Operation Shelter: Missoula County, City help the houseless find a temporary safe place, connect to permanent housing

Missoula County Shelter Project Coordinator Casey Gannon and City of Missoula Houseless Initiatives Specialist Emily Armstrong join the commissioners to provide an update on County and City efforts to help unhoused people in our community.  

Finding housing takes time and resources, which can be difficult when you’re constantly living in survival mode. In response to this need, the City and County created the Operation Shelter team to identify and vet potential locations for community members experiencing houselessness to temporarily stay while searching for housing.   

Casey and Emily explain how the City and County have partnered together and are finding creative solutions to a problem that outpaces available resources. While they are focused on the intense immediate need of providing temporary, safe and secure spaces for those camping in the urban area, they are also keeping their eyes on the long-term goal of helping these members of our community find stable housing.  

The conversation explores the key differences between the Temporary Safe Outdoor Space and the Authorized Camping Site, the longevity of these services and next steps as American Rescue Plan Act funding begins to dissipate. It’s a balance of infrastructure, systems, programs and provider support, and a community that is willing to recognize these people, living and working among us, also consider Missoula home, even if they don’t have a house of their own. 

Thank you to Missoula's Community Media Resource for podcast recording support!

Transcript

Commissioner Josh Slotnick: 0:20

Well, welcome back, everybody, to Tip of the Spear with your Missoula County commissioners. I'm Josh Slotnick and joined here by my buddy and fellow county commissioner Dave Strohmaier. Juanita is off taking one for the team, doing hard labor in other locales. This afternoon. We have two guests. Today, we have Emily Armstrong, the houseless initiative specialist at the City of Missoula, and Casey Gannon, shelter project coordinator with the County. So, we're going to begin first with Emily. Could you give us a brief intro of who you are and the work you do as the houseless initiative specialist?

Houseless Initiatives Specialist Emily Armstrong: 0:54

I would love to. Thanks. Yeah. Emily Armstrong (she/her) and houseless initiative specialists. So, really I am focused on the systems that relate to supporting people who are unhoused and trying to problem solve for that within and throughout our community. So, really at that systems perspective, trying to build system wide capacity and taking on new initiatives, trying to build out, discover where the gaps are and then build out projects and programs and partnerships to fill those gaps, so that we have really robust programming and supports community-wide around houselessness.

Commissioner Dave Strohmaier: 1:26

Thanks, Emily and Casey. Similarly, tell us a little bit about yourself and your work as Operation Shelter Coordinator and and just a little bit about how your role interfaces with Emily's role.

Shelter Project Coordinator Casey Gannon: 1:38

Yeah. First of all, thanks for having us here to talk about the work we've been working on. And yeah, so as a shelter project coordinator, I've kind of was brought on to kind of implement some of the recommendations we got from Operation Shelter where we had OEM(Office of Emergency Management) Incident Command Team kind of go through some stuff. So, kind of working on two main projects of setting up an Authorized Camping Site and also expanding on the Temporary Safe Outdoor Space and kind of implementing those continuum of care pieces that we are trying to add to our community. So, kind of been mostly tasked with more of the infrastructure and setting up these sites, but then working closely with Emily, who's already kind of tied in to all the service providers and kind of the overarching City-County plan to kind of address homelessness in in Missoula City and County. So, it's been a great partnership with the City and County. It's great to have both both sides working so closely together and really kind of tackling the project head on.

Commissioner Josh Slotnick: 2:33

So, Casey mentioned the OEM, that's Office of Emergency Management, and we tasked Adrianne Beck and her peers over at the Office of Emergency Management with this we called it Operation Shelter when the TSOS was in its infancy. But we realized that TSOS was just one piece of a solution to the problem of urban camping, literally people camping where they weren't supposed to be. And we needed to create places for people where they actually were supposed to be, places where people could be safe and secure and live in cleanliness and have access to services and have the chance to move their lives forward. Adrianne Beck and her and her folks did an inventory of all kinds of places around the City and County that might work.

Commissioner Dave Strohmaier: 3:14

And I'll ask this somewhat rhetorically. So, why the Office of Emergency Management? Well, I think one reason is that if you think about what they do, they pull together in the midst of crises such as a fire, a flood, a pandemic, and use the incident command system to take a methodical and concentrated approach to figuring out some really tough problems. And this is one that we identified as one of those really tough, urgent, chronic, but also acute problems in Missoula that we needed help getting to the bottom of what are some of the potential solutions. So, with that, I guess, Emily, let's drill down just a little bit more and talk to us about some of the specifics of Operation Shelter.

Houseless Initiatives Specialist Emily Armstrong: 4:05

So, I think Josh gave a really good summary of kind of the origins of Operation Shelter. It came about in an effort to address kind of this emergency of urban camping that we saw last spring. And with that, we realized we needed spaces and we also needed staff support and services. And there's so much more that comes with creating new spaces than just the space itself. So, there was a the Office of Emergency Management was extremely valuable and effective in identifying locations for sites, which is surprisingly difficult in the County and the City. And then we also work to build out kind of the other services necessary to truly increase and elongate our continuum and spectrum of options for people who are unhoused. So that also involved creating a community care team, which is kind of a mobile roving team of staff that involves housing support and social supports and basic medical care that goes to some of these sites and really supports the populations that are there. And then some of our other efforts, the Emergency Winter Shelter, the Temporary Safe Outdoor Space that was mentioned, this element of security and safety for residents, all of those things are really encompassed in Operation Shelter as a whole to try to make it as successful as possible.

