as well.
>> Good news.  That brings us into economic impact payments, using the new verbiage.  Did I get that right?
>> You did indeed.  Am I on?
>> You are on.
>> Hey, not only that, but a friend of mine from the Foreign Service has sent me a training video on how to use a Zoom meeting appropriately so you see something besides the top of my head.  Obviously I haven't looked at it yet, but I think the cat trumps that.  That's what I want to know, how I do the cat.
	It feels like ‑‑ those of you just on the phone, the Marx brothers have just joined us.  Gerrit has a mustache from ear to ear.  Anyway, so I feel like I am wandering into a whole other world after listening to these reports on just meeting real basic needs.  So we are going to talk about following the money for a moment.  If you are on the LISTSERV, you've got the message from me on yesterday actually, yesterday morning, kind of a status of where these economic impact payments are for people experiencing homelessness or who are very low income and have not filed.
	The dramatic change is that if you receive SSI, you will receive this impact payment automatically.  So what that does is that takes care of everybody who receives regular retirement Social Security or railroad retirement.  Everybody who filed federal taxes in 2018 or 2019, everybody who gets SSDI and everybody who gets SSI.  So that leaves us the pool of people who are not going to automatically receive these payments.  The folks who do not have to file because their incomes are so low or they don't have an income, there are glitches.  There are eligibility requirements.  If you owe past child support, that will be garnished.  Not student loans, not other kinds of debt, but the child support, the feds will take that out of the payment.
	So where I think we are right now, besides trying to figure out how the outreach teams when they go back out can help people realize that they can apply for this money if they need it apply, is how many people would prefer to receive their money by direct deposit if we could set up a no‑fee banking account for them, which it appears that we can do.  And I am asking a few people who do direct service work with people experiencing homelessness to help me walk through what the credit union is offering, Seattle Credit Union, and to see if this is going to work or not or what would make it work.
	There is also a possibility that they could do an online new account with Seattle Credit Union after Gerrit suggested how they could sort of trick the computer, and if we gave people apartment numbers at shelters then the computer wouldn't see the same address coming in.  It would just be any like kind of apartment building that would have the same street address, but different units.  The credit union is looking over that with their IT team.  Non‑filers are going to have to file.  They have to go through the portal on the IRS web page that says non‑filers.  
	One option is direct deposit, which they need a bank account, and the other option is a paper check, which means they need a mailing address.  We know they can get the mailing address through shelters and other ways.  But it seems to me the question is how do we help people be able to cash those checks in a way that they are not walking around with $1,200, or conceivably more if they are a family, in cash.  
	And so I am talking to Harborstone Credit Union, I am talking to Fred Meyer.  Gerrit told me Fred Meyer cashes checks.  I have talked with them.  They will cash ‑‑ and I will just put this in sort of a status, but they will cash up to 2,000 with valid ID.  People that don't have valid ID, if it's outdated, that could be another glitch.
	Gerrit, he has a cow on his head now.  [Laughs].  I don't believe these filters.  I am going to contact your son.
>> Staying focused.
>> Yeah, staying focused Wal‑Mart has some sort of a program, and there may be others.  And Sherri suggested cash cards that Valeo uses with their folks.  So you know these things that I don't know.  What would work for the people that you are working with so they get this money to which they are most likely entitled?  And real bluntly, if you start multiplying the number of people experiencing homelessness in our county with $1,200 apiece, for the adults, and $500 apiece for the eligible children, those that are 16 and under, then we are talking about real money.  This could be 5, $6 million.  So I think it's worth not just because I believe that everybody deserves to get their money, but just think of the impact in our community.
	And think of how you can help folks that you are working with to do some things that they haven't opinion able to do before.  I am not going to worry about who is going to buy drugs.  All right?  That's not a hundred percent of the group.  I am worried about the people that you send in requests for when they need special clothing, when they need dental work done, when they need to get their license tabs, if they are living in a vehicle, when they need a gas card, when they need shoes for their kids that fit, whatever it is, that this is money they are entitled to, and the only thing we have to do, I think, is help bridge whatever gaps are between them and getting the money.
	And you have avenue got the nitty‑gritty, the information, that will make the difference, so talk to people who are experiencing homelessness, ask them how they want the money, what is safest for them.  We can get the costs down on cashing the checks.  There are places that will convert to money orders, that will convert to, you know, like prepaid Visa cards, prepaid debit cards, but find out from them ‑‑ put the stuff in the chat what you think or what questions you have because it's easy to capture it, or e‑mail me.  But it's that ‑‑ it's what we used to call the last three feet.  It's between the resource and the person, and how do we make this happen?
