On March 4^th, we were honored to welcome U.S. Congresswoman Zoe Lofgren to tour our former Sí Se Puede (SSP) Residential Program site, which will soon be replaced with our new state- of- the- art SSP Behavioral Health Center. Our new center will include expanded access to services including substance use disorder residential treatment, outpatient programs, and Medication Addiction Treatment (MAT) for adults and Transition Age Youth (ages 18-24).

Happy Women's History Month from the Inclusion Diversity Equity & Action (IDEA) Team! This month we spoke with several of our hardworking, powerful, and incredible staff members from across our organization and asked them what Women’s History Month means to them, and to also reflect on women in their life who have inspired them along the way. We have so many impressive female-identifying staff working at Encompass, and we are so excited to spotlight a few! At Encompass, we know the power of women, so please join us in celebrating and recognizing the amazing women in our lives- and those who paved the way for us today!

Unfortunately, the opioid crisis in the US continues to persist. According to the US Department of Health & Human Services, over 130 people die every day from opioid-related drug overdoses. The California Department of Health Care Services (DHCS) has implemented a program called the California DHCS Opioid Response (previously known as the California MAT Expansion Project) to increase access to Medication-Assisted Treatment (MAT) services, reduce unmet treatment needs, and reduce opioid overdose-related deaths in California. DHCS’ Opioid Response focuses on 3 goals: saving lives, ensuring access to treatment, and reducing the barriers to care. The program also focuses on populations with limited MAT access, including youth, people in rural areas, and American Indian & Alaska Native tribal communities.

Happy 2024! We are proud to report that Encompass secured federal and state grants and contracts last month to continue many of our safety-net services for the Santa Cruz community. Encompass operates over 40 programs spanning Youth and Family Services, Housing Support Services, Residential Treatment Services, and Adult Outpatient Services.

The Encompass Links2Health program is designed to provide wraparound care to community members who are unhoused or living outside. This comprehensive program provides adults experiencing homelessness with essential life needs and also helps them improve their health outcomes. Made possible by Medi-Cal funding, our program offers both housing navigation and enhanced care management (ECM) services to qualifying Medi-Cal beneficiaries including adults and/or families experiencing homelessness, adults with serious mental illness or substance use disorder, and adult high utilizers of the healthcare system.

It’s time to shine the light on our Sí Se Puede Residential Behavioral Health Center and our amazing staff! Located in the foothills of Watsonville, Sí Se Puede (SSP) is a 23-bed residential facility led by Latinos with lived experience serving Spanish-speaking, male clients for a 30-90 day period, depending on client needs. Licensed by the California State Department of Health Care Services (DHCS) and CARF accredited, SSP is one of the only bilingual and monolingual treatment centers in the nation. The program helps clients recover from substance use disorder (SUD) using evidence-based trauma informed and cognitive behavioral therapies (CBT), Dialectical Behavioral Therapy (DBT), as well as focused individual and group counseling, life-skill building, and mindfulness. Clients are assessed at intake and twice a month during treatment to ensure that they are receiving the care they need. When a client is ready for a lower intensity of care, we work to successfully transition clients to outpatient services. Our hard-working bilingual staff includes highly skilled, trained and certified clinicians, counselors, and peer mentors who strive to meet each individual where they are in their recovery journey, treating each client with dignity and respect.

One of the most important services Encompass provides is Substance Use Disorder (SUD) treatment and counseling. Our qualified and licensed staff help members of our community struggling with drug or alcohol dependencies recover and get their lives back. Encompass’ Alto Counseling Centers located in Santa Cruz and Watsonville provide trauma-informed SUD counseling, supporting clients to identify and achieve their goals of harm reduction, sobriety, medication assisted treatment, legal follow through, mental health linkage, medical needs, and more. They help clients sort out life stressors and determine what part substance use plays in them. Our counselors are trained professionals with knowledge of substance misuse and its impact. They offer in-person or counseling via Telehealth and provide coordination with clients’ medical providers and with their families, when needed. With therapy and support, our Alto team strives to make positive changes in the lives of our clients. 

Every August, the National Association of Community Health Centers (NACHC) sponsors National Health Center Week (NHCW) to celebrate and increase awareness of America’s 1,400 Community Health Centers. National Health Center Week is an opportunity to highlight the commitment and passion of Community Health Center staff, board members, and supporters who make it possible to provide quality healthcare services to more than 30 million patients across 14,500 communities annually.

We are so happy to highlight the important work of our Unsung Heroes at Encompass – the Finance Team! Their dedication and attention to detail keep our operations humming and make sure we are allocating all of our donations, contracts, and grant money effectively. If you have made a mid-year donation to our agency, we sincerely appreciate your generosity. As a non-profit, we depend on your donations, as well as government and private grants to continue to serve our Santa Cruz community. 

We are proud to report that Encompass formed a Racial Equity Workgroup earlier this year. Our Racial Equity Workgroup (REWG) is a staff-led effort dedicated to cultivating an organizational culture that promotes equitable pay, hiring practices, and thresholds for growth within the agency. We recognize that diversity at all levels of our organization is not only an asset to our agency, but also to the communities we serve. Our REWG is another example of our Encompass values in practice: resiliency, equity, kindness, and compassion.

As we celebrate Juneteenth this month, we would like to shine the spotlight on our Racial Equity Workgroup staff members and the goals and plans for the group in 2023 and beyond. Special thanks for their commitment to our community and a more diverse, inclusive work environment.