GET TO KNOW TAMERA KOHLER

Tamera Kohler, CEO of the Regional Task Force on the Homeless, considers San Diego’s challenges and somehow remains optimistic.

She joined the Regional Task Force on the Homeless in 2017 as chief operations officer before becoming CEO in 2018.The task force is a nonprofit organization that coordinates funding, policy and strategy to help the homeless population in San Diego County.

Kohler is this week’s guest on the Name Drop San Diego podcast. Read excerpts of her interview here or listen to the full episode in your favorite listening app.

On what drew her to this kind of work:

So when I went to work for the state of Utah, to really work on a database around tracking homelessness, there was a part of me that was like, oh, this is amazing, let’s do all this stuff with the data and there wasn’t a good way to put it into action. So the data side, the performance side, led me to more leadership opportunities too, and I’m that person in the room that can’t sit on their hand and not raise your hand and say, I’ll do that. So I’m incredibly passionate about this work. Because I firmly believe it’s an achievable outcome. We can end homelessness. It’s a solvable problem. And then

behind that, is the fact that I like data, but I like that it’s about people. So I have a very person-centered approach due to my own background, but also I just, I’m driven and focused on doing good work in our communities, whatever that may be . ... People absolutely want to be housed. I have no one I’ve ever met that said they wanted to be homeless. What they needed is the right level of support and opportunities to end that, you know, housing instability problem.

On the conditions on the streets of San Diego:

So the streets of San Diego, I think, are a challenging space right now. We know that, during the pandemic, the shift around homelessness was not only just to shelter and provide housing to the best of our ability, but it really was a protective measure . ... And so the importance of having adequate shelter that was safe and appropriate, is really the underpinning of the work around the convention center as a large multi-shelter operation. That work has ramped down. None of those individuals were returned to the street, but to other shelter options or to housing . ... But anybody who is Downtown — and I happen to live Downtown — sees we still have a homeless problem, we have individuals who are still sleeping on our streets, we’re seeing a little bit more in the tent structures Downtown. And that’s something that we need to make sure that we’re engaging more intentionally some of this population . ... So I would say San Diego as a whole for Downtown has a plan that we’re engaging those individuals. But as the city comes back to life, more tourists, you know, more events and more opportunities, it may look like the homeless population is changing. It’s just we’ve got more and more general population out there. But the work at hand is really addressing those who are in tents, that need to be connected to more appropriate sheltering resources. We need a couple more options around shelter. And you’ve seen that in the mayor’s budget. So we’re not as bad as we have been in previous years. But we don’t want to go that direction again, either. So good coordination and good effort to try and stem what we’re seeing in a positive way.