Ventura County Sheriff's Homeless Liaison Unit extends outreach

Muddied human belongings streaked the dry Ventura River bottom.

They were the telltale signs of dwelling. Plastic containers, bicycle tires, piles of clothing, emptied propane cylinders and other household items peeked out from behind vegetation with bright yellow flowers and invasive arundo with stems resembling bamboo, which cover the riverbed off Highway 33.

“These areas, they're beautiful, but they're not meant for human habitation. It's not a healthy environment ... they're not livable,” said Ventura County Sheriff's Sgt. James Douglas.

Douglas said deputies try to educate people about the dangers of living in an area increasingly susceptible to flash floods and fires.

In 2021, the sheriff’s office created the Homeless Liaison Unit to address the needs of homeless people and aid deputies already designated to do the work. The group had operated as a “collateral team” with one sergeant and 20 deputies. The deputies had other primary assignments and they helped the new unit as needed.

Capt. Cameron Henderson, who oversees the Homeless Liaison Unit, said that the SWAT and tactical response teams operate the same way. The agency runs on such teams, he said.

The Ventura County Board of Supervisors approved an expansion and a full-time Homeless Liaison Unit at its Feb. 27 meeting.

The unit currently has one sergeant and four deputies. When fully staffed, they will have two sergeants and eight deputies. Douglas will soon join Sgt. Scott Baxter as his partner. Other deputies are still being recruited.

The 10-person unit is part of a countywide plan to prevent and reduce homelessness, according to county documents.

The supervisors also approved positions for a homelessness solutions director and housing solutions director for the County Executive Office, two new homeless services social worker positions, and a homeless services program assistant position for the Human Services Agency.

The total county investment for these jobs will be around $2.8 million annually.

How do the deputies help with outreach?

The Homeless Liaison Unit has two primary functions: enforcing the law and providing services and support to homeless people across the county. Henderson emphasized that the “overwhelming focus of the unit is on the services side.”

Services and resources are provided through directed outreach programs which are run in collaboration with the Ventura County Health Care Agency, Ventura County Continuum of Care, Ventura County Behavioral Health, Ventura County Human Services Agency and other organizations.

On June 10, about 12 county workers and five sheriff’s deputies gathered to participate in a community outreach at the Ventura River bottom off Highway 33.

Sheriff's deputies Adam Armstrong and Scott Garner walked ahead to investigate the area. They held dog poles in case they encountered an aggressive dog and needed to corral it.

As they made their way through well trodden paths between the shrubbery, they called ahead to announce their presence, letting residents know that nobody was getting arrested and there were health, shelter and other service providers on standby if they would like to avail themselves of the services.

The deputies said they have made an effort to educate people about Backpack Medicine , a county health care services program for homeless people, and the name is usually recognizable.

How Ventura County services help homeless people

Many residents of the encampments were not at home. Deputies said many people living there do work so they may be at their jobs or running errands.

The group provided services to three homeless individuals out of five people they met, with two declining services. Floriberto Rosales, who lives in a tent around the Ventura River area with his dog, received several vaccines.

Susann Reid received information about a nearby One Stop location where she could connect with a case manager to find shelter. The team also gave her a free bus pass.

One Stops are weekly events run by the county, offering sack lunches, showers, health care services — including testing for tuberculosis, HIV or sexually transmitted infections — case management, help with food stamp applications, job applications and more. Two One Stop locations are in Ventura and three others in Oxnard, Camarillo and Santa Paula.

Reid said she lived with her husband in a boat in Oxnard until they got divorced about four months earlier. Since then, she has been homeless and camped at a few different spots in Ventura County. In June, she camped at the riverbed in a secluded spot.

Most camps and makeshift shelters in the area have some semblance of privacy granted by the surrounding thicket.

“I know that they (sheriffs) come down here a lot. I hear people talk about it a lot,” Reid said about the Homeless Liaison Unit’s outreach visits. Previously she was camped under Main Street Bridge in Ventura and was asked to move.

Allyriane Diaz, who works for a county health care services program called Health Care for the Homeless Clinic, said that in her six months with the agency she has witnessed several success stories. Diaz recalled helping a homeless man who needed to be taken to the emergency room. He ended up finding housing and going through a recovery program for addiction.

“And he looks great now,” Diaz said. “I've actually seen him through a case manager. He comes by, picks up his mail and stuff.”

Diaz added that the agencies send out people on outreach efforts every week to different areas in the county.

What will the Homeless Liaison Unit do?

According to the 2024 point-in-time homeless count conducted in January, the total number of homeless people fell by 83 to 2,358 in the county, decreasing for the first time since 2017. However, the survey offers only a snapshot of the number of people found living on the streets, in cars and other places like shelters and transitional housing on a particular day.

“The average person probably won't fully know what some of the individuals down here go through unless they've actually seen it,” said Thomas Acosta, a nurse with the county’s health care agency.

Acosta started working with the agency in 2021 mostly with COVID-19 response, later transitioning to help at the One Stop events and with the Backpack Medicine program.

Part of the team’s job will be to assist other units within the sheriff's department, according to Baxter. If detectives identify a suspect who resides in a river bottom, the unit would use their knowledge of the area and the people to locate the suspect.

The latest expansion also allows the unit to be more consistent with county partners and develop best practices and measurable outcomes for success but they don't have those metrics yet.

In addition, the unit would continue to provide security for outreach staff, organize cleanups at vacated encampments and conduct surveys to determine where people are.

To find some of the encampments hidden in the vegetation, the deputies have flown drones overhead to get color and infrared snapshots in the past, according to Senior Deputy Jason Havelka.

Henderson said that with a full-time team, the sheriff's Homeless Liaison Unit will focus solely on homeless people.

The unit hopes to reduce homelessness in the county, especially in unincorporated areas, by directing people to the specific services they may need.

Dua Anjum is an investigative and watchdog reporter for the Ventura County Star. Reach her at dua.anjum@vcstar.com . This story was made possible by a grant from the Ventura County Community Foundation's Fund to Support Local Journalism.

This article originally appeared on Ventura County Star: Ventura County Sheriff's Homeless Liaison Unit extends outreach