Following the 2020 Victorville City Council elections, newly elected Mayor Debra Jones inherited a series of ongoing problems in Victorville; spikes in Covid-19 cases, an ongoing increase in homelessness, and public concern of police brutality. I reached out to Mayor Jones to hold an interview via zoom to discuss these issues in depth.
Victorville has had an exponential growth in homelessness since the early 2000s. The city has the 2nd highest concentration of homeless people in the county. Every year things seem to be getting worse. What will the city do to combat this challenge and ensure everyone has housing?
Mayor Jones: Right, so the city of Victorville, just so you know, isn't alone in facing this very complex challenge that's affecting cities throughout California. In fact, one study reported that more than 50% of our entire nation's homeless are right here in the state of CA, so the challenge for our city government is that we’re not funded to provide health and human services. But, we’re not going to let that stop us. So we’re actively working to identify grants and other funding sources and we’re establishing partnerships with social service agencies and organizations to help us lessen the homelessness in Victorville.
So let me just share with you some of the important actions that we’ve taken so far. And this is a great question by the way because it impacts all of us and it’s very difficult for us to see what’s happening. So, in March 2017, the City of Victorville partnered with the San Bernardino County Housing Authority to convert the former Queens Motel into a 31 unit permanent supportive housing complex for the homeless, and this complex located on Stoddard Wells Road is expected to begin accepting occupants this spring. So, we’re moving actively toward that and it is called Desert Haven and it’s going to provide onsite wrap-around services and I don’t know if you're familiar with what that is, but I can go into that a little bit later if you’d like. So these wrap-around services are meant to help individuals end that cycle of homelessness. In 2019, not too long ago, we hired a homelessness solutions coordinator and established a homelessness solutions task force, I hope you're familiar with that. And, this task force has made great progress since April 2019. We have a group of citizen stakeholders that help us identify strategies and funding sources to reduce homelessness in our city. And, with their help, we've already developed plans for a wellness center campus. I hope we touch on that later, that has great potential to lessen homelessness in our city. And that wellness center will operate as a low barrier, which is good news, emergency shelter where homeless individuals will receive life changing services such as income stabilization, housing navigation, mental health counseling services that they need to break that cycle of homelessness and provide a better quality of life for them. So case managers will connect homeless individuals and families to helpful resources, and an onsite medical clinic will be available to residents and the broader community. So this is expected to be a 168 bed facility which will be located on city-owned land at 16902 First Street.
I understand the city is currently undergoing its plan for the largest homeless shelter in the high desert, however people are concerned about where the major source of funding will come from. How does the city intend to fund this very needed shelter? When should we expect the shelter to be operational?
Mayor Jones: Sure, great question, so we were extremely excited to receive a notice of funding reservation for a homekey grant in the amount of 16.8 million dollars at the end of October 2020. Unfortunately, here's the caveat, to accept those grant funds the city would have been required to expend the entire 16.8 million by December 30th, 2020. So, at that time, it would have just been a matter of eight weeks. Honestly, there is no way the city could have hired a contractor, constructed a wellness center campus, and extended all of the grant funds that quickly. And here’s the catch, if we were to have accepted the grant and not spent it entirely by December 30th, the City of Victorville would've been liable to pay any expenses that occurred past that deadline from city funds rather than the grant funding. So, this clearly wouldn’t have been a fiscally prudent choice so we clearly were unable to accept the grant, with such time limitations. But, here’s the good news I hope, additional homekey funds are expected to be made available by the State and if so, we will again apply for grant to support construction for our wellness center campus. We’re extremely hopeful that the State would see fit to award the City of Victorville another grant and we will receive the grant in time to construct our wellness center campus for the benefit of the entire community. So, our staff continues to apply for other sources of funding to support the wellness center campus. We’ve been awarded a permanent local housing allocation grant that will bring in over $630,000 annually to support the wellness center operations and a one-time homeless housing and prevention grant in the amount of $300,000. So we’re very emboldened by the support we’re receiving from our wellness center campus in the form of community support through our homelessness solutions task force and that’s evidenced by the recent grants that we’ve been awarded, so we’ll continue to work to make this vision a reality to serve our community’s homeless and you know absolutely for the betterment of the entire city.
Covid-19 cases in Victorville are growing at alarming rates. In the high desert, we have started to see people organizing “Anti-mask” events. How is the city enforcing Social Distancing and mask guidelines?
Mayor Jones: Sure, and gosh I thank you for being so interested in it because it really does impact all of us and we’ve seen what’s happened throughout 2020 and starting here in 2021. Throughout this pandemic, the City of Victorville’s priority has always been to protect our community from the spread of Covid-19, so our best way of doing this is educating and informing our community about safety protocols and recommendations from trusted health agencies like the Centers for Disease Control, and the California Public Health Department, and the San Bernardino County Department of Public Health. So, public health orders, and this is something Mr. Ponce that a lot of people may not be aware of, but public health orders that have been issued by the State and County are not the jurisdiction of the City of Victorville. So, we don’t have the authority to enforce these orders. However, we do take an active role in informing and educating our community about these orders and protocols which we all know is social distancing and mask-wearing that’s going to help prevent that spread of Covid-19. We communicate this information regularly through the city's communication channels including our website, social media sites, and our digital newsletter that is distributed to I think it’s about 34,000 people every other week. You can subscribe and your classmates can subscribe to our digital newsletter and find links to our social media channels on our cities website at victorvilleca.gov/stayconnected.
