Local Service Organizations Tapped For Statewide Homelessness Initiative

Sonora, CA – A new statewide initiative to improve health and housing outcomes for people experiencing homelessness has chosen to partner with Resiliency Village, a non-profit working to reduce the homeless crisis in the Tuolumne County region, and the Mathiesen Memorial Medical Clinic.

The team is one of eight selected to join Partnerships for Action: California Health Care & Homelessness Learning Collaborative.

“We are honored and excited to be chosen to join the other incredible organizations from across California who are working to address the barriers people experiencing homelessness face when trying to access health care,” said Mark Dyken, Executive Director of Resiliency Village. “We are the smallest organization and the only rural project selected. Having an outstanding partner like the Mathiesen Memorial Health Clinic makes this possible, and we are so grateful for their willingness to partner together.”

Over two years, Resiliency Village, the Mathiesen Memorial Health Clinic, and the other teams will work together to help develop and/or enhance strategies to improve health and housing outcomes for people experiencing homelessness noted Dyken. He added that the initiative is designed to strengthen health care and homeless service organization partnerships and address new opportunities made possible through California Advancing and Innovating Medi-Cal (CalAIM), focusing on redesigning health care delivery for high-need populations, including people experiencing homelessness.

“The Mathiesen Memorial Health Clinic is proud and excited to partner with Resiliency Village in being awarded a two-year grant to address health issues in our county’s homeless population”, added John Vass, Executive Director of the MMHC, “and collectively begin the long-needed services in our medical and behavioral health services that will be expanded during this grant time frame.”

The learning collaborative is led by the Center for Health Care Strategies (CHCS) and made possible by the California Health Care Foundation. It will build the capacity of eight cross-sector teams to partner in establishing a more robust support network for people experiencing homelessness, detailed CHCS. Those teams are made up of health care organizations, managed care plans, community-based organizations, housing providers, and other stakeholders. Throughout the initiative, CHCS will distill lessons from the sites’ efforts, which will be shared broadly with stakeholders in California and across the country.

“Partnerships between health care, social services, and housing providers are essential to foster a whole-person care approach for people experiencing homelessness,” said Michelle Schneidermann, MD, Director of People-Centered Care, California Health Care Foundation. “We’re excited to support these innovative cross-sector partnerships working toward the promise of CalAIM — delivering care that is responsive, coordinated, comprehensive, and just.”

According to Housing and Urban Development (HUD) statistics, California has the largest number of people experiencing homelessness in the nation at 161,548. Additionally, people experiencing homelessness have less access to necessary preventive, primary, and specialty health care services, and suffer poorer health outcomes and lower life expectancy than the general population.