	And I can't find anybody who is trying to do this on some sort of a wide scale, like we are trying to do.  Now, okay.  So that's the impact, the economic impact payments.  You probably have yours, about half of the people in the country have theirs in their accounts already, and if you have seen some people on Facebook say, you know, this is nice but we don't really need it, we would like to donate it, so those of you in that position think about that, too.
	All right.  So what else do I know?  Can I just walk into advocacy?  Or does anybody have anything?
>> I do not.  I see a couple questions.
>> Oh, okay.
>> And this came in from earlier and I didn't notice.  Theresa.
>> So this is just to the whole group, what Maureen is saying is really important, and I don't know if anyone has the bandwidth to do some kind of flyer that we could give to people when we are interacting with them that basically says that what a rip‑off Moneytree is and that there are other options, because this is my fear because people who are able to get these checks are going to go straight to those horrid places and give them a chunk of change.  So if anyone has the time or energy to put something together, I would love that.  I would love to be part of getting it out and maybe even a little ‑‑ now that we have this capacity to do something like this, some sort of ‑‑ we can get people to the Internet in a number of ways.  It's much harder, but we can do it.  If there was something that walked them through, what they do if they don't have a check, how to apply, step‑by‑step, that would be great.
>> So let me just quickly, one, don't go to Moneytree.  It's $38.55, and Fred Meyer is a couple of dollars up to $2,000.  So that's part of kind of what I am directing right now.  That's one thing.  The second thing is lots of groups are putting out information right now.  The problem is the information they are putting out is pretty much for you and me.  It's not for folks who ‑‑ you know, maybe they haven't had their eyes checked in ten years, or they don't have graduate degrees, so part of what we have to ‑‑ what you all who are doing the direct work have to do to make this work is that you have to ‑‑ you have to review anything that comes out and say, we need more white space, it needs to be in shorter sentences, whatever.  It needs to have a literacy review on it.  We used to use fifth grade reading as the kind of standard.  I don't know if that's true anymore.
	But anyway, so that's one piece.  The other piece is Nick Leider with Catholic Community Services, thanks to Gerrit for making that connection, is working on this in his job, which is a kind of a network of Catholic parishes throughout Western Washington, so he has actually started working on some outreach materials and things, and so he is ‑‑ and he knows because of his past experience working with people experiencing homelessness, he knows at least some of what is required to make this last three feet come together.  And so he's part of this little working group.  Anybody else who wants to be part of it, just let me know.  
	I have also Norman Brickhouse.  I think I have that right.  He went from Goodwill to Valeo.  He has made the outreach to Goodwill and Sound Outreach, and then though my understanding is that the strong families programs normally work with people more stably housed, but they have access to lenders, they have information and they may be able to help us make whatever they have workable for the folks that we are most concerned about.
	I did put it on ‑‑ I asked Erika to put it on the PC connected report, that I was looking for lenders who would do basically no‑fee check cashing.  So that's kind of where I am with it right now, if that helps.  Trying to see if there is anything in the chat.
>> There was a question ‑‑
>> I see Jennifer thinks Northwest Justice might have something.  The glitch that I have seen on everything that I have seen come in, there is a lot of information about eligibility.  There is not this process of how you can safely convert the money for people who don't have a place to live.  And the other thing we need, Jennifer, while you are on, the other thing that we need is a way, a quick referral for case managers and other providers, when somebody has a real glitch that's outside the edge.  I suspect that James and other people doing youth are going to need something specific to youth because you are not eligible to get the money in your own right if you are a dependent on someone else's tax form.  And my understanding is that's what's happened to a lot of the 17‑ to 24‑year‑olds, is that they may not even know it, but they are dependents on their parents' tax forms.
	The other glitch for folks and people who may get their money automatically, but they have to file ‑‑ they have to go to the portal anyway, if they are not ‑‑ if they don't have to file normally and have children, the IRS doesn't know they have eligible children, so they are going to have to let the IRS know that they have these eligible children.  Undocumented people are not eligible.  You got to have a Social Security number.  So it's an imperfect world, but it's still a lot of money that would make a huge difference I think to individuals.
	Okay.  Can I go on to advocacy?
>> Yeah.  I think maybe we had one more question.  Is it you, Joy, in Shared Housing Services?
>> No.  I was just commenting on what Maureen was saying because originally we thought Ben would get it.  He is at Boise State.  So when we got the money, we thought he would have got the $500, but he didn't, so then we are just trying to figure it out, and I read the same thing Maureen was just talking about.  I went back and read it, and it's like, no, you are dependent.  Even though you don't live with us, we pay your bills, some of your bills, and we count you on our income tax, so.
>> Right, right.  It's an imperfect world.  Okay?
>> All right, Maureen.
