Board of Supervisors Response to Grand Jury Report No. 1212:*

There are an inadequate number of shelter beds in the County for the homeless youth population. Response: Respondent agrees with the finding.

Adding to the problem of an inadequate number of youth shelter beds, there are no youth shelters outside of West Contra Costa County, which does not serve the needs of the rest of the County. Response: Respondent partially disagrees with the finding. There are an inadequate number of youth shelter beds, however, there is one other youth shelter, operated by Northern California Family Center, located in Martinez that serves a limited number runaway and homeless youth up to age 17.

Little has been done to educate the public about homelessness even though it is identified as one of the three main tasks of the County's Homeless Program. Response: Respondent disagrees with the finding. There are a number of forums that the County Homeless Program uses to educate the public about homelessness that includes quarterly meetings of the Contra Costa Inter-jurisdictional Council on Homelessness that are open to the public, annual Project Homeless Connect events that are advertised throughout the county, a bi-annual Homeless Count that relies heavily on volunteers from the community, and bi-annual posting of the Homeless Continuum-wide Demographic and Outcomes reports on the County's public website. Additionally, the Homeless Program makes presentations (average 8 - 10 times per year) at regional conferences, health/job fairs, advisory commissions, as well as to the Contra Costa County Board of Supervisors. There has been limited progress toward establishing benchmarks, measuring achievement of

outcomes, and using these data to evaluate and communicate the effectiveness of programs and services. Response: Respondent disagrees with the finding. The County Homeless Program has well established benchmarks for its programs and can measure achievement of those outcomes. And, as a program that believes in continuous quality improvement, it has been engaged over the past year in a strategic planning process to refine those benchmarks and most importantly understand the impact of its services on the consumers it serves. Additionally, the County Homeless Program has engaged in a similar effort with other non-profit service providers within the Homeless Continuum of Care to establish continuum-wide benchmarks that they can collectively work to achieve.