Commissioner Dave Strohmaier: 5:13

And the community care team just started up relatively recently, did it not?

Houseless Initiatives Specialist Emily Armstrong: 5:16

Yeah. Yeah.

Commissioner Dave Strohmaier: 5:17

And any initial thoughts on how that's been going?

Houseless Initiatives Specialist Emily Armstrong: 5:21

Yeah, definitely. It's been really valuable. I mean, they are one of our main staff supports at the authorized camping site. They visit multiple sites. But given that a lot of our other shelter sites have other staff support at different times of the week and day, whereas authorized campsite doesn't necessarily they've been able to dedicate more time there. And it's been really, really incredible the way they've built relationships already. You know, it takes a long time to build the relationships and the trust that are necessary to be able to provide really basic medical care or housing services. So, that's where a lot of their time and energy has been spent and just getting to know the residents, but also building a clientele. And already they've been giving out wound kits and connecting people with partnership and connecting people to therapeutic services and basic medical needs. And it's so important.

Commissioner Josh Slotnick: 6:01

You know, we've heard for years with folks who work specifically with an unhoused population about meeting people where they are. And that's always felt more metaphoric than literal. And it is really great to hear that this is literally going to where people are and taking out not just the transportation burden, but the idea of making an appointment and being somewhere at a certain time when the rest of your life is fairly insecure. So, it just makes tons of practical sense. So, Casey, I had a quick question for you. So, through our conversation here, we keep tossing these acronyms around or expand them the TSOS or the TSOS or the Temporary Safe Outdoor Space and the ACS. What are the difference in these two places and why do we need them both?

Shelter Project Coordinator Casey Gannon: 6:41

Thanks, Josh. Yeah, so the Authorized Camp Site or the ACS and the TSOS are two different points on kind of this continuum of services that we're talking about, where you talk about meeting people where they are and kind of accommodating where they are in the process of trying to find housing. So, you know, some people it's like therapy. If you're not ready to engage in it, you're you're not going to get anything out of it. So, the Authorized Campsite is a space for people to legally camp that provides bathrooms, trash, services and water. And we also provide security at the site to provide a sense of safety for people living out on the street. It's supposed to be a low barrier. So, I mean, it's come and go as you want, very little rules other than respectful of people also living there, keeping your site clean. There's just a really open door policy of come, here's a place to sleep, but also have some security where the Temporary Safe Outdoor Space who HOPE Rescue Mission operates. And we've been kind of assisting them and then trying to now relocate that and kind of build on their successes and make it a more kind of sustainable operation that they have. Is a more service rich environment. They have staff on site during the week, during the days, peer support specialists kind of walking people through the process of finding housing. And a requirement of being in that program is that you are progressing towards finding permanent or stable housing. So, those are the people that are ready to fully engage in services and really dive headfirst into trying to find housing. And they've had great successes out there and a great work and that's why we want to build on it and make sure that that's an operation that we can keep in this community and operational.

Commissioner Dave Strohmaier: 8:20

So, someone asked me the other day, why did we decide to open it up during the middle of the winter? And what I tried to describe is that it wasn't as if we were trying to pick a date on the calendar that is the most inhospitable to open up the ACS. It took a long time and there were there were administrative hoops and various challenges to figure that out. Any thoughts for those out there who might be asking a similar question?

Commissioner Josh Slotnick: 8:47

Yeah, I'd love to hear about the process. What did it take to get the ACS open?

Shelter Project Coordinator Casey Gannon: 8:51

Yeah, for the ACS, yeah. We open in the middle of winter and that was just the timing of we were trying to open it as soon as possible. We had people camping on, I mean, Reserve Street bridge, we've had people camping under there for years and years and throughout the City. So, it was just kind of a priority that was more addressed as an emergency that we need to open this as soon as possible and get infrastructure in place. So, that included finding land and getting campground approval through the State in terms of providing certain resources to make that an illegal campground for us. So, just kind of working through all that was kind of some of the time that took into it. But overall, in the realm of things that opened up fairly quickly, I think, and even opening in the middle of winter, it filled up within a few weeks. We had almost all the sites full. So, I mean there was the need for even in the middle of winter and we even had a winter shelter open and sleeping near capacity. So, there was plenty of need for it regardless of the time of year.

Commissioner Dave Strohmaier: 9:46

Oh, that's good. Emily, so Operation Shelter is obviously a City and County and community partner undertaking. What from your perspective, are some of the different roles between City and County specifically as it pertains to Operation Shelter? And what are some of the the biggest challenges that that you've wrestled with so far?

Houseless Initiatives Specialist Emily Armstrong: 10:08

Yeah, it's a great question. And I think Casey alluded to it earlier. When when you just I think in your introduction, my position existed pre-Operation Shelter. So, I have. Have a lot of those relationships built up with providers and that kind of systemwide view of everything that's going on. And that's kind of what I can bring in. And my counterpart in Reaching Home, Sam Hilliard, can also bring to all of the work that we're doing and having Casey and the County's capacity to just support with all the infrastructure and the development and really co-develop for the whole community. You know, Missoula is very much a city, county. Everything we do is so oriented to both. And so, having just that partnership alone as a foundation for the work is really valuable. And then having kind of that infrastructure expertise that personally I know I don't have. So, it's really helpful to have someone who can, you know, dedicate capacity to that and really like figure out all the logistics of floodplain management and, you know, going through DPHHS (Department of Public Health and Human Services) and all of that kind of stuff. So, I think that's kind of the biggest distinction between city county work is yeah, just kind of infrastructure versus systems and programs and provider support.