>> Okay.  So let me go through some advocacy things.  First of all, the National Low Income Housing Coalition has expanded from its Monday homeless and housing call, and remember anybody can join these calls, they are like 2500 people on them, and they always have one or two members of congress who are champions on either the homelessness or the housing side, spend a few minutes updating people.  If you want to learn federal housing policy quickly and federal homelessness policy quickly, this is a really easy and free way to do it.  And the calls are recorded, so if you can't join the calls you can still listen to them later.
	Now they have expanded the calls to a call a day.  They are now issue‑based.  And so I sent out to "Maureen's Musings" the list.  I will send it out to the full coalition in kind of an update, and all you do is just click on button and register.  You have to register.  These have been some of the best managed calls that I have ever been on in terms of presentations, timing, that sort of thing.  And I have sort of met some just incredible people in this process.
	Now on the state level, the Washington Low Income Housing Alliance has a call every Wednesday from 10:00 to 11:15.  These are free calls.  You have to register and you get a password.  There is always a structured agenda and the calls are recorded.  Materials are available.  There are excellent slides from a presentation from a member of Building Changes on the racial break down of people who have died in Washington State.  It's a ‑‑ it's ‑‑ you know how some presentations are cluttered and you have to kind of wind your way through?  This is not.  This is incredibly clear and straightforward, and could almost be a model for doing any kind of a slide presentation.
	And now on to the really good news.  If you looked in your inbox, if you are on this list, you know that the eviction moratorium is not only extended until June 4th, but it is broadly expanded, and that's just amazing.  And the language, it's worth clicking.  I sent I think the press release from the governor's office out with Michelle Thomas's notice to us when she got this last night, but click on the part in the press release which talks about the ‑‑ it links you to the presentation itself, and read the governor's language.  I mean this is really pretty amazing.  I am not going to go through everything.  I am not the landlord/tenant attorney or advocate or anything.  That's why we've got Amy, the Washington Tenants Union, and we have the Northwest ‑‑ we have the Tacoma Tenants and other folks out there, Fair Housing, so they are going to tell us I think over the next week or so as they go through it.
	And yeah, it's pretty amazing.  So we buy time.  All right.  It's what we do.  And the governor is really clear.  He said, look, if you can pay your rent, pay your rent, but if you can't pay your rent you've got until June 4th.  We've got this moratorium and here are some ways to figure it out.  Do I think there is going to be a statewide rental assistance program?  Only if the National Low Income Housing Coalition and the advocates get the hundred billion, like billions, hundred billion dollars into the next COVID federal bill, that they are requesting for rental assistance, if that were the case, then Washington State would get about $2 billion, and that would carry us for I think it's a year, or maybe until the end of December.  But I mean the amount of money that would be needed is just incredible.
	Do I think we will get some other things from the state?  I don't know.  I think first of all everybody has to take a good hard look at the governor's proclamation and see if there still are gaps.  I mean this gets into things like mobile home parks where people own their home but they don't own the land, so they cannot be evicted from that land in this period.  And the message I sent out yesterday has a link to the Attorney General's Office, so if you get any kind of an eviction notice, if you hear of any, it's a real easy ‑‑ just click on this link.  The AG wants to know what's going on.
	So that's one thing.  The other thing is that the day before on Wednesday I think it was, the governor issued the proclamation barring any garnishment, any consumer debt garnishments during this two‑month, now, period.  Again, I am going to rely on Northwest Justice and others to give us talking points on that, but in my past experience I know that a lot of folks who are working, who are working in Human Services, who may be working at less than a living wage, do in fact have garnishments.  So it's not just about people that you are assisting.  It may be you, it maybe some of your colleagues, and so, again, as we get more information, then more ‑‑ oh, I know.  
	Unemployment, if you've got people who are frustrated or who are coming and saying I need help because I have less than the number of hours that qualifies me for unemployment, that sort of thing, that's the federal change that's going to kick in on Sunday in Washington State.  
	On Saturday, Employment Security is going to shut down their whole computer system for the day so that they can integrate the changes that allow the broadening of who is eligible for unemployment and also begin issuing those $600 a week federal unemployment checks.
	So if you've got people who say I applied, they said ‑‑ they kicked it back, I wasn't eligible, they are going to have to reapply after Saturday, and so that's ‑‑ and Employment Security, you will see the stuff all the time on any Facebook trail, you know, I waited 85 hours to talk to somebody and things, but as a state agency they have really ramped up and they have hired more people, and they are really trying to determine eligibility and get the money out.  So, again, if you have friends, co‑workers, family members, clients, who may be eligible because of the broadening of the eligibility under the CARES Act, under the federal part, have them reapply on Sunday.
