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Sacramento Steps Forward  |  CoC Program Competition  |  Meetings  |  2018 May Advisory Board Meeting

2018 May Advisory Board Meeting

MEMBERS PRESENT: Jonathan Porteus, Sarah Bontrager, Emily Bender, Alexis Bernard, Cindy Cavanaugh, Dion Dwyer, John Foley, Katie Freeny, Emily Halcon, Stefan Heisler, Mike Jaske, Erin Johansen, Noel Kammerman, Lt. Dan Monk, Amani Sawires Rapaski, John Kraintz

GUEST(S): Susan Veazey, Joan Burke, Suzi Dotson, Erica Plumb, Nick Mori, Paige Madder, Bill Knowlton, Steve Watters, Teri Hayes, Tara Weims, Jasmine Vollender, Dorathy Landsberg, Danny Marquez

MEMBERS NOT IN ATTENDANCE: Joycelynn Brown-Hollis, Alyson Collier, Cathy Creswell, Olivia Kasirye, Todd Henry, Sarah O’Daniel,

SSF STAFF: Michele Watts – Chief of Programs, Nick Lee – Chief of Operations, Desli Beckman – Chief Financial Officer, Ben Avey – Chief of Public Affairs, Chris Weare – Manager of Data Analytics and Research, Kate Casarino – CoC and Contracts Coordinator,

 

Call to Order: Jonathan Porteus 8:09 AM, Quorum met 8:09 AM

 