Commissioner Dave Strohmaier: 11:11

DPHHS, Department of Health and Human Services with the State of Montana.

Commissioner Josh Slotnick: 11:15

There you go.

Commissioner Dave Strohmaier: 11:16

If anyone was wondering.

Houseless Initiatives Specialist Emily Armstrong: 11:16

The world of acronyms. And you asked about challenges. It's you know, we're learning. I think one of the other benefits that we got from opening up the Temporary Safe Outdoor Space was the willingness to try and learn and fail and adjust as we go. And I think that made us as a community more willing to try that again, because we had so much success with it the first time. And so, it means that we're learning and we're like making mistakes and we're figuring it out and things are going great and things aren't going great. So, some of the challenges I think have definitely been just that the need continues to outpace the existing space, even as we create new spaces. As Casey said, they fill up quickly, which is fabulous. It means we're doing something right. People are going to them. We're creating the spaces that meet the need. But the need is really great right now and we have to keep figuring out how we respond to that while also keeping our eye on the long term of building housing, which ultimately is the goal for everyone.

Commissioner Dave Strohmaier: 12:08

I think something you said there is super important I just want to underscore is, is that nothing that we're doing in this space is risk free. And I believe it was one of our colleagues this morning, Juanita Vero, Commissioner Vero, in her State of the Community address, made the comment about it's hard to roll up your sleeves when you're wringing your hands.

Commissioner Josh Slotnick: 12:29

I love that.

Commissioner Dave Strohmaier: 12:30

And and we could to this day, continue to have been wringing our hands as far as what to do. We took some risks, and I think we're seeing some payoff in the community.

Commissioner Josh Slotnick: 12:42

And like Emily was alluding to, as we make mistakes, we learn and we readjust. There isn't a permanence in this, like something's carved in stone and can't be undone. And the only way to make progress really is to start. And I applaud you guys for plowing new ground and going where a lot of communities have in a sense been a bit afraid to go. And we've had some wonderful success because of it. So, I want to throw out a question to both of you. And this is a question kind of a long winded question. I mean, you're shocked that I'm going to be long winded. It's crazy. It's the solid caffeine. This came to us, Dave and Juan and I, when we were on a radio call in show. And I've heard the same question rephrase in lots of different places. The three of us are not boots on the ground. It's not the role that we play and we all have our answers. But I'm really interested in hearing what your guy's answers are from your specific perspective. Basically, the question would go something like this, "Wait a minute, you're going to build houses for people who made a bunch of bad choices, so you're going to reward them for their bad choices by giving them a place to live. And don't they just throw garbage on the ground and make a mess? And wait a minute, if you do this, aren't people going to come here, like from Spokane and Billings? Because we have these great supports and and we're going to have to pay for this with our already sky-high property taxes. I got problems with my road in front of my house. Instead, you're going to give a house to some homeless person who doesn't even pay property taxes. What the heck?" It kind of goes like that. So what? And believe me, we all have our answers. Everyone at this table could go on and an answer to that question, but really want to hear from what you all have to say, given your perspective of right there on the ground.

Shelter Project Coordinator Casey Gannon: 14:22

I think, first of all, it's just really important to remember that these are people that are struggling in their part of our community. Regardless of where they came from, they came here. Many of them already have attachments to this community and this is their home. So, we're changing it to it's houselessness. They don't have a house, they have a home, and that's Missoula and the community. So, we need to respect them as one of our own and treat them that way. Not think of out of sight, out of mind. If we ship them off in a bus ticket, then the problem is solved. That's just the wrong approach. And this is a problem that faces a lot of people. You look at studies, 30 to 40% of people are one or two paychecks away from being homeless pretty much. So, if they don't have a support system that may be catch them. That's what local government is here to do is help build up that support system for them. So, I think it's important for us to address that and face it head on. I mean, the pandemic caused major damage to a lot of people's financial situations, so it's even more pressing time to address the situation.

Houseless Initiatives Specialist Emily Armstrong: 15:19

Yeah. I mean, I think you touched on a lot of it. Houselessness is a symptom of a lot of other root issues. It's a symptom of inadequate medical care and unaffordable, you know, insurance. It's a symptom of childhood trauma. It's a symptom of poor wages. It's a symptom of unaffordable housing. All of these other things that then create these situations that makes it so that someone falls out of ability to afford a house or stay in some sort of a home or lose connection with loved ones because they got injured and had to pay medical bills and their parent died in the process and it becomes impossible to catch back up. So, it's it is a symptom of so many other root causes. And that, I think is often overlooked in these comments that we hear about. You know, it's this person who throws trash everywhere. Well, if they don't have access to a trash bin, yeah, they're probably going to put it on the street. To me, I think it's the relational aspect is just really missing. When I hear those kinds of comments, it's such a disconnect from the true stories of the people that we're working with and we're trying to build that much more into our work and make these connections and really build that in these projects because that understanding just fosters more community support and community buy in. And that's what's needed across people of all income levels, whether you live in a mansion or if you live in a tent. The other side of it is, you know, shipping people elsewhere. That term alone just makes me cringe. It's not that, it's not solving anything. Those folks are just going to go to another community and burden that community or they're going to come right back here because their problem wasn't solved. So we're really trying to look at the long term economic impacts. That's not a financially stable solution to ship people, other places or to react to things all the time. If we can build up systems and prevent us having to spend the money, when someone goes to the ER in a situation where they didn't need to utilize that service, if they had had a safe and clean home in the first place, that just saved us a lot of money. So, we're trying to look at it from not just the social relational aspect of things. Of course that's wonderful, but from the hard financial economic side of things as well. Like what is the best decision for the county and the city financially? How can we best spend our money? And the funding for Operation Shelter is mostly American Rescue Plan Act funds. It's not taxpayer. It's not Montana taxpayer dollars.