	Okay.  I sent out last night the letter from the attorney with National Law Center on Homelessness & Poverty to the City of Puyallup, and I just think it provides really good guidance for local jurisdictions, and I asked Carrie to make sure that Dr. Chen saw that also.  He has been saying in different places that ‑‑ he has been recognizing the CDC guidelines for people who are unsheltered, asking that at least part of those be implemented, and also that people be safely housed, safely sheltered.
	And the last note is that the "San Francisco Chronicle" this morning has an article that says that 93% of the people in one of their large congregate shelters who tested positive showed no symptoms at all.  So I am guessing that that's not limited to the shelter in San Francisco, but if the same thing is true in our shelters and in our organizations, if that's true, and the general public, that we have a lot of people who would test positive if we could test, and who are asymptomatic and who are spreading the virus.  And so I can't imagine being a frontline worker right now, either in a shelter or getting ready to go back ‑‑ either being on an outreach team like TRM that's out there or getting ready to go back out as James was talking about.  So, you know, just be safe.
	If I can do something, let me know.  Thanks.  [Laughs].  He is now wearing a mask.
[Talking simultaneously]
>> It doesn't protect me from you.  It protects you from me.
>> Thanks, everybody.
>> Al, what?
>> Picking up on what Maureen was saying just now, I listened in on the county coordinating ‑‑ behavioral health coordinating meeting yesterday, and several people said very clearly that your staffs are beginning to burn out from all of this, and I raised issue of, we see all this public appreciation for the physical healthcare workers in the hospitals, is there a way we can begin to bring some public appreciation to folks who are doing the work that you all are doing?  I am trying to think of strategies to get thank you demonstrations or I don't know what all, but anybody else who is interested in that would you give me an e‑mail or something?
>> You can talk about it during our breakout sessions, Al.  That's a good thought, things we need to worry about with going forward is staff morale.
>> I want to add one more thing if I could.
>> Yep.
>> Larry just sent this to me, but maybe everybody would benefit.  Whether the state has money for people who are not documented, there is a petition, a letter, an organizational sign‑on letter going to the state asking for a separate relief fund for people who are undocumented.  I don't know what will happen.  I do know that the governor did put out 5 million to the tribes out of state money, so I think, you know ‑‑ I think we are fortunate to be in a state that has really strong advocates across all these issues, that has elected officials who are good and decent people, in our governor and in key positions in the house and senate, and has some incredible, you know, civil servants working in government.  Because that's what's coming together and giving us things like this new expanded eviction moratorium, and which will give us more.
	So, yeah.  Thanks.
>> May I point out that it's the school kids, all of our K‑12 kids or college students I think up to age 25, it's irrelevant whether they are undocumented or not.  So all of those school services, school lunches, those kinds of things, are accessible to the homeless kids who may be undocumented.
>> Good point, Larry, and I think ‑‑ I don't know ‑‑ well, maybe in the breakout sessions.  I don't know if we collectively are at a point where there is a better way to sort of provide some of this information or collect it or something.  The sort of quick reminders, things that you used to be able to do when you were seated next to somebody in an office, and you could say, what about.  How to do this, so I am going to throw that out for the breakout sessions is ‑‑ Theresa said if she had to go through my e‑mails and look for one more piece of information one more time, she was going to scream.  [Laughs].  Yeah.  Anyway, I am going to throw that out for people.
>> All right.  Let's go through some quick updates if folks want to bring anything out.
>> Can I just ‑‑ can I do a couple of quick followups on what Maureen was saying?  I also have a real cat, so I am topping your fake cat.  I think you just saw her, but she just jumped down.
	So I sent out that question the other day about folks ‑‑
>> Jennifer a.m. mons with the northwest ‑‑
>> Oh, I'm sorry.  Yes.  Staff attorney with the Northwest Justice Project.  Some of the responses there is actually a fund out there, a private fund for folks who are undocumented and need help because of COVID‑19, and the other one was Vicky Knight pointed out that the Pierce County fund that's being operated by Share and Care House does not require a Social Security number or proof of citizenship, so that may be available to our undocumented clients as well.
	I can't comment yet on the garnishment proclamation by the governor because it referred to a whole lot of statutes that we haven't gone through yet, but the eviction one, the eviction moratorium, is amazing.  It's due to a lot of advocacy.  It was done by a lot of different groups, largely among them actually was Northwest Justice Project trying to get those gaps filled.  But, yes, it does apply to people who own their mobile home, living in a mobile home park, people who own RVs living places.  It applies to people who are camping now.  It is supposed to apply to people who are living in hotels or motels, if they are actually living there as opposed to just staying there for a couple of days.
