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City manager: police to lead new homelessness outreach; $500,000 EDA grant application not awarded
Summary
City Manager reported the police department will lead a new outreach and enforcement-informed homelessness response after studying a Sarasota program, and said the city was not awarded a $500,000 Economic Development Administration grant for which the Chamber led the application.
The City Manager told the St. Joseph City Council that the city is refocusing parts of its street-homelessness response and that the police department has begun taking a lead role after reviewing a program in Sarasota that pairs outreach and education with enforcement when necessary.
"The police department is really starting to take the lead on on this effort," the City Manager said, describing challenges the local continuum of care faces when individuals decline services. He said the approach observed in Sarasota includes outreach and education but uses enforcement when necessary, and that implementing a similar model in St. Joseph will require additional resources.
On economic development, the City Manager said the city served as the applicant on a $500,000 Economic Development Administration (EDA) grant application that had been led and paid for by the Chamber of Commerce. The city learned it was not awarded the grant; the manager noted that, in this funding round, no Missouri community received an award.
The report was delivered as part of the city manager's update; no public speakers addressed these items in the meeting's public-comment period.
