Los Angeles County officials recently unveiled an online portal to request help for the homeless, allowing residents in Santa Clarita and throughout the county to notify outreach teams about the chronically homeless in need of assistance in their area.

The online portal is available for the general public, first responders and service providers to provide information on homeless people on the street.

“The portal takes the guesswork out of figuring out geographic boundaries by routing requests and tracking the response,” officials said in a statement unveiling the website.

When requesting services, informants will be asked for the location, date last seen, number of people and any physical description they noted. Tipsters can remain anonymous.

Due to high demand, it may take a few days for an outreach team to be deployed. But once outreach workers are in contact with the person in need, they start by building a trusting relationship, according to county officials.

The outreach teams, following the example of similar programs across the country, provide individually-tailored resources to the homeless people they interact with.

At any given time, there are approximately 300 individuals experiencing homelessness who live in Santa Clarita, according to Bridge to Home, a Santa Clarita Valley organization.

Outreach team efforts include helping someone experiencing homelessness complete simple tasks such as acquiring a legal ID card or as complex as helping to meet medical and mental health needs.

The ultimate goal of the outreach service is to help people who are homeless move from the streets into a permanent home, according to officials.

Related: City Of Santa Clarita Asking For Residents’ Opinions On Fighting Homelessness

The portal, dubbed LA-HOP, is funded by Measure H, the county measure approved by voters last year and expected to raise $355 million annually for 10 years for homeless programs through a sales tax increase.

An outreach coordinator in each region serves as the “air traffic controller” for all requests and deploys the most appropriate outreach team to the site, which officials said will reduce response times to those in need.  

“With just a few taps on a cell phone, LA-HOP makes it easier to request help for people experiencing homelessness on the streets of L.A.County,” said Supervisor Mark Ridley-Thomas. “This innovative tool will help us deploy our street outreach teams where they are most needed, so they can begin building relationships with our homeless neighbors and offer to connect them to services and housing.”

The tool is being supported by L.A. County Measure H, Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority, Los Angeles County Department of Mental Health and Los Angeles County Health Services.

In the Santa Clarita Valley, Bridge to Home serves its low income and homeless neighbors by offering an emergency winter shelter and comprehensive year-round support services, according to the organization. While they are not partnering with the county for the outreach teams, the organization provides its own outreach programs for Santa Clarita’s homeless population.

This outreach program is being rolled out shortly after the city of Santa Clarita enacted a ban on public sleeping throughout the city.

City Councilmembers said the controversial plan was not a move to make homelessness illegal, but an education tool to help direct homeless people to resources such as the Bridge to Home shelter, which is in the process of constructing a year-round homeless shelter.

“We want to keep our community safe. This is a public safety issue,” Councilmember Cameron Smyth said. “The city wants to encourage people to get off the streets and into the shelter.”

The online portal can be found here.

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