WILLIAMSBURG — The City of Williamsburg’s HOPE Team Pilot Program, launched in May and running through October, aims to help the increasing number of unhoused individuals in the city.
The HOPE Team — Houseless Outreach Partnership Engagement — is a street outreach team comprised of an outreach coordinator from the city’s Department of Human Services and a mental health clinician from Colonial Behavioral Health. A community engagement officer from the Williamsburg Police Department provides support or consultation to the team as needed, the city said.
The team conducts regular outreach to areas with high concentrations of unhoused individuals, focusing on building rapport and trust through consistent engagement and a multidisciplinary outreach approach, the city said, helping connect them to essential services and secure permanent housing.
Since its launch in May, the city said the HOPE Team has engaged 42 individuals who were unhoused, assisting one individual with transportation to return to their home community and helping seven others obtain housing.
The city said the outreach team focuses on unhoused individuals in public spaces who often have difficulty navigating conventional service models and face challenges like severe mental illness, chronic health conditions and substance use disorders.
“It has long been our practice to offer a guiding hand to any unhoused individual in the City of Williamsburg,” said Roy Gerardi, the city’s outreach coordinator. “The HOPE Team helps us further our vision to provide compassionate, accessible support where it’s needed most. By meeting people where they are, and engaging with them consistently, we aim to create pathways to services that lead to long-term stability.”
In addition to receiving housing and employment services, individuals receive support in enrolling in benefit programs, obtaining identification and accessing mental health resources, the city explained.
“Our goal is to engage with every unhoused individual in the City to help them navigate available resources and locate sustainable housing,” Human Services Director Wendy Evans said. “The HOPE Team is another example of City programs designed to meet the goals set by our community values. We are confident that most, if not all, of our unhoused or precariously housed individuals and families have been offered, and are likely receiving, some form of assistance.”
According to the city, the pilot program will collect data and evaluate the effectiveness, structure and resource needs of a dedicated street outreach effort.
Members of the community can assist the HOPE team by contacting Human Services at 757-220-6161 whenever they encounter someone who is unhoused in the city and providing their location.