Commissioner Dave Strohmaier: 17:31

So, we as Missoula County are starting something called Mythbusters, and there's plenty of myths to bust out there, one of which seems to be this issue, this recurring theme of of communities who are buying bus tickets to ship folks here to Missoula and vice versa. What is the genesis of that? Do you have any thoughts as far as how folks are are thinking that that really is the case?

Houseless Initiatives Specialist Emily Armstrong: 17:58

I think it's honestly, I think that's a national like rumor. I think it's something that's happening in places. But I don't think we're the only community that has that myth being dispelled often. I think a lot of communities that provide strong resources for their houseless folks are dealing with this myth that people are getting.

Commissioner Josh Slotnick: 18:14

So, in Lexington they're saying the people in Louisville are sending them to there with bus tickets.

Houseless Initiatives Specialist Emily Armstrong: 18:18

Same idea. Yeah. And we can tell you about 70%. You know, it varies a little bit depending on the day we pull the data. But about 70% of people that are involved in the Missoula Coordinated Entry System have a most recent zip code or report or most recent zip code of Montana or Missoula. So, most the large majority of our folks are from Montana, at least if not Missoula itself. And as Casey said, you know, many of them have strong connections here. They they work here. That's that's another one. Like many, many of these people have jobs. They just don't have a house. But yeah, I think that myth is pervasive around the country. It's not just on us.

Commissioner Dave Strohmaier: 18:50

And well, and and Operation Shelter is part of a mosaic of other houseless initiatives, certainly with the City of Missoula. In your role, talk to us maybe about some of what else the City of Missoula is up to in the world of houselessness initiatives.

Houseless Initiatives Specialist Emily Armstrong: 19:08

Yeah, I think the other thing that really can't be overlooked and I think doesn't get enough attention is the Missoula Coordinated Entry System, which is a piece of, it came out of the Ten-Year Plan to End Homelessness, Reaching Home, and is led by my counterpart at the city, Sam Hilliard, who's our coordinated entry specialist. And it is a system that we developed basically to best prioritize the most vulnerable in our system for the limited resources that we have. We don't have enough vouchers and and resources to be able to serve every single person who we wish we could. So, we try to assess need and vulnerability and be able to share those resources to the people who need them most and also connect everyone else to the resources that we can. So, it's kind of an agreement across all the providers in Missoula. And there are, I think, nearly 40 organizations signed into the Coordinated Entry System at this point from five when it started in 2017. Who all agree to be part of this, they're not required. They chose to opt in. They chose to be a partner or to be an access point and be able to, rather than each kind of on their own saying, okay, we have these resources and we'll help you here to instead say, okay, we all have these resources. How can we connect this person to this resource and this person to this resource across different organizations so that we're not duplicating our efforts and so that we're. Making it much easier for the people who need the resources, the folks who are trying to support, to know where to go so they can just go to one specific door and get access to everything rather than having to go to 12 different doors and hopefully get some of their needs met along the way. And some of those spaces, the Coordinated Entry System it truly feels magical sometimes. You know, we have been at such a low housing rate for a year or two or more at this point, and they are still housing people every week. There are successes of them, housing people, and that's purely like really strong dedication of case managers and outreach staff and direct service staff who are just like getting to know their client, getting to know property managers, getting to know landlords, really being creative and how they're there, problem solving around the need. So, that system, I think it doesn't get enough attention and it's just one of the many other initiatives that are going on. But that's key and it's so tied into Operation Shelter.

Commissioner Dave Strohmaier: 21:08

Yeah. Thanks. Casey, You strike me as someone who's probably pretty resistant to learning new things, but in spite of that, what if not? I'm just joking. You're a lifelong learner, but what have you learned through this process of helping spin up Operation Shelter?

Shelter Project Coordinator Casey Gannon: 21:26

Yeah, I think there's there's been a lot a lot of learning along the way. And I think we kind of knew that as I mean, we're doing things that haven't really been tested too much throughout the country. There's. We're doing similar things, but they're all brand new. So, there's there's not a lot of data necessarily backing up what we're doing, but we also know doing nothing is not an option. And I think that's the biggest lesson, like the open market is this the natural market is not providing the resources we need to make sure everyone is housed in our community. And that's the main role of government, is to fill those gaps that the general market isn't covering. So, I think it's really important that the City and County are stepping up and trying to fill that void and provide that service. So, we're learning lots of things. I mean, we saw that opening a campground in the middle of winter. People still wanted to be there. I mean, it filled up within weeks. The simple idea of having security, there was a huge factor to having people move there to have a sense of security so their stuff's not being stolen regularly. They can leave some of their stuff and not walk around with it all day long. Simple things like that, providing the basic necessities in life so then they can commit a little bit more energy of their time to trying to find housing or get back on their feet and not necessarily just be in survival mode the whole time. So, really just trying to get people out of survival mode I think is the most important part and then be there to help them move on from that.