  • Welcome and Introductions: Jonathan Porteus
  • Review and Approval of Minutes: Emily Bender, Secretary
    • Cavanaugh: When do we verbalize the Follow-Up items?
      • Porteus: Has not identified a time to do that
      • Loofbourrow: Kate documents any follow-up items and takes that to the Executive Committee.
      • A report would be nice because it’s items are not presented to the Board, and thus members are unsure whether follow-ups have been resolve.
      • I would want staff to identify where we are with the follow-ups.
    • Sawires-Rapaski: A space other than the Advisory Board have a conversation around tactical, on the ground issues.
    • Johansen: If the Advisory Board is not the place where we debate individual items for the Rank and Review, then there has to be a place for that, and if that is in the PRC, then the committee needs to be educated about certain special populations and the various nuances surrounding those populations.
      • Porteus: This is an Advisory Board. Last year I was very vocal about decisions were being made at the last minute. This year I feel the responsibility for keeping the meetings moving and I’m feeling l like our Advisory Board becomes a committee frequently. My experience with advisory boards, and we can change the structure of this one if we want, but my experience is that the advisory board makes recommendations based on the work of committees. It seems that committees are not working as committees in a timely fashion. But the Advisory Board will get slowed down and not be able to accomplish much in 90 minutes if we do not move forward with recommendations. What seems to be happening is that the Advisory Board receives information and then we kind of start our own ad hoc committee during our meeting.
      • Cavanaugh: I think the committees have been confusing in terms of which committees exist because we’ve downsized the committees. I agree, ideally committees should be having these discussions but I don’t think we’ve organized committees around the work that needs to be done.
      • Watts: The work on defining committees, what remains, etc, will begin to be addressed under the ad hoc Governance Committee agenda item. Circling back to Erin’s comment on PRC training, there will be another round of training, so we will seek input from the Advisory Board in terms of the types of things folks thinks should be included in the training. We’ll make sure that everyone knows what that curriculum is. The official training will occur later than the next PRC meeting.
    • Bernard: As a board member, it’s really important that I have the information in a timely way so that I can respond to it before we get to the meeting if we’re not going to discuss it here. That’s critical because I’m not comfortable voting on something I don’t fully understand or haven’t received a full explanation on.
      • Porteus: That is part of the conversation. How much in advanced should we get information? There’s a responsibility that we have to review material prior to meetings. So we want to make sure that we’re doing our part. There’s a general experience that information comes close to the meetings, so it’s hard to do that. I want to keep an eye on that.
    • Kammerman: It sounds like that’s going to be one of the items that Governance Committee would discuss.
    • Cavanaugh: One other suggestion that we can consider is to have a regular reports of progress from committees.
    • Porteus: This is also about wanting to respect the committees, to empower committees rather than disempower meetings. When we lose ourselves in the weeds, we lose the opportunity as an Advisory Board to make high level analysis of what are we doing. How do we want to shape the use of HUD funding in this region? That’s what this Advisory Board.
    • Motion to approve the minutes: John Foley, 1st, Emily Halcon, 2nd. MSC.
  • Chair’s Report
  • SSF CEO’s Report
    • Loofbourrow reports: Thanks members who were able to attend Cap-to-Cap under the guidance of the Sacramento Metro Chamber of Commerce. Much of it was a report back on the state of affairs. The Open Doors document will be revised and released in late June/July. They have a new regional coordinator, Helene Schneider, who will be coming to Sacramento to talk about the new policies and the direction she sees USICH headed. She’s also interested in meeting with nearby counties. HUD had to testify on the hill, so was unable to attend, so we met with appropriation instead. We had this great marriage of the issue of retaining and the ask to increase funding for homeless direct service, but also articulating how there is a nexus between the work we do and the need for housing units that are obtainable and cost effective so that people can afford to move in. We also talked about the disparity of what’s allocated for the $860 we can use for a 1-bedroom and what it would actually cost for a 1-bedroom in this community. We had a breakout session. The Sacramento Police Department talked about the impacts of homelessness in our community. USC students looked at systems mapping. Erin gave a great summary of what it’s like now in-between addressing homelessness and finding housing, and what that wait is. After that session, people shared that it changed their understanding of homelessness and the connection with housing.
    • Johansen: What struck me at that panel was we were not preaching to the same choir. It wasn’t just us. It made a difference to those unfamiliar with homelessness because it made them look at it differently and it motivated them to help us in the side of housing capacity. The other piece that was fascinating was the new opportunity zone information, which is a new tax credit for rich people to hide their capital gains, but it could work to our benefit. I’m doing a lot of follow-up in tying that back in to housing.
  • Item A: Performance Review Committee New Membership Appointment
    • Bontrager: We have a total of 11 members in the committee, 3 of which are HUD recipients or subrecipients. We have had a number of people who have left over the last year for various reasons. We are looking to fill a total of five spots on the PRC. We received a total of 11 Declarations of Interest, 2 whom are HUD recipients/subrecipients, and we had to spots available for them. The Executive Committee, along with Noel Kammerman looked at applications. We agree that both conflicted candidates are good candidates for the community, so we are recommending to elect Bridget Alexander from Waking the Village and Cheyenne Caraway from SHRA to join the PRC as the HUD recipient members. We had a lot of discussion on the non-conflicted applicants, but ultimately we are recommending Bill Knowlton from Mack Road Partnership, Vivian Khem from UC Davis Health System who had a background in serving homeless populations. We think the health aspect on the PRC will be valuable. We had a glowing recommendation from Eduardo from the County of Angel Uhercik, who works at DHA, which will be a good compliment to the other members on the PRC.
      • Cavanaugh: Would Angel Uhercik be conflicted, since she is with the County
      • Watts: I consulted with HomeBase on that. Based on their advice, she would not be conflicted on the review and rank tools because the County will not be competing in the NOFA competition.
    • Motion to approve the PRC new membership slate: John Foley, 1st, C. Cavanaugh, 2nd. MSC
  • Item B: Convene Ad Hoc Governance Committee
    • We need to convene an ad hoc committee on governance. This Governance Committee will be the one to review and recommend revisions to the Governance Charter. One of the things they will talk about is discussion on the Advisory Board committees, which include the addition and renewal of some of the committees, and the process that should take place in order to create those committees. The committee will also review the charter, which is a HUD mandated document that should be reviewed annually. The current charter was drafted by the original Executive Committee. Because it was approved in 2016, we are behind in the annual review of the Governance Charter.
    • Are there any other recommendations or additional topics you would like to add on to the responsibilities of the Governance Committee?
      • Cavanaugh: Source documentation should be provided to the committee regulations that need to be in the charter.
      • Jaske: Do we have a clear of understanding of the major missions that need to be accomplished, and a guide on how this committee will tackle this? We need to be clear on what we’re organizing to accomplish.
        • Loofbourrow: We will have our core mission, HUD related application generated subcommittees, but there will be other committees that you can talk about that the community as a whole needs.
      • Halcon: What is the role of this Governance Committee is. Is it for the CoC or for the things that SSF as an organization has taken on, because that should go to the SSF Board of Directors. Is this intended to marry CoC charter or SSF organization charter? How is this Governance Committee going to be related to the SSF Board of the Directors?
        • R: Loofbourrow: This is specific to the CoC Governance Charter.
        • Halcon: Where do community desire issues go to, as opposed to HUD mandated issues? Does that go to the SSF Board?
        • Loofbourrow: It’s not as black and white as that. There is a crossover, so in the area of creating a plan, I think that’s both the CoC, the SSF Board, the City council. There are areas to be discussed and explored. There are going to be things that will certainly go to my board and staff executed projects and decision making. But the majority that we do is under the CoC.
        • Halcon: That should be clarified in the first meeting of the Governance Committee. The community is beyond just HUD funding.
          • Porteus: Decisions like that is a community wide thing, which is where the JPA comes in.
        • Cavanaugh: One of the areas of confusion is the requirements for the application. Some are very concrete before the application, and others are community wide convening, planning, and strategy.
        • Johansen: Is it the intention of the Governance Committee to also lay out that plan. How does a committee inform this? If the Governance Committee is really just to talk about the structure and not the plan, I would like to be in the place where the plan is being made.
          • Loofbourrow: I think you are all thinking about questions you need to answer for yourselves. We as SSF can inform you how much bandwidth we have as staff to support the committee structures that you’d like, but I think that’s where the governance starts. I’d like to see some decisions how the subcommittees are structured. In my mind, each committee has some structure, with a chair and assigned membership, how you would get information from the general public and others who are subject experts. I’d like to see your thoughts on that so that when we implement new subcommittees they have very good structure, they have a report back process that comes to this body, the Executive Committee understands what this body needs and that there is a flow and that everyone is receiving information in a timely manner.
        • Bontrager: It sounds like the Governance Committee’s goal is to better define how the information is disseminated to this group and what time frames people will have to look at things, and time frames surrounding feedback. The issue is that we have 90 minutes each month, and each topic could take 90 minutes so we need some form outside of this committee to cover the fine details. So the Governance Committee will lay out how that process works.
        • Watts: The Governance Committee is tasked with defining the structures and processes for completing your work, regardless of the particular content area or committee, but it will address these types of questions that keep coming up. How do we assure that everyone is well informed and is comfortable with making decisions when it comes time to vote; how do committees brief the board in between votes. The Governance Committee will not make content decisions but they will define process and they will make recommendations for approval of the full Advisory Board.
        • Cavanaugh: We have an existing Charter that tells us what we should be doing. It has HUD requirements, so it’s a way for us to ground ourselves and change it.
        • Bender: The goal is not to have an on-going Governance Committee. There is no current timeline, but we need a group to work on the charter short term.
        • Avey: The current Governance Charter is available on the website.
        • Watts: The process for forming the Governance Charter is as follows: If someone is interested in participating in the Ad Hoc Governance Committee can express their interest now; however, Kate will be following up with an email asking folks to volunteer in response to the email. All interested individuals will be reviewed at the Executive Committee meeting on May 24th to determine the official membership and the Advisory Board will approve the slate during the June meeting. Governance Committee membership is limited to Advisory Board members. There currently is a set number of how many members there will be, but there have been 4 previously, including the Executive Committee members.

