Authorize the Probation Department to enter into a contract with Cache Creek Lodge, Inc. for the provision of transitional housing and other supportive services utilizing Prop 47 grant funds in the amount of $1,300,000 for the period of May 1, 2025 through June 30, 2028. (No general fund impact) (Gayton) 

Authorize the Probation Department to enter into a contract with Cache Creek Lodge, Inc. for the provision of transitional housing and other supportive services utilizing Prop 47 grant funds in the amount of $1,300,000 for the period of May 1, 2025 through June 30, 2028.

Background
Prop 47 was a voter-approved initiative on the November 2014 ballot that reduced from felonies to misdemeanors specified low-level drug and property crimes.  Each year, the state savings generated by the implementation of Prop 47 are deposited into the Safe Neighborhoods and Schools Fund.  Sixty-five percent of these savings are set aside annually for the Board of State and Community Corrections (BSCC) to administer a competitive grant program.  Proposition 47 requires that these funds be awarded to public agencies to provide mental health services, substance use disorder treatment and/or diversion programs for those in the criminal justice system.  Additional legislation requires that the grant be awarded competitively and specifies that funds may serve adults and juveniles and allows funds to be used for housing-related assistance and other community-based supportive services, including job skills training, case management or civil legal services.  The BSCC further requires that at least 50 percent of the award made to grantees is passed through to community-based service providers. 

Reason for Recommended Action
The Probation Department applied for and was awarded $2.0M grant that will be used to expand its Transitions to Care program in the community.  This award will provide 65% of the awarded budget ($1.3M) to community-based organizations to identify and fund case management services, substance use disorder counseling and treatment, housing navigation services as well as stipends for housing placement.  The initial goal is to use the stipends for emergency and temporary housing, with the long-term goal that the client can benefit from wraparound SUD services to be in a better place (mentally), allowing them to transition into permanent housing on their own.  There will be a robust project evaluation component with $100K earmarked for those activities and $15K for program audit.  This award will also provide funding for one deputy probation officer to identify eligible participants, oversee and manage this program, as well as a small amount of funding for an administrative analyst to gather data and provide analysis of program metrics. 

On December 3, 2024, the Board of Supervisors approved Agenda Item No. 47, which authorized the Probation Department to sign the contract with the Board of State and Community Corrections and to accept the Prop 47 grant award of $2.0M, which required the department to issue Request for Proposals for both the housing and treatment components of the grant as well as the evaluator component as well. 

The overall distribution of these funds over the grant period are provided below:



Cache Creek Lodge is a private rehabilitation facility located in Woodland, CA.  Cache Creek was established as a nonprofit organization in 1974 by Hugh Cameron, a Yolo County resident and landowner empathetic to the needs of individuals recovering from substance abuse disorder.  Cache Creek Lodge has been in its current Woodland location since 1994 and currently maintains 55 beds for men and 10 beds for women, providing residential and transitional housing for those in various stages of rehabilitation.  The mission of Cache Creek Lodge is to facilitate individual rehabilitation and community reintegration of men and women struggling with substance abuse disorders with guidance, education and compassionate support.  Cache Creek Lodge provides various levels of care from residential, outpatient and sober living environments.  Norma Cordero served as Program Manager for Cache Creek for nine years and was appointed as Executive Director in October 2024 after the passing of the long-time Director.

Cache Creek Lodge has a long-standing history with Yolo County Probation. The facility was used to provide residential treatment and sober living opportunities to probation clients. However, due to County concerns with management practices, the facility was no longer appropriate to serve our clients and our contract was terminated. It was therefore the Probation Departments' top priority to confirm that Cache Creek had a plan to address this issue and must demonstrate that the measures that they had implemented were effective.  

In the last year, Cache Creek has taken several active measures to mitigate the opportunity for drug use in their facility:

As part of the Department’s due diligence, Probation has noted that calls to the facility were down significantly since these new measures were implemented. In addition, the Department conducted two site visits to walk the facility, observe classes and determine if the program was operating as anticipated.  After these visits, Probation management feels confident that Cache Creek Lodge is functioning in a manner that would support awarding this contract for Prop 47 services.

Community Corrections Partnership

The Probation Department released a Request for Proposal utilizing the professional consulting services of Blue Blood Consulting twice.  The first release of the RFP for Prop 47 housing and supportive services was November 13, 2024 with a closing date of December 18, 2024 2PM PST.

The RFP was sent to the following bidder classifications:

918-03   Alcohol and Drug Abuse Consulting Services
918-67   Human Services Consulting (to include Mental Health Consulting Services)
952-55   Homeless Prevention Services
952-78   Safe Housing

The RFP was released in the Periscope system and successfully notified 12,257 registered individuals on behalf of vendors about this opportunity.  No proposals were received by the deadline of December 18, 2024 at 2PM PST.

The Request for Proposal was reissued on January 2, 2025 with proposals due on January 30, 2025 at 2PM PST.  For this re-issuance the bidder classifications were expanded significantly to include the following: 918-03 Alcohol and Drug Abuse Consulting Services; 918-67 Human Services Consulting; 948-47 Health Care Center Services; 948-48 Health Care Services (not Otherwise Classified); 948-76 Psychologists/psychological and Psychiatric Services; 952-55 Homelessness Prevention Services; 952-78 Safe Housing; 958-56 Health Care Management (including Managed Care Services).

The Periscope system successfully notified 19,189 individuals on behalf of the registered vendors in the Periscope system about this opportunity.  In addition, the following suggested vendors were notified by email of the issuance and directed to the Periscope website:

1. Bay Area Community Services
2. Communicare

CommuniCare advised Blue Blood Consulting on January 29, 2025 by email that: “Given the answers to our questions posed early this month, we unfortunately decided to pass on this opportunity. When we created a lean budget (almost unrealistically lean) it was still over the ceiling. We had to make the difficult decision to not apply because there just isn’t enough funding in this grant/opportunity to meet the deliverables.”  No proposals were received by the deadline of January 30, 2025 at 2PM PST. 

At this point, the Department became aware that Cache Creek Lodge, Inc. no longer had an exclusive contract with CDCR (California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation) and had capacity in its housing and supportive services programs due to the reduction in scope of their current CDCR agreement.  Probation management met with the County Procurement Officer to discuss how we could engage Cache Creek, in regard to this opportunity.  We were advised that we could reach out to them directly and, if they were interested, we would need to perform our due diligence and, if appropriate, could move directly into contract negotiations. 

Probation management reached out to Cache Creek Lodge and sent them the RFP to review.   Cache Creek Lodge notified us that they were interested in discussing this opportunity further.  Probation management and staff then conducted two site visits meeting with Cache Creek leadership and staff and touring their facility.  In addition, Cache Creek Lodge management and fiscal were invited to meet with Probation management and staff to discuss the specifics of the various Cache Creek service delivery models and the components of each.  All of these meetings were positive and it was determined that the Department would move forward with the preparation of a contract.