Commissioner Dave Strohmaier: 22:50

Yeah, that's great.

Commissioner Josh Slotnick: 22:52

So, Emily, I wanted to ask you a question about some of the successes from the TSOS, but I wanted to just preface this with some of my own little riffing here to start. So, when talking to people about Operation Shelter, this is me talking to people around our community. I've realized there's kind of a spectrum of concern, and I've found from talking to people that everybody lands somewhere on the same spectrum. But we also, as individuals can be at different points on this same spectrum, depending on where we are in our own lives. The spectrum goes on one side. It it hurts our hearts to see our brothers and sisters living in squalor in the wealthiest country in the world. The other end, I don't want to look at another blue tarp blowing in the wind or some more garbage in the gutter. And I'm worried that those desperate, drug addicted people are going to harm me or my children. And so most everyone falls on that spectrum at some time. If there's an illegal encampment across from your house, you might be on the I'm afraid for myself, if it's on the other side of town, you might be like, how? How is this happening that these people are living in such a way? Can't we help? You pointed out we used ARPA money, Emily, which is great. We were able to use some of this money that was associated with the COVID epidemic, and I wanted to talk a bit for a moment about the return on that investment socially, not just asking you about the success, because we were able to team up with the City and the County and nonprofits, we were able to create safe places for people to be. So, they weren't places where they weren't supposed to be. And that has an economic benefit in that there's nobody camping on Ryman Street. There's no one. There are no blue tarps in front of businesses in a way that affect people's livelihoods. Recently I was at another city in Montana and the houseless population in the downtown area was outnumbering the population of people who could have been customers at restaurants and bars and cafes and such. And you could really see, wow, this has a big effect if we create places for people to be and then they're not places where they're not supposed to be. But I want to ask you about the specific successes for people who are residents at the TSOS. What happened to them because of their time there?

Houseless Initiatives Specialist Emily Armstrong: 25:01

Yeah, that site is very service intensive and they have really great case management. So, there's been a lot of great success as far as people getting housed. Most recent sets I heard were, I think just of last week. And at that point the Temporary Safe Outdoor Space had served 116 unique individuals. And 49% of those of those folks had exited out of the Homelessness Management information system, which is the database that we use for them is liquidated entry system to some sort of housing solution. That doesn't necessarily mean they're now in permanent housing. It may mean they're in a permanent house. They may mean that they're in treatment for something. It may mean that they have been relocated or reunited with family, but some sort of more positive, more at least somewhat permanent housing solution, which is huge. And 37 of those 116 were exited to housing specifically. And then some other really great statistics from there. You know, they're they're getting housing, but along the way, there are a lot of individual steps. And one of the first steps is getting the documents that you need to even just apply for housing or or apply for anything, a job to get money to get housing. So, 20 folks had obtained IDs or birth certificates or Social Security cards since they got there, which is just this huge step that's often overlooked in the process of getting access to housing. 11 of them had been connected to case management, and it doesn't include all the others who came to the site already connected to case managers. So, that's been really significant. So, just a lot of really great successes there and that doesn't say anything about the quality of relationships that have been formed, the smaller activities of rent wise classes, how to be a good renter, how to do financial management, all of that kind of stuff that's constantly being brought on to that site and provide it for the residents who live there.

Commissioner Dave Strohmaier: 26:39

So, we talked a little bit about this earlier just in terms of common misperceptions or themes that are filtering through the public as far as homelessness or houselessness. And and just a few of the common refrains that we hear things like we're never going to build or shelter our way out of homelessness or houselessness, or Missoula will, because of the services we offer, just be a magnet for homelessness or our streets, our community, our rights of way are chock full of trash and and broken down RVs. We don't want to see this. I guess just any additional reflections on on how as you go about doing the work that you do, Emily, you typically respond to those sorts of comments.

Houseless Initiatives Specialist Emily Armstrong: 27:30

Yeah, I think it's really important to recognize that this is a national challenge. We are while we like to think we're unique in Missoula, we are in many ways. This is not one of the ways we're unique. This is a national problem. It's happening everywhere. And everyone is trying to be creative. No one has a solution. So, this is something we are learning along with the entire nation. At the same time as we face, especially with all the impacts of COVID, we face rising numbers of people who are unhoused. And I'll say to the refrain about this, if you build it, they will come. So will everyone else. Missoula is a lovely place to be. It's wonderful. We have great we have 12 different kinds of grocery stores. We have lovely things. We have trail access from our houses. It's a beautiful place.

Commissioner Dave Strohmaier: 28:10

And they were here already. I mean, it wasn't as though we built this stuff and immediately houseless folks materialize.

Commissioner Josh Slotnick: 28:18

I have to add to this, when I was recently in this other city in Montana that had an obviously large population of houseless people and barely any services there they were, I have this sense that if you are a person who has nothing, you have to go where there things are that you can grab out of a dumpster or out of a garbage can or something like that. And in every population center in the country, we have people who are attempting to eke out a living out of the wake that civilization creates. So, if there's a population center, there are going to be people struggling without being without without a house.

Houseless Initiatives Specialist Emily Armstrong: 28:51

Especially in such a rural state. You know, that's how rural estates work. People are going to go where the resources are, whether you absolutely or not.

Commissioner Josh Slotnick: 28:58

You go with the resources. That's well said.