Item C: CES Evaluation Committee Updates

  • Foley: During the April 11th Advisory Board meeting, we decided that we needed a couple more representation areas in the CES Evaluation Committee, so you will be receiving another call for nominations email for recruitment specifically for areas of representation in transitional housing, shelters, and SHRA.
  • Item D: Lived Experience Seat for Household with Children
    • Bender: It’s really important that we have diverse and direct voice from individuals with lived experience. One seat that we are still looking to fill on the Advisory Board is someone with lived experience who is in a household with children. If there are agencies that can recruit volunteers who meets that criteria, please send that information to Kate (SSF).
    • Porteus: We’re looking for someone who’s whole household was homeless, and not someone who was previously homeless and now has children.
    • Watts: It would nice to have this appointment by the next meeting.
    • Cavanaugh: Will there be materials given to the family with information on what this is?
      • This can be provided.
    • Veazey: Will transportation be provided?
      • A stipend will be provided, as well as transportation if necessary.
    • Item E: Care Transitions
      • Porteus: There is been a lot of discussion of care transitions in the community. There have been newspaper articles about people leaving hospitals and mental health facilities and ending up in shelters. We really want to objectively look at how care transitions are being handled. The first step is to make sure that we’re gathering data as consistently as possible. This is a draft questionnaire for asking questions that will help us understand care transitions. People have been using the phrase “patient dumping,” which is one of the things that we’re looking at.
    • Announcements
    • Adjourn
      • Meeting adjourned 2:30 PM

Additional Items

Download AgendaDownload Minutes

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