Anonymous
Source: City of Goleta
City of Goleta staff held an interactive and engaging Community Update Meeting for Goleta’s Homelessness Strategic Plan on February 19, 2020, at the Goleta Community Center. More than 50 community members and representatives from a variety of organizations attended and learned more about the steps being taken to craft the City’s Homelessness Strategic Plan. Attendees were asked to provide input on the prioritization of suggestions to be included in the draft plan, which would then be brought to Council.
On March 3, the results of the Community Open House, Community Survey, as well as all other input and research was presented holistically to City Council in order to discuss draft recommendations for the Homelessness Strategic Plan’s goals. Short-term, mid-term, and long-term goals and objectives were included for review. View the staff report here. Looking forward, staff will now create the draft Homelessness Strategic Plan to present before Council in late April or early May. This will be immediately followed by a review period for the community. Staff hope to hear from the community regarding the draft plan prior to finalizing for adoption with Council this summer.
City staff previously held a Community Open House in December 2019, as well as stakeholder meetings, and released a community survey (which has received more than 430 responses). This public engagement is part of a larger effort to address homelessness, including best practice discussions with communities nationwide and enhanced partnerships on regional homelessness efforts.
Community input is an essential part of the City of Goleta’s effort to develop the City’s first comprehensive Homelessness Strategic Plan. We appreciate the community’s involvement and input in this process thus far and look forward to continued engagement during this important effort.
For more information, please contact Dominique Samario, Management Analyst for the City of Goleta, at dsamario@cityofgoleta.org or 805-690-5126. Learn more about Goleta’s Homelessness Strategic Plan at tinyurl.com/GoletaHomelessnessPlan.
No need to comment Chip. You said it all!
And the study determined that more study is needed.
I don’t see anything in the report that addresses the root cause of the problem, addiction and mental illness. Virtually all the objectives listed are simply providing benefits and services to the so called “homeless.” Providing additional public toilets and trash cans may benefit the community by reducing pollution. However, all the services and benefits being offered will likely attract more “homeless” people to our community, resulting in an overall increase in pollution. We need to address the root cause of the problem, drug addiction and mental illness. Until we do that, we won’t do much good for the “homeless” or for our community.
Chip, sorry there is not a quadruple gazillion thumbs up button for your very well-stated comment.
Mental health and addiction are a large part of the problem, and then we have a large group of people in their 20s, probably several large groups actually, who just want to camp and not work. We have the climate for it for sure! It’s also hard to live in a city where you have to work 2 minimum wage jobs to pay rent on a room in a shared house if you don’t have a degree. I say move somewhere with a better cost of living but people don’t want to leave our climate. Myself included!
I vote that we turn the westwood drive in into a campground on one section and tiny houses on another. There is so much potential with that spot!!
That’s exactly what it is. The bureaucrats need the homeless to pretend that they are necessary to fix it. They never do.