Houseless Initiatives Specialist Emily Armstrong: 29:00

And I think another piece of that just goes to your initial question goes back to what we were saying earlier about the root causes. You know, housing is housing is health care. Housing is a human right. And at the same time, we need to be focusing on things like substance use and treatment and affordable health care and affordable housing and mental health care and adequate wages, like all of those things come hand in hand. It's not this isn't just we're sheltering our way out of powerlessness. It's we're focusing on how we can build better systems and also thinking about all these other root causes that are in our playing well situation.

Commissioner Dave Strohmaier: 29:31

And to the point you made earlier, as far as and I think it's it's pretty instructive that so many folks who are houseless in our community have Montana area codes or zip codes from which they have some connection. That's important because these are not folks who in the middle of winter are in Palm Springs thinking, man, I want to go camp out in Missoula, Montana.

Houseless Initiatives Specialist Emily Armstrong: 29:58

Yeah.

Commissioner Josh Slotnick: 29:59

And I want to add to what you said, housing is also economic development and that if we can to the same refrain, if we can create safe places for people to be, then they won't be camping in places where they're not supposed to be. And that has the opposite effect on economics. So, it's in all of our best interests to create safe places for people to be even. If that isn't your primary concern as a person. So, I have a question for you, Casey. At the outset of the establishment of TSOS, when we were in really in the planning stages with partnership with the United Way, Missoula County helped send Eric Legvold of United Way off to go visit a handful of sites across the west and northwest that do similar work. He came back and he had a couple real clear lessons learned. One of them was scale and how important scale was in the creation of this kind of a little village. The other one was how important it was for personal safety for the residents if we were to hopefully have success at these places. How do we incorporate those lessons into TSOS or into ACS?

Shelter Project Coordinator Casey Gannon: 31:01

Yeah, I think it was great getting some better perspective of what other communities are doing and the lessons learned from some of the experiments they have carried out already. And I think one of the biggest ones was safety. I mean, it's a with security and cameras, it's you play this balance of like, are we over surveilling this group or are we actually providing a service that's benefiting them by making them feel safer in that space? And it's a tough balance to play. But I think he did learn through some of these a lot of these residents did enjoy that extra sense of security, even if it meant having cameras and stuff like that. Because one of the biggest things you struggle with being homeless is, you know, your security and the safety of your stuff. You don't have many belongings, but those belongings mean the world to you. So if you lose them, you've lost everything.

Commissioner Josh Slotnick: 31:46

You can't lock a tent.

Shelter Project Coordinator Casey Gannon: 31:47

Yeah. And you can't walk a tent. You know, you're out in the open public space. It's really hard to secure that. So, I think just providing that security is something that we've put at the top of the list of what we need to provide with these sites and scale as well. And we want to build it big enough where we can accommodate as many people as possible. But we also want to keep it at a size that works for the people staying there. You know, he said, you know, we don't want more than 20 to 30 people. These people are going through a lot. And by putting them all in one small space isn't going to really help them move forward. There's going to be more conflict and stuff. So, keeping a smaller is helpful for the people. There's less conflict and a more secure spot for the people as well. So, kind of taking those lessons and as we design these spaces, it might mean we might need more locations, but I think it will be more successful in the long run if we build it right the first time and not if we do it wrong, you know, it might get closed down the whole site and then we're not helping anyone. So, we really want to make sure it's a successful site.

Commissioner Dave Strohmaier: 32:45

Well, let's look into the future just a little bit. So, we've talked about there being tents at the current TSOS. Well, we are looking at hard sided shelters at the next iteration of this TSOS as we envision it. Anything that you want to add to that, Casey, in terms of, I guess also lessons learned elsewhere in the country and and also some folks out there might be wondering why, Casey Gannon, are you taking so long to get this thing moved?

Commissioner Josh Slotnick: 33:17

And this to be clear, this thing is the T and the TSOS is temporary and that it's going to be moved and it won't be temporary anymore.

Shelter Project Coordinator Casey Gannon: 33:25

So, the Temporary Safe Outdoor Space has been running for over a year now. I think they started in kind of initially like ice fishing tents, kind of nylon tents. As you know, Montana weather isn't the most habitable spot for a tent year round, whether it's snow, feet of snow falling on your tent or the sun pounding it all day long. So, we did help get canvas tents, which are much sturdy out there right now to get through this last winter. And then the City and County purchased some hearted, sided shelters that have heating and cooling to help provide a better sleeping shelter for people. And yes, it was painful to have them in storage throughout the winter. It feels like, hey, we have these shelters, why aren't we using them? But they do require some infrastructure in terms of electricity platform and then we need to bring in bathrooms. And then so there's design and infrastructure, but probably the hardest hurdle that's been taken time is finding a location that put them. The reason we're in a housing crunch is we lack open space for even housing. So, for us to find City or County land that has the infrastructure we need but is also close to resources, that's going to make it a successful site for these people. Many of them don't have cars, so they rely on public transportation, which means we have to keep them somewhat in the city center by taking the time and making sure we get a really good site that's going to work for the project. We're helping set ourselves up for a successful for the years to come at the project's going to be in place. So, at the time we're losing now is going to pay off by having a really successful site down the road.

Commissioner Dave Strohmaier: 34:54

That makes total sense.

