Sacramento County continues to make efforts to alleviate homelessness — after investing more than $220 million in fiscal year 2023-24 with programs, services and solutions — and gave the Board of Supervisors an update Tuesday on the first six months of its outreach in 2024.
The county’s Department of Homeless Services and Housing and the Department of Health Services released their Semi-Annual Homeless Outcomes report, which detailed the county’s efforts to provide outreach services and engage with the homeless population in the first half of this year in unincorporated areas of Sacramento including along the American River Parkway.
The county contracted outreach teams through the nonprofit Community HealthWorks and the county’s Behavioral Health Services’ Homeless Engagement and Response Team featuring 10 staffers assigned to the Parkway, eight staffers for its encampment services team and eight staffers tasked with community-based outreach.
According to the report, Sacramento County’s outreach teams provided 25,433 services — such as case management and housing placement searches — to 995 people. Officials said 256 people, just over 25% of those contacted, accepted housing or shelter between Jan. 1 and June 30.
“The county has made some innovative moves as well, through Capital Investments and diversifying the kinds of programs and services it’s funding,” said Emily Halcon, director of the county’s homeless services. “There is no single solution to ending homelessness, so continuing to create solutions that meet the diverse needs of the population, while balancing the needs of the community abroad, is our priority.”
Halcon said people via self-reporting to outreach members have said they’ve become homeless due to varying factors such as addiction, family separation and loss of employment.
The report said, on average, unhoused residents of the county have been homeless for roughly 42 months. Among other findings from the report:
▪ People of color represented 59% of all homeless cases identified in the county; 41% were white.
▪ Men are the majority of county homeless residents who were identified by outreach teams.
▪ 41% of those considered homeless are between the ages of 45 and 61; 37% of unhoused residents are between 25 and 44; younger and older age groups are evenly split at 11%.
▪ 757 people were referred to behavioral health service providers.
▪ 609 people, or 80% of that subset, successfully connected with services and resources.
“That means we worked with the person in their homeless encampment or shelter, and they said ‘yes, I’m ready’,” said Sheri Green, division manager for Behavioral Health Services, of the 80% who completed their initial appointment.
“That’s a really good outcome, and we’re really proud of that,” Green told the supervisors.
Green also highlighted the outreach team’s efforts for the unhoused with pets, saying that her engagement and response team has partnered with local animal agencies such as the Mobile Street Medicine clinic and the city’s Front Street Animal Shelter.
Supervisor Patrick Kennedy, who represents most of south Sacramento, as well as the Vineyard suburb, said those efforts were appreciated and amplified what the county was already doing.
“I just wanted to highlight the fact that the county has this program,” he told Green. “We should be giving credit because all of the folks over at our Animal Control Services and do a fantastic job.”
Currently, the county has 401 permanent supportive housing units at more than 16 properties, the report states. The county expects an additional 175 units to open by 2026.
“Sacramento County is incredibly proud of the work it’s done in the last six months in outreach, shelter and rehousing,” Halcon said.
She also told supervisors of the agency’s new dashboards that aim to provide “clear, accessible information” about ongoing homeless outreach.
“Are you getting the participation and support from all of our agencies ... that you need in order for this data to be as accurate as possible (and) as useful as possible?” Kennedy asked during the presentation.
“The data quality is dependent on our providers,” Halcon said, adding that agencies inside and outside the county are working to add information quickly. “By far, our providers understand the importance (of the system). ... We get great participation.”
The full biannual report is available on the county’s website .
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