	It does not appear to address the idea of people who are living in their cars and being moved along by police because it does require that you are legally occupying that space.  But, still, it is really broad.  So if you are hearing of any evictions, yes, let the AG's Office know.  You might contact the Northwest Justice Project or Tacoma Pro Bono.  Go to their website now because how they are taking new intakes is kind of changing all the time.  But we are very interested in hearing about anybody who is giving eviction notices, or trying to enforce any that exist already, trying to collect on alleged late fees, all of that.
>> Great.  Appreciate that update.  Appreciate all the brains in this room, this virtual room.  Okay.  Shelter updates, did you want to give an update, Melissa?
>> Can you hear me?
>> Yes.
>> All right.  So we are kind of just running as normal.  Things have finally kind of settled down I think and staff have kind of got into a groove of just running the hotel.  We had our hiring staff right now to kind of alleviate the case managers on having to staff that all the time, and so that will free us up and get back to providing [mic cutting out].  
	The Stability Site has been ‑‑ the volunteers, it's been really beautiful, coming in and helping provide meals to the Stability Site and to the Nativity House.  Recently we just lost a cook, so that's been kind of a Godsend that that's happening.  If anybody wants to come and serve meals or make a meal, we are welcoming those people to come in.  But everything else is going well.  Like we talked about yesterday, it is a low for staff right now and I think they are just tired.  We had an exposure to somebody that had COVID‑19 last week, and so the staff that were around the person just are a little nervous and anxious and kind of waiting to see if they have symptoms, and so I think that's just kind of draining on everyone.  Getting back to functioning as normal, being able to provide more services, it's kind of discouraging watching people being outside eating meals but not allowed the space during the daytime, and that's what our shelter used to be, and now that's kind of a big dorm in the Day Center.  We are trying to make it day by day.
>> Thanks, Melissa.  I don't know if I see anyone from the Rescue Mission on right now.  I think some folks had to leave early.  But I will give you a second.  [Indiscernible] if you are here, while I pretend to be an avocado.  Hey, looking good, huh?  All right.  Nobody from the Rescue Mission.  How about we have James.  Got any updates from the Beacon Center?
>> Similar to everyone else, this has been a really tough week.  We had our first positive case of COVID‑19, but we don't believe that was a staff member, that they were at work when they contracted it or they exposed anyone during the incubation period.  They called in to say they were tested and found they were positive.  Like most of us described, it caused ripples in our programming.  We expanded services out the gate.  
	The first day we opened up our inclement weather response, 24/7, 50 participants, and all the applications we are getting for grants, we have expanded out of our capacity and we are finding it really hard.  Some things we need to do to keep staff safe aren't eligible.  We need an apartment that staff can go to to shower, do laundry, and all the recommendations that has been sent out by the Health Department to keep stuff safe at home.  When you come home, take a shower, some people can't do that before they expose somebody.  If they feel they want to come to work and minimize their risk, we have rented an apartment at our own cost that they can either stay at or go to to do laundry and take showers and do all the decontamination process.  It is not currently an eligible expense that we were able to get reimbursed, so we are doing it out of our pocket because we are asking people to expose themselves to the risks.  Staff morale is tough.  I have just take the sliver of the most optimistic news I can possibly find and I repeat it on repeat just so I can get up in the morning, but then I am telling staff the same thing.  These are the most optimistic news, but I don't know the reality.  
	I know the Health Department has consulted with us multiple times and says we are doing every possible thing that we can do at this point.  And we have all the correct PPE and protocol, so that gives me some feeling that we are doing everything we can, but the first positive case kind of sent ripples, so we are ‑‑ it's just really, really uncertain times and I am trying to encourage people to be positive, and deep down am I doing the right thing.  It's weird and hard.  And we were encouraged to get an outreach team out again, which we had suspended face‑to‑face services.  Nobody offered to pay for anything, no hazard pay, no nothing.  They were just asking us to go out with our normal contracts and do this work, so eventually because we care about the work we have chosen, we are starting outreaches again.  But, again, we are doing it proactively and trying to apply for stopgap funding, and some of the feedback is it's for expansion of services, so it's a little bit, like, well, this service is important and we are spending more money than normal for hazard pay and to get PPE and rent an apartment for our staff, but that's not eligible in some of the grants.  That's just an FYI.  Beyond that, I have some amazing staff who have already determined that this is what they are going to do and they are going to push themselves and the value of the program is way more important than their own risk, so whoever said earlier about all the stuff going out about healthcare workers, we have folks that have put on their badge of honor for like 16 bucks an hour, so it's pretty humbling to have people who are so committed to the work.  If they are do it I definitely can be here and do everything that I can do.  That's it.
>> By the way, James, you are doing very good stuff.
