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Community Assessment

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Community Assessment

Demographic Overview:

The objective of this assessment is to identify the issues affecting the community and find solutions for the identified issues through a macro social work project. The population of interest is the low-income individuals who are homeless and those who cannot access mental health services. The community to be addressed is Stockton City in California, located in Central Valley: Community Assessment.

By size, it is best described as a mid-sized urban city. The community has a higher poverty at 18%, and housing is a problem because most households spend more than 30% of their total income on rent.

Needs Assessment: Act Together

Identify needs, assets, services and institutions related to your objective. Identify serve gaps and works to be completed. How will you build rapport with community stakeholders; explore partnerships?

The need, in this case, is to reduce the mental health barriers faced by people experiencing homelessness and poverty in this community. The assets, services and institutions related to the objectives include healthcare providers, local government agencies, educational institutions, and community organizations. Rapport will be with the community stakeholders through open communication and engagement, which will be achieved through meetings and dialogues.

Rapport will also be achieved through collaborative planning, which will be characterized by including stakeholders in decision-making (Reisch, 2020). Rapport can also be created through community outreach through workshops and partnership agreements.

Partnership will be explored through having stakeholder meetings and networking with them. Making formal agreements through the Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) can also be an effective means of exploring partnerships. Funding collaboration and grant applications will be one way of exploring partnerships. Coordinating with the stakeholders to ensure resource sharing and minimize cost will also be an effective way of exploring partnerships.

  1. Define the scope of your objective:
    1. Overall Goal

The overall goal is to identify the existing gaps limiting access to mental health services among the poor and homeless population in Stockton City.

  1. The Community

Stockton City is the community of interest. It has a population of 320 people and herein there is a diverse and multiracial community composed of Asian community, Latino and African American communities (U.S. Census Bureau, 2023).

  1. Stakeholders
    1. Stockton Medical Center and community health clinics
    2. San Joaquin County health and human services
  1. Homeless shelters, faith-based organizations, and food banks
  2. The residents
  1. Gather Data: Collect Community Data
    1. Federal Statistics

Federal statistics show that Stockton has a median household income of $58,393, and 18% of its population is poor (U.S. Census Bureau, 2023).

  1. Community Level Indicators

The community level indicators show that there is a 20 percent increase in the San Joaquin Homeless Count based on the 2023 statistics, which shows that the intervention is much needed (San Joaquin Continuum of Care, 2024).

  1. Community Member Experiences
    1. How will you gather the data to support your objective?

The data will be gathered through interviews with the affected individuals and those who have gone through such experiences.

  1. You’ve identified a need but are there services already in place?

Mental health services to the poor and homeless is the need, and although such services exist, they are not accessible to these people.

The community will be addressed through faith-based organizations, town hall meetings, and the media. The gap to be served is to ensure access to mental health for the poor and homeless by dealing with the huddles to accessing these vital health services.

  1. You don’t want to duplicate services! Who can you partner with? Do you have energy from the community to proceed?

To avoid duplication of services, partnerships will be made with

Community Assets: (Chapter 3; Section 8 of the Community Toolbox)

  1. What does the community have and do well?

The community has a strong network of community organizations and service providers. One thing they do well is collaboration. There is proper collaboration between non-profits, faith-based organizations, and the local government.

  1. Individual or Large Scale assets
    1. Individual people, consultants, skills

The community has dedicated mental health professionals, social workers, and community advocates.

  1. Resources, programs, institutions, churches, library, grants…

Non-profit organizations are already involved in addressing homelessness and can combine the same with access to mental health services (Berkowitz & Nagy, n.d.). Many churches are expressing interest in human welfare and are willing to host mental health workshops. There are community clinics that are ready to offer mental health services but lack funds.

  1. Organize Key Findings: Evaluate Your findings
    1. Summarize the objective if it has changed based on 1 & 2.

The objective is the same—to address issues preventing the poor and homeless from accessing mental health services.

  1. Summarize Assessment

The community has a concerning gap in access to mental health for low-income people and the homeless. Though mental health services are available, they are inadequate and not accessible to everyone. The community has resources and has formed relevant partnerships, but funding is the problem. There are partners ready and willing to support this initiative.

  1. What steps will you take to produce findings for stakeholders and the public for support?

The community has a high demand for services but they lack enough facilities and service providers (Berkowitz & Nagy, n.d.). Also, there are limited funds for mental health programs.

  1. Set Priorities
    1. What are the top 3 priorities identified to proceed in addressing your objective?

The first priority will be to increase accessibility of mental health services and this will be made possible through increased partnership with the healthcare providers within Stockton City. The second priority is increasing outreach efforts (Reisch, 2020). The outreach efforts will be primarily to connect the affected or disadvantaged individuals with the available mental health resources. The next priority will be to get policy support and funding.

  1. What existing services support your objective?

Lack of crisis intervention and immediate mental health services for homeless individuals.

  1. What is the biggest opportunity/support you can adequately address?

The willingness of churches and non-profits to partner in hosting programs and workshops

  1. Communicating Next Steps: Share
    1. How will you communicate your findings to the public/community?

The findings and proposed solutions can be effectively communicated by sharing the same with community organizations, shelters, and advocacy groups. Additionally, the same can be shared with the San Joaquin County Health and Human Services as well as the Stockton City Council. Also, findings and proposed solutions should be communicated to the local residents through the media and town hall meetings.

References

Berkowitz, B., & Nagy, J. (n.d.). Section 7. Conducting needs assessment surveys. Community Tool Box. https://ctb.ku.edu/en/table-of-contents/assessment/assessing-community-needs-and-resources/conducting-needs-assessment-surveys/main

Reisch, M. (2020). Macro social work practice: Working for change in a multicultural society. Pearson.

San Joaquin Continuum of Care. (2024). San Joaquin County 2024 homelessness point-in-time count and report. http://www.sanjoaquincoc.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/2024-San-Joaquin-County-Point-In-Time-Count-Report.pdf

U.S. Census Bureau. (2023). QuickFacts: Stockton, California. https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/fact/table/stocktoncitycalifornia/PST045223

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Question

Resources:

Community Assessment

Community Assessment

Based off the discussions from Chapters 9 and 10 and the Community Toolbox in Week 3, conduct an assessment of your community. The purpose of the assessment is to identify a problem or need that you can potentially address through the conceptual project that you would create. Steps in this process would be:

Please use the attached template to guide your discussion and write up of the assessment.

Client’s Notes:

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