MEDFORD, Ore. — Oasis of the Rogue Valley and OnTrack Rogue Valley were awarded $3.7 million dollars in Measure 110 funding to create emergency housing for pregnant women and mothers.
The downtown Oasis facility was bought with Measure 110 funding and there were apartments behind the main building. OnTrack helps manage the housing facility.
“The Measure 110 funding for this project is used to support our partnership with OnTrack, pay for the intensive case management, supplies, utilities and those types of things,” said Kirsten Johnsen, the Oasis of the Rogue Valley Executive Director.
The low-barrier housing is crucial for women who are homeless and risk losing their children or already have children in foster care. The women live in the apartments for less than five weeks.
“Most of our housing is for people who are in early recovery, transitioning out of residential treatment,” Wolcott said. “We built this in as a first step because we were losing so many people while they were on the waitlist.”
Wolcott told NewsWatch 12 that in the six months the emergency housing has been available, 26 women have been through the program — with one already clean. Only three women have not been able to follow through to treatment.
Jennifer Beaver, a women’s treatment coordinator for OnTrack Rogue Valley, works side by side with these women who could be unhoused or getting out of a hospital or birthing center.
“It’s crucial that they get in on the first step,” Beaver said. “Because these women have no support, and we just get them in and suit their needs and meet their needs right where they’re at.”
Beaver said one of the women, who has now been through the program, gave birth to her child on the greenway. While her child was in the NICU, she moved into the emergency housing and enrolled in the Oasis parenting program and on a waitlist for treatment. By receiving those resources, she hasn’t lost visitation rights to her child.
“I see (emergency housing) as groundbreaking,” Beaver said. “If this would have been around longer, I think we would have more success rates and less overdoses in all actuality. And that’s my clinical observation.”
