Outreach

DRC Solutions managed and staffed the overflow shelter, seeing many familiar faces and some not-so-familiar. DRC staff encountered large numbers of individuals and families who believed they were in the Tarrant County Homeless Coalition database and simply waiting for housing, but who, in fact, were not.

These people either were no longer in the system after years of no contact by any service provider, or had never been evaluated by any participating organization and entered into the database. Nobody was tracking them. Instead of moving towards housing, hundreds of individuals and families were languishing in unsheltered homelessness with no end in sight.

Something had to change.

The DRC assessed how this gap in services could be filled, and in late 2020 launched the DRC Street Outreach Team.

The DRC Street Outreach Team provides services to ensure unsheltered citizens experiencing homelessness have access to housing opportunities in the community. This team locates individuals and families experiencing unsheltered homelessness, completes assessments for housing, helps them gather documentation required for housing program eligibility, and connects them with appropriate housing interventions within the Tarrant County Continuum of Care.

Partnership

On June 15, 2021, Texas Governor Greg Abbott signed into law Texas House Bill 1925 which took effect on September 1, 2021. HB1925 makes camping in an unapproved public place by people experiencing homelessness a Class C misdemeanor punishable by a fine of up to $500 and/or arrest. The bill also mandates that law enforcement provide people living unsheltered in camps with information about organizations and programs which may be of assistance.

Two members of the DRC Street Outreach Team are embedded with the Fort Worth Police Department’s HOPE Unit, a partnership between the DRC and the City of Fort Worth, the Fort Worth Police Department, and My Health My Resources Tarrant County (MHMR). JPS Care Connections is brought in as necessary.