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Congressman Harder Co-Sponsors Bill To Tackle Homelessness In Central Valley

MODESTO (CBS13) — California is now home to one-quarter of the nation's total homeless population.

Cities in the San Joaquin Valley are ground zero for this growing group of people.

Wednesday morning, Congressman Josh Harder visited a homeless encampment in Modesto to tell CBS13 about a new bill he co-sponsored to address the "root causes" of the crisis.

Tamran Provance has lived in a homeless encampment underneath the 9th Street Bridge in Modesto since February.

"Before we got here all the doors were closing, closing, closing," she said.

A year ago, she said she had a job and a home in a neighborhood for her husband and two daughters to live, but suddenly lost it all.

"We had roommates and it became unsafe for our children so we had to move out of there," she said.

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Provance joined nearly 300 people in an encampment jointly-operated by the city of Modesto and Stanislaus County in order to get the services her family needed.

"Right now I'm volunteering with the Downtown Street Team in Modesto in the morning and in the afternoon I volunteer with Turning Point," which she said is among the organizations providing much-needed services to people living in the donated tents.

The encampment is now overflowing, which is why freshman Democratic Congressman Josh Harder told CBS13 he and his colleagues in Washington D.C. recently introduced a bill to tackle homelessness at the local level.

"We should not have a waiting list for homeless people who want to get mental health and substance abuse services and that's what we have already in Modesto," Harder said.

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Harder said the Fighting Homelessness through Services and Housing Act would give $750 million in grants to local governments each year for the next five years to address the "root causes" of homelessness.

"I think cities know their problem the best," explained Harder. "The homelessness problem in San Francisco is very different than the homelessness problem in Modesto. Both are growing but need different approaches to what works."

Harder outlined how the new potential funding would benefit Modesto.

"Right now in Modesto we're trying to get a 180-bed shelter over at the Salvation Army, but we have over 180 people here at the homeless encampment, so we know there needs to be more emergency housing," he said.

He said the funding would also go toward mental health counseling, substance abuse treatment, and job assistance.

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"I think that's awesome because I put applications out all the time and a lot of the jobs are in another county. Not all of us have a vehicle for transportation," Provance said.

Provance believes the funding would help, but said she'd also like to see more help with family services and medical care.

"A lot of people think homelessness is just about mental health and drug abuse, but it's also about job loss and divided families. There's a big group of people they're missing," she said. "I think they should also maybe get some sort of medical team down here because there's a lot of people here that haven't been able to get to a doctor, that are missing a limb and have lost mobility," Provance said.

The bill would also require a 25% match from non-federal funds to cover other services for the homeless population.

Harder said the bill has bipartisan support in both the house and senate.

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