HONOLULU — A retired city-owned bus with about 1.7 million miles on it will now roll to the assistance of Oahu’s homeless.
Once part of TheBus fleet, the aging vehicle will now work as part the city’s Crisis Outreach Response and Engagement, or CORE, program.
As such, CORE workers will drive the bus to encampments, parks, beaches and surrounding areas to identify, evaluate and transport the unsheltered to the city’s Leahi or Aala respite center and shelter, when homeless people agree to accept such help, city officials said Tuesday.
Formerly used to assist with mass casualty incidents, the latest incarnation of the bus will be able to transport up to 29 people, either on medical stretchers or in regular bus seats, to those shelters or centers, they said.
Staffed with two to three emergency medical technicians, the bus is outfitted with medical equipment as well, and will assist in keeping EMS resources available for medical emergencies, officials say.
In addition, the bus will carry other specialty items, including clean used clothing, adult diapers and other hygiene supplies. It will also have kennels for pets.
The CORE bus will deploy once a week in the first phase of operations, city officials said.
“As a city, we are committed to finding innovative ways to address homelessness and support our most vulnerable residents,” Mayor Rick Blangiardi said in a statement. “The CORE bus is a great example of how we can re-purpose existing resources to bring essential services directly to those in need.”
Honolulu Emergency Services Director Jim Ireland agreed.
“Big problems need big solutions but not necessarily expensive solutions. This is a retired city bus with roughly 1.7 million miles on it, but it can still be put to good use,” said Ireland. “If someone needs medical attention, they will be able to lay flat on a stretcher safely and receive care on their way to a respite center.”
At a news conference Tuesday morning outside City Hall, HESD Deputy Director Ian Santee told the Honolulu Star-Advertiser that the bus will supplement CORE’s existing fleet of two ambulances and four SUVs.
“It’s almost the same as when we do our regular outreach,” Santee said, adding the bus will be brought out “when we find a group of people at a massive encampment or gathering that are all willing. … It actually improves the efficiency of the city to take a group rather than one, two, three, four, five, six.”
Based on the latest Point in Time Count data released in May, the number of homeless people on Oahu increased for the second year in a row — to 4,494 in January — with the greatest increase among those considered “unsheltered,” meaning they were not staying in homeless shelters.
On the bus Tuesday, city Community Services Director Anton Krucky told reporters that there are “probably 2,000 homeless people” living on the streets of Oahu.
“Got another 2,000 to 2,500 in shelters, give or take,” he said. “And it fluctuates.”
Krucky noted that in the near future the city plans to open a command center where it can track the location of homeless people. That information, he added, will be tracked in real time.
“So when a bus like this goes around, they can tell which shelters have openings, what type of shelters they are — if it takes dogs, or its females-only, or medical,” Krucky said. “And they’ll be able to see that in real time (including) HPD.”
Under such a command center, he said, the city will start to analyze where the homeless people “are and who they are, what their needs are.”
He added that this data — largely gleaned via caseworkers on the ground — will be funneled to the command center to allow the city to make decisions regarding the island’s homeless population overall.
“It’s not just to analyze and ‘Here’s what we have’; it’s if we have this ‘What do you do? What’s your strategy? How do we put together the resources to address this area?’” Krucky said.