>> Thanks.  Actually my staff are doing very good stuff.  I still have an office.  I do come to work every day and I go to the shelter every day but I am there for an hour or two.  And some folks are working 16‑hour shifts when we have short staff.  I have amazing staff.  Just like Melissa, there are some that are really committed and others who can't rationalize coming in anymore.  We are constantly hiring.  It's interesting to hire seven people to bring into this work environment, but these people that we have been hiring have been laid off from their own small business, or whatever, so they have their own reasons to come into work.  There is also ‑‑ it's a weird environment to take advantage of someone who is laid off to some degree to get more workers.  It's all weird.  Everything is weird right now.
>> By the way, James, you are doing very good stuff that enables your staff to do very good stuff.
>> Thanks, Al.
>> Quit being honest.  You are doing great stuff.
>> Gerrit, you are muted.
>> Thank you.  Delmar, did you want to do an update on the Family Day Center?
>> Sure.  So earlier when I spoke I was in my Planet Fitness T‑shirt, but I have switched to a more formal attire, a hoodie.  So now I can share video.  As far as the Family Day Center we are trucking along.  We still have hotel rooms that we are filling for the folks that are in a program at FHN.  We did our first case this week, which really showed how our staff would kind of step up in that situation.  I was impressed.  We had a particular case manager that worked 14 hours or something crazy that day.  It was ridiculous.  In order to help this particular family out.  She drove to Issaquah to provide oxygen tanks for this particular person that was positive.  So it was just really, really awesome to see everyone step up in that situation.  
	And the Day Center, we are still seeing a lot of families come in.  Not as many as normal, but still our fair share.  You know, we have just made a few minor adjustments in our lobby.  We have put up kind of like a shield so that folks don't get as close to our staff as they normally can.
	So, yeah, we are just trucking along.  As mentioned earlier, I have seen a lot of fatigue.  People are starting to just kind of ‑‑ this is just kind of wearing on not just them, but everybody.  I am tired of being in my basement as well.  Yeah, we are all in this together and we are struggling, but we are still doing good work and we are still helping the most vulnerable folks in the community, so kudos to everyone.
>> Thanks, Delmar.  All right.  Rob, did you have anything from Bethlehem?
>> Nothing major that's new to share.  We are operating at capacity in 24 hours.  We have been doing that for awhile.  And I know we are getting supplies now, so that's helping with staff feeling better about working with clients there and continuing our protocols.  Just like everybody else, I think everybody is getting a little tired, so I appreciate the work everybody in this community is doing.  And nothing major new at MDC.
>> Thanks for the update.  We are going to jump into our breakout sessions, so we can slice our group into five or six different meeting rooms, and our goal for this work is going to be to ‑‑ this is sort of a Larry Seaquist spurred this idea on, but basically let's think down the road a little bit about what the challenges our staff or our clients are going to have, and then try to position ourselves in a way to try to meet those.  So some of them are going ‑‑ so we know that unemployment payments are coming in and that's good for some people.  There is going to be a point where those don't come in anymore.  There are going to be people that aren't eligible for those.  There are going to be supports that I am not sure it's easy to anticipate for one person, but maybe our collective hive mind can come up with the things that we need, and so I am going to ask for us to come up with ideas, safe parking, childcare, you know, employment assistance.  I don't know what those things are.
	And then at some point I would love for you guys to maybe try to group those together in some way that might be useful for us, whether that's a prioritization, more important than housing right now is going to be employment, or I am not worried about employment, but I am worried about childcare.  Let's think about those in one way and housing in another.  I am hoping we can come up with some efforts that we as a collective maybe want to work on.  However, before I have you do either of those things in your groups, I would like you to spend a few minutes doing check‑ins with each other.  It's not so challenging with a group of 50, but not for seven or eight.  I would like you to introduce yourselves and check in on some of the struggles you are seeing, or some of the excitement you are seeing.  Short check‑ins and I will have us move into a little bit of brainstorming.  So hopefully ‑‑ we've got 40 people, so if I put us into rooms of, say, seven ‑‑ boy, that's challenging my math right there.  I am going to go with ‑‑ I am going to go with six rooms.  That would be six ‑‑ I am losing people here.  So ‑‑ oh, boy, this is complicated.  Five rooms, and it's going to toss you all into a room and ask you if you would like to go into the room, so off we go.  As we kind of move through this, I hope someone can kind of take the role of collecting some information.  Have fun.
[Breakout room sessions ‑ not captioned]
>> Thank you, Gerrit.  Bye.
>> Oh, are we not going back to the mini session?
>> I think we are ‑‑ I think so.  Gerrit, we are waiting for guidance.
>> Jennifer.
>> Yep.