As vaccines are being distributed, how can residents of Victorville stay updated for when it’s their turn to receive a vaccine?
Mayor Jones: So the San Bernardino County Department of Public Health is overseeing the distribution of the Covid-19 vaccine. And I know that the county is distributing the vaccine in accordance with a phase system, so right now the county’s in phase 1A which includes healthcare workers, first responders, and people aged 65 and older. The county’s vaccine distribution plan is described in more detail on the county’s website sbcovid19.com/vaccine. Residents can also call (909) 387-3911. So the City of Victorville is in communication with the county regarding their plans and we share this information with our residents via our website and social media and digital newsletter. We’re also in discussions with the county to provide, and I love this, one of our facilities to serve as a vaccine distribution center when the county progresses to broader distribution of the vaccine in our community. We’ll share that information when it’s available.
(At the time of publication San Bernardino County is now on Phases 1A- Phase 1B Tier 1)
Police brutality has made itself much more evident to the majority of Americans last summer. The Black Lives Matter movement has called for much-needed change to fight this problem. What change has the city of Victorville planned to do to combat police brutality?
Mayor Jones: Yeah so great question, very timely of course, so first and foremost Mr. Ponce I want you to know and I want to make it abundantly clear that the City of Victorville is firmly against police brutality and so is the San Bernardino County Sheriff's Department which provides contracted police services to our city. The Sheriff's Department has made its stance very clear on this issue with the issuance of its 8 Can’t Wait Program which bans the use of chokeholds, mandates de-escalation training for all personnel, and much more to eliminate misconduct within its ranks. Additionally, the City of Victorville joined with community stakeholders and the sheriff's department to establish a citizens workgroup specifically to address community concerns about police conduct. Very serious issue, this group is opening the lines of communication needed to improve police-community relationships and trust. Typically when we’re not in a pandemic, the city joins with the sheriff's department to sponsor several outreach events aimed at fostering positive police-community relationships such as national night out, our fall festival, and the neighborhood pop-ups. These events give our community and sheriff’s deputies the opportunity to meet one another one-on-one and establish those positive personal connections that mean so much to all of us. And our sheriff’s department also forms bonds with Victorville youth through the police and fire activities league and activities like “shop with a cop”. And so I believe that training within the County Sheriff’s Department and these community outreach programs are critical to preventing police brutality and establishing the lasting relationships that truly are needed to create the positive change we are all looking forward to.
Finally, what can young people do to get more involved in local government? What can the city do to reach out to its youth?
Mayor Jones: Okay, so I have to giggle a little when you say young people because when I say young people it means I’m an old person. So, honestly I think that this interview is a great step in promoting youth involvement in our local government. I expect the article you're going to write will spark interest from your fellow students. A great way for young people to get involved and learn more about our city government is to watch our city council meetings. I don’t know if you had an opportunity to do that but these meetings are conducted online via zoom and posted on the cities website where they can be viewed anytime. Watching one or more of our council meetings will provide a window into the issues our local government faces and the kinds of decisions our local officials are making such as budgetary decisions, matters of policy, approval of large road and infrastructure projects, and of course more. City Council meets the first and third Tuesday of each month at 6pm and information about our meetings including the meeting agenda can be viewed on the city website at victorvilleca.gov/agendas. So I welcome you, I welcome your classmates to join us. You know, because being a council member is much more than people perceive, it’s not necessarily what we see on T.V right? Because, we do have to govern through law, policy, and procedures and if we are doing our jobs well we’re applying those best practices and governance that’s going to help us be more effective and efficiently in our work ultimately for the good of our community.
Going a little bit further if I could, the city of Victorville outreaches to our youth in a broader way and in a variety of ways. As I mentioned earlier prior to the pandemic we hosted many community events throughout the year. We also hosted a variety of youth sports and activities through our recreation division, which we hope to expand with the passing of Measure P. We formed the R.A.T Pack, which is a club actively specifically geared towards teens to encourage civic service and involvement, and we also provide tours, not many people know this, of City Hall upon request. And, I do hope also that when we open back up and students are back in the classroom, I certainly would like to make myself available to classes to talk about what local governance is, what it looks like, what it should look like, and what really our roles and responsibilities are. So, even though a lot of this is suspended because of Covid-19 we've learned to become creative with drive-thru events and online activities and we can’t wait to resume in-person activities, of course when it’s safe to do so.
Sources
8 can't wait. (n.d.). Retrieved March 05, 2021, from https://8cantwait.org/
Vaccine - COVID-19. (n.d.). Retrieved March 05, 2021, from https://sbcovid19.com/vaccine/
Victorville, CA. (n.d.). Retrieved March 05, 2021, from https://www.victorvilleca.gov/government/agendas
Victorville, CA. (n.d.). Retrieved March 05, 2021, from https://www.victorvilleca.gov/government/measure-p-1126#:~:text=Measure%20P%20is%20a%20one,and%20raise%20%2415%20million%20annually.&text=Pursuant%20to%20California%20Revenue%20and,are%20exempt%20from%20sales%20taxes.
Victorville, CA. (n.d.). Retrieved March 05, 2021, from https://www.victorvilleca.gov/our-city/stay-connected
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