Commissioner Josh Slotnick: 34:55

Yeah, it's really complicated to figure these things out. It's one thing to come up with the realization that we need to create such a space and another one to find the location for it. It's pretty fraught. Who would want to be the neighbor to such a thing? If you go visit the TSOS, it's tidy. It looks fine, looks great. People are pretty happy there. No problems with it. I think we had one call for service in more. In a year, there was probably more than one call for service in every other neighborhood in the City of Missoula or across the County. If you were to break things down into neighborhoods and yet if you were to say to someone, how would you like it if we set up this permanent village of old, hard sided shelters for formerly homeless people to be in your neighborhood, the reaction most likely is going to be super negative, even though it's proven itself to be successful. So, these are these are huge challenges. So, I want to ask you guys one last question. We're going to combine the two because it's two last questions. So, both of you work for local government, and we are super grateful that both of you have made this choice. I can say to anybody listening, we're sitting here with two super accomplished, hyper competent young people that could be doing just about anything they wanted and probably be making a lot more money and have made the choice to work for local government. And we are really appreciative. What do you need from us? Okay, then the follow up question is what have you come across recently in a book or a podcast or a conversation? You feel like there's a real nugget of wisdom or interesting things that you want to pass on generally. So, we'll do the the kind of hard first and then you get that desert question.

Houseless Initiatives Specialist Emily Armstrong: 36:29

I would say to the initial question about what's needed, I think it's just I think we're really lucky right now. We have elected leaders who care and are willing to try things and and be creative. And so, just continued energy in that direction. And and we really, you know, we need continued funding. This, like I said, was all American Rescue Plan Act funding. And that ends and we're right now already trying to figure out ok fiscal year 2023 fiscal year 2024. How are we sustaining all these projects? You know, it's one thing to stand them up and it's another thing to think about the early operational costs now that we've created the spaces and want to sustain them. So, that's a piece that we really have our attention toward the city. And I know County goes through a budget process at the same time. So, I think that's a really important element of this. You know, I feel like we've created this idea that we can just we have all this funds and we can kind of create anything and that only goes so long. So, we're really trying to figure out how we how we sustain all of this from a financial standpoint and just continue to build that understanding and awareness of how this interweaves with all the other projects related to substance use and treatment and all of those kinds of supports that that go hand in hand with the experiences of powerlessness.

Commissioner Josh Slotnick: 37:36

Desert question.

Houseless Initiatives Specialist Emily Armstrong: 37:36

Oh, at the same time!

Commissioner Josh Slotnick: 37:38

Sure, sure.

Houseless Initiatives Specialist Emily Armstrong: 37:39

You know, this was actually the hardest one for me to.

Commissioner Josh Slotnick: 37:42

Oh, you probably had too many to choose from.

Houseless Initiatives Specialist Emily Armstrong: 37:45

So many good things. I was thinking about, though. I have been reading this book called Sustaining Spirit. It's written by this this gal, Naomi Ortiz. And it's really just within the world of social justice work and these really huge social issues. How do we maintain our own spirit? How do we stay strong? How do we stay resilient?

Commissioner Josh Slotnick: 38:04

The people who are working in the work.

Houseless Initiatives Specialist Emily Armstrong: 38:06

Yeah, how do we continue doing that? Because it's such a high burnout type of field, any of any of this work, you know, even, you know, elected positions. This is it's intense. These are hard, hard challenges we're trying to work through. And the feedback we get is on the spectrum. And sometimes it's challenging to receive that community feedback all the time. And yeah, it just has these, it's this this gal who's native and Latinx and just has a really fabulous perspective on all of it and how to sustain ourselves and really be intentional in the work.

Commissioner Josh Slotnick: 38:34

Say the name of her book again.

Houseless Initiatives Specialist Emily Armstrong: 38:35

Yeah, it's called Sustaining Spirit: Self-Care for Social Justice. And her name is Naomi Ortiz.

Commissioner Josh Slotnick: 38:41

Thanks for that.

Commissioner Dave Strohmaier: 38:42

Yeah.

Shelter Project Coordinator Casey Gannon: 38:43

All right. Yeah. So, uh, things that you guys can do. Yeah, I think we're doing our community, local governments already doing a lot of things right. I think we're moving in the right direction. Uh, I think having kind of that systematic community response is so important. There's so many moving pieces. And then as part of that, as local government leaders, I think it's important that you you're the leaders and champions of kind of bringing all those groups together and kind of helping convene those groups. I mean, helping solve this problem is we're bringing in health care centers, hospitals, housing specialists, you know, food bank, every partner, faith groups, every partner you can imagine and getting them so we can all work together towards this common goal. And I think that's where you guys really come in and kind of try and make sure we're all bringing coming together and working at it as a group. And then going forward is yeah, the sustainability of we got these ARPA dollars, which has been an incredible opportunity to take on some of these challenges, but we need to also figure out how to make it sustainable and keep keep this on the front line of what we're trying to accomplish in our community and how do we continue to fund these programs in this kind of safety net for people in our community? I think it's going to be what we kind of have to work towards addressing and but also at the same time evaluating our programs and making sure we're spending dollars wisely and making sure the things we are trying are working. And if they're not, we have to readjust and pivot to something different. So, I think that's very important to just make sure we're looking at data to make sure we're doing the best.

Commissioner Josh Slotnick: 40:09

That's evaluation piece.

Shelter Project Coordinator Casey Gannon: 40:10

Exactly. Yeah, actually is right. And when I started this position, you guys recommended the podcast, The Outsiders, by the Seattle Times. They follow pretty much Olympia, Washington, going through a similar process as we're going through now, kind of trying to set up similar projects and, you know, show the government perspective, but then also perspective of people living in the camps. And it set up this job really well in terms of the problems we face or going to face and kind of the intricacies of it all in terms of all of that. So, it found it really inspiring even though it showed all the challenges that I was seeing the face, it was pretty inspiring as well to see that, you know, other communities are trying, regardless of all the pushback they got.

