Advocacy & Policy Committee Update - Dec 2009

Objective: Determine Short-Term Action Items to Support our Two Investees

Simonne Ruff, CSH

• 8,000 homeless per night county-wide, most transitional/episodic
  - Up to 2,000 chronically homeless, often with disabilities – disproportionate use of
  expensive resources to support this segment, as opposed to supportive housing which is
  more cost effective
• CSH’s goal is to be a catalyst for high-quality supportive housing
  - Sense is there is a lot of money for supportive housing that is not being used
  - CSH works with project sponsors like Father Joe’s, Catholic Charities to help keep
  projects healthy, including funding (which usually comes from CRA funds through banks
• Don’t expect any new money on the table for 2-3 years, so current strategy is to use Section 8 Voucher system
  - S8 administered through Housing Commissions, current waiting list is 5-8 years, 12,000
  limit in SD City given to specific individuals, 10,000 in SD County
  - Solution is to repurpose from Tenant-Based to Project-Based; Housing Commissions can
  move 25% of the 12,000 to be special purposed
  o Currently SD City only has 250 special-purposed, about 200 are Project-Based
  o County not doing much repurposing at all, not likely, resistance all around
  - Housing commission agreed to release an RFP for 200 Project-Based units, but they
  haven’t done so yet
• What SDSVP can do and who the players are:
  - Break that log-jam for the first 200
  - Keep the cycle going for more
  - Richard Gentry, CEO of City Housing Commission
  http://www.sdhc.org/giaboutus1a.shtml
  http://www.linkedin.com/pub/rick-gentry/11/60b/30a
  - Carrol Vaughan, EVP of City Housing Commission
  http://www.sdhc.org/giaboutus1b.shtml
  http://www.linkedin.com/pub/carrol-vaughan/7/44/444
  - County Director of Housing and Community Development: David R. Estrella
  http://www.co.san-diego.ca.us/sdhcd/aboutus/about_us.html
  - City Council or Council influencers: Kevin Faulconer
  o City Council doesn’t vote on this item, it’s all under the City Housing Commission, but
  they can exert pressure
  
  Action Items
  - Meeting with Rick Gentry (David & Leigh J)
  o Simonne to make introduction
  - Write Talking Points / Briefing Book (TBD – David L / Sherri N to find)
  - Consider rename to “Advocacy and Policy Committee”
  o Ask Board for approval and to announce at party (David L)
  - Develop SDSVP Advocacy Infrastructure (Kathy F)