>> I just pressed the little red button at the top right and it says, "leave breakout room," and I think it happened.
>> Yeah.  I left the breakout room.  Now we are in the main section, but it's still pretty much just our group minus Theresa and Gerrit.  Only I am not sure that's really Gerrit.
>> There is a couple Gerrits.  Yeah, you guys kind of popped out a little bit or something?  I don't know.  I have just been sort of surfing breakout rooms.
>> Are we back in the main session?  We all clicked, leave breakout room.
>> I guess you are back in the main session if you clicked it.  Yep, you guys are all ‑‑ yep.  You guys all done?  Is that what that means?
>> We weren't sure if we were supposed to come back to the main session.
>> We will in a minute.  I will let folks know to maybe kind of wrap up.  Let's see.  All right.  I am giving folks three minutes, and then I will shut the rooms down.  Is your cat enjoying all this attention?
>> Actually, my mom's cat.  I am taking care of my mom, and, yes, I can either hold her and pet her or she walks by and shoves her way into the group, so.
>> Seems very lovey, though.
>> Yeah, she is.  This is Buttercup.
>> My little Buttercup got the sweetest smile.  Janet, what's going on in your world?
>> Hello.  Well, as you know last Thursday the Salvation Army gymnasium site was closed, and then on Tuesday the MDC Tacoma Avenue site was closed.
>> I hear you have like two people or something like that at the hotel on Hosmer?
>> The last I heard it was one, so is it up to two now?  We've got 120 rooms reserved.  Yes.  So the question is given our experience with the Salvation Army and the Tacoma Avenue and now the hotel, and given reports from other cities, what is happening with those who are living homeless with COVID here in Tacoma‑Pierce County?  What's going on?  Because they are not presenting to the hospitals.  Like students from all the different hospitals, they are telling me, these nurses, that folks living homeless are not showing up in the hospital for any reason.  They are just not going to seek care in the numbers that was happening before.  COVID or no COVID.  So what's going on, Gerrit?
>> I think you are in the shelter world and you are getting exposed or you are homeless and you are already self‑isolating because you are in an encampment or you are in your car.  I don't know.  Interesting questions.  I mean they do have some larger encampments, but are they isolated enough?  I will bring folks back in here.  See if this works.  I mean we definitely could fill up more hotel rooms with people that are homeless.  We are prioritizing, but there is still massive unmet shelter needs for people that are homeless, just not necessarily COVID or life or death maybe.
>> Right.  Unless it's going to happen later.  We are just don't know.  It's like standing on one foot and standing on the other.
>> Yeah.  Yes.  Lots of unanswered questions.  All right, folks.  I think ‑‑ all right, folks.  I think everybody is back?  And good deal.  We went from 48 down to 20, so as with our regular coalition meetings, once you break into small groups near the end of the meeting, you are going to lose some people.  I would love it if each group could report out on maybe one or two things, and then ‑‑ yeah.  And why don't we start ‑‑ if you are in group one, did you guys design somebody to be a reporter?
>> I think we were group one.  Is that right?
>> Yep, you are group one.
>> All right.  Well, I am Rosemary Powers for those of you who don't know me, but we talked ‑‑
>> You just muted yourself, Rosemary.
>> All right.  Can you hear me now?
>> Yes.
>> Okay.  So we had a conversation about safe lots and the ideas about pushing that to becoming more of a priority for the city, and we talked about K‑Mart and the possibility that we may need to get our ‑‑
>> I think you just froze up, Rosemary.  Although, it's a good action pose.  Someone else from that group want to jump in?  All right.  Maybe that will reset itself.  Oh, Troy.
>> Yes.  We were talking about some solutions possibly with the long range parking, just reiterating what ‑‑ you know, what the City of Tacoma doesn't want to do, which is not move the people in three days given more time.  The other thing was Rosemary was talking about the organization she worked with, and I was hoping she would come back, her giving more detail on that.  But what I brought up is what we are going to do just thinking about long‑term, as far as shelters, specifically I was bringing up Nativity House, what are they going to do there?  We can provide PPE for the staff, but how ‑‑ we have to help the clients understand that, okay, we have PPE for you as well, getting them to buy in ‑‑ not just buy into, but to participate to wearing a PPE, such as the mask or gloves more often than they would now.  Does that mean they would wear it all the time or whenever they talk with or meet with staff?  That's going to be a challenge.  The other thing is long‑term, because of the amount of closeness where people are sleeping in the dorm, does it mean that long‑term [mic cutting out] we have to separate the people in order to achieve the social distancing moving forward, but does that reduce the capacity?  Does that mean that possibly asking to extend some of the hotel stays for some of the more vulnerable?  Those are some of the things that I brought to the front.