Commissioner Josh Slotnick: 40:51

So, if I remember right, they really learned a lesson around scale.

Shelter Project Coordinator Casey Gannon: 40:54

Yeah, scale. We'll see if I think they want to you know, they put up, I think a hundred person campsite and it was just, you know, it's a lot to manage. It's a lot of people that are in a difficult position. So, it's like.

Commissioner Josh Slotnick: 41:06

Hey, can I try a curve ball here?

Commissioner Dave Strohmaier: 41:09

Yeah, let it rip.

Commissioner Josh Slotnick: 41:10

Hey, do you have one? Anything you read stumbled into listen to heard about that man. That's really interesting and worthy of note in the recent past.

Commissioner Dave Strohmaier: 41:18

Well, as as folks might remember, like 20 episodes ago, I was reading a book that I'm almost finished with right now. It's called The Pyrocene by Stephen Pyne. Totally different topic. But in thinking about how to live with fire in these landscapes of the American West and recognizing that there are actually several different areas of fire, there's the what you might call native fire in the landscape. And that is first fire. That is the fire that comes from the sky by way of lightning. Then, with the advent of the Homo sapiens on the planet, we have brought our own fire torches to influence the landscapes in which we live. And then this latest phase that we live within the the pyro scene, if you will, we are actually harnessing fire like fire from the ground to create an industrial age that is now creating this this ironic feedback loop of because of the fire that we've harnessed, we have now changed the atmosphere and the planet in which we live in. So, how to come to peace with all of these aspects of fire on the landscape as as a feature of this world in which we live is pretty, pretty fascinating and is something that I am like two pages away from finishing this book. So, more to come.

Houseless Initiatives Specialist Emily Armstrong: 42:45

Related to this topic. I mean, we're now having to discuss severe weather in the summer in Montana for for folks and shelters. And who knows it's not something we've had to discuss.

Commissioner Josh Slotnick: 42:55

The heat issue.

Houseless Initiatives Specialist Emily Armstrong: 42:56

It relates. Yeah, yeah. Heat, fire, smoke, unhealthy air.

Commissioner Josh Slotnick: 42:59

Oh, my gosh. Absolutely.

Commissioner Dave Strohmaier: 43:01

Thanks for that curveball, Josh

Commissioner Josh Slotnick: 43:02

Yeah, it's really fun. It's really fun.

Commissioner Dave Strohmaier: 43:04

Back at you. Yeah. This is an addendum to Tip of the Spear this week.

Commissioner Josh Slotnick: 43:10

So, my wife and I have been watching a series, I mean we live in the era of boutique TV now, all of us do. It's called the Beforeigners. Anyone know this one.

Commissioner Dave Strohmaier: 43:22

Nope.

Commissioner Josh Slotnick: 43:23

Okay, here's the premise. It takes place in modern day Norway and Oslo, Norway. And people start popping up out of the ocean from 100 years ago, from 1,000 years ago.

Commissioner Dave Strohmaier: 43:33

I saw that happen in the Clark Fork (River) the other day.

Commissioner Josh Slotnick: 43:35

Yeah, it's amazing. Yeah. Some people from 10,000 years ago. So, when it's one person, it's super interesting. Like, Wow, tell me where you came from. That's so cool. What if it starts being hundreds, if not thousands of people? And now this city of Oslo is overrun by migrants, but they're from Norway. They're just from a long time ago. And it's kind of this sci-fi cool thing, but it's really just an allegory about immigration. And pretty soon there's an othering. Well, there's the nowaday people and the old time people and their cultures don't mix. And how come they stick together and their neighborhoods look dirty and trashy and they have issues with crime that we don't have. And it's sort of looks like science fiction, but really it's a big allegory for immigration. And it's been really fascinating to watch.

Commissioner Dave Strohmaier: 44:15

What's it called?

Houseless Initiatives Specialist Emily Armstrong: 44:16

I reading a book on a similar premise.

Commissioner Josh Slotnick: 44:17

Really? It's called The Beforeigners.

Commissioner Dave Strohmaier: 44:18

The Beforeigners.

Commissioner Josh Slotnick: 44:19

Yeah.

Houseless Initiatives Specialist Emily Armstrong: 44:20

There's the book I was reading. I can't remember the title right now, but the very it's like towards the end of the book, they have this one phrase that says, "We're all migrants through time." And I was just like that's this.

Commissioner Josh Slotnick: 44:30

There you go.

Houseless Initiatives Specialist Emily Armstrong: 44:31

Yeah.

Commissioner Josh Slotnick: 44:31

You got it. Yeah, I feel that way all the time. We can barely understand each other with that 30 year gulf between us. Sometimes I have to draw pictures.

Shelter Project Coordinator Casey Gannon: 44:40

Yeah.

Commissioner Josh Slotnick: 44:42

Well, thank you all for joining us. Thanks. Thanks for having me. And anybody who's up.

Shelter Project Coordinator Casey Gannon: 44:49

Thank you for having us.

Houseless Initiatives Specialist Emily Armstrong: 44:50

Yeah, it was fabulous to be here.

Commissioner Dave Strohmaier: 44:51

Thank you.