Berkeley 'host' program will help homeless, visitors

0 Comments | Oakland Tribune, Jul 28, 2008 | by Doug Oakley

Anthony Bledsoe needs some help.

In between riffs on his beat-up acoustic guitar, he implored people Monday from a downtown Berkeley street corner to give him change.

"I need help with housing, I need a foundation under my feet, and I need to get horizontal at night," Bledsoe said. "I need somewhere I can wash up and get this funk off my face."

That assistance could be on the way.

The City Council last week approved a $200,000 contract for a coalition of business and addiction-recovery groups to employ business district "hosts" who will report problem people to police and mental health professionals, get referrals for those who need housing and addiction help, and help customers find businesses.

Two teams of two will work Shattuck and Telegraph avenues as part of a trial program that will start in September, said Deborah Badhia, director of the Downtown Berkeley Association.

Badhia's group will work with drug and alcohol rehabilitation center Options Recovery Services and the Telegraph Business Improvement District in the program, spawned from Mayor Tom Bates' Public Commons for Everyone Initiative.

At least some of the four to five outreach workers will be former drug and alcohol addicts who have gone through the Options Recovery program, said Davida Coady, who directs that organization.

"A lot of our graduates were homeless and living on the streets at one point," Coady said. "They understand the problem from a grass- roots level. We will limit it to people who are clean and sober and who are nonsmokers familiar with our services."

Berkeley has about 800 homeless people, about 90 percent of whom have drug and alcohol problems, Coady said. Her organization was interested in helping run the program because it will help get more people off the streets and into drug and alcohol rehabilitation, she said.

Such "host" programs are becoming a national trend, Badhia said.

Berkeley's program will be similar to one started in downtown Santa Cruz eight years ago. Workers there provide information to visitors and shoppers and help merchants deal with graffiti, aggressive panhandling and other code violations.

Santa Cruz police spokesman Zach Friend said the department likes to work with civilians on the street.

"They work in tandem with officers assigned to the downtown area, but their role is not to provide police functions," Friend said. "I think any additional points of contact that provide information to police on people who are crossing the line is helpful."

Berkeley's program will be paid through parking meter fees and will be reviewed in two years to see if it is worth continuing.

"We're really aware that we have some people on our streets who are unbalanced and exhibiting alienating behavior," Badhia said. "We really need to have more people keeping an eye out. And we want to provide information, whether it's to a visitor, a blight issue that needs to be called in or a call to police for illegal activity."

In Santa Cruz, the hosts know their limits, Coady said.

"They seemed to have a good rapport with people and appreciated them," she said. "They were available, but they didn't intervene. Our program will probably be different, because with any program, you don't know where it will go until you start."

Reach Doug Oakley at doakley@bayareanewsgroup.com.