>> Thanks, Troy.  Group two.  I didn't ask you to remember your group numbers.  My apologize.
>> I am from group two.  We had two ideas.  One was from Al, and I think Al is not with us right now.  That was how to recognize those of us that are working in a non‑medical setting because there seems to be a lot of media attention and personal attention for healthcare workers, but most of the folks in this coalition are social workers or non‑medical people, and the burnout seems to be real, so how can we get a community attaboy and recognition for folks who are also on the front line but not the medical or the healthcare folks?  So Al is wanting ideas on that.  He is going to try to get ahold of Matt Driscoll from the paper and there are other ideas, maybe putting signs up around the yards saying, thank you, for all social workers and all social service agencies.  That was the main takeaway.
	The other one I am going to write up and send to Gerrit later, so to be announced later.
>> Thanks, Janet.  Group three.  Which would have been ‑‑ is that your group, Delmar?
>> So I think we were four.
>> Maureen.  Great.
>> Yeah, we are three.  So data.  So we have like four tracks.  One is data that we need.  We need to be able to get usable information in real time out of the income and housing data that we need going forward.  The second one is we don't want to lose any housing units as the market is clearly beginning to change, either rental housing units or owner‑occupied units.  We want a way for shared housing to resume, perhaps with people who are peers sharing a house, like an Oxford House model, all of whom who have antibody tested positive so they have been through and survived the virus, to minimize risk.  And the fourth one is efficiency apartments starting with at least 25, in whatever configuration they are for people who are ‑‑ it's got some sort of a title, CL something or other.  People who really can't live with other people, but need their own space.  So that's kind of where we left it.  Larry, Joy or Bonnie, want to weigh in?
>> No.  That was good.
>> All right.  Delmar's group or ‑‑ were you all together?  The dangerous bunch of people.  Who is your reporter?
>> I can ‑‑ I think we mostly talked about different ideas swelling around some version of either safe camping or creating an environment for like safe parking, that both of those kind of interchanged.  We talk about different ‑‑ Delmar had some very specific details about location and dream that maybe he can share to Gerrit or probably Gerrit already knows since you work together.  I saw an article where Vegas hotels were using their parking lots for safe distance or camp, or safe park, either/or.  So that was a priority of the conversation.
>> Cool.  And group five, I didn't get to you, and you guys were a small group.
>> Yes.  This is Danny Goodrich from the Department of Social and Health Services.  We talked about the services we provide and I answered a couple questions about the programs we have at DSHS.
>> Cool.  Thanks.  Sorry.  Like I say, we went from like 40 people to ‑‑ yeah, that wasn't so smooth.  Cool.  Well, I think those are useful things for us to look at and see if those are things maybe we want to kind of simmer down into some action plans for next week.
>> Hey, Gerrit.  I can't figure out how to raise my hand.
>> Just talk.
>> Okay.  So I think maybe some of the people dropped off didn't realize how well this worked.  Really.  I mean some people dropped off for all kinds of reasons, but I haven't done this before where it broke into small groups and I thought it worked really well.  I don't know about other people.  Yay.
>> Oh, I did, too.  I thought it worked real good.
>> And I can assign people to particular groups, too.  I am sorry, Rosemary.  It can be random or it can be very targeted.  Rosemary?
>> Oh, no.  I wanted to say I thought it's a good process, too, and it was easy, and if we do have specific topic groups they could be assigned and people ‑‑ it's easy for people to do it if that happens.  So either way works I think.  I like it.
>> Cool.  So suggestions?  So in some ways this was kind of a lets's see what we think about the tool and think about how to best use it.  As always I am going to go ahead and wrap us up.  It's 11:00.  We would love suggestions for next week's meeting, ideas on what to do.  Before I go I am going to show you this handy looking lovely water bottle these can be in your hands.  I have a lot of them.  I designed them around being a talking point for getting our folks counted in the census, and I have a thousand.  Some of them are in the hands of Comprehensive Life Resources, some in the hands of Nativity House and Family Housing Network.  I am happy to provide these to anybody interacting with folks that are homeless in person.  So a nice thing to give out, to give them a way to keep their water, and also remind them about how to get counted in the census.  So I have those, and I will send those out to the list as well about that.
	And I am going to wrap us up.  Good meeting, folks.  Thanks so much, and I am going to go ahead ‑‑ oh, look at my wreath of flowers.
>> Oh, that's too funny.
>> To celebrate spring being here.
>> I think this is good mental health that I have had come across my desk from any source.  This is amazing.  How do we take a picture so we can save it?  That's what I want to know.
[Laughter]
>> Just a flash moment in time.
>> All right, folks.
>> Bye.
>> Enjoy the sun.
[CART session ended]