This summer marked the official launch of Project Open Hand's new mobile program, a "pop-up shop" vehicle that ventures into some of the most vulnerable neighborhoods in San Francisco to provide clients access to services right in their own communities. Be on the lookout for two new vehicles on the road; outfitted to provide all of the services provided at Project Open Hand's headquarters.
Project Open Hand's mobile services outside of Southeast Health Center in the Bayview neighborhood.
Q&A WITH WELLNESS PROGRAM MANAGER, SERENA NGO
Q: WHY ARE YOU HERE AT SOUTHEAST HEALTH CENTER?
A: Today is our first day co-locating with Southeast Health Center. They are a partner organization of ours and they refer clients to us, so we are setting up our mobile services here. We realize if you are very sick, and you live this far from our Tenderloin location, it’s probably difficult for you to pick up our services. We are anticipating around 15-20 clients, and the clients seemed to be really excited when we called them, so we’re hoping this will be a big benefit to the residents here. We are looking at geography when we determine where to go. We did a mini survey of our clients and some of the barriers that kept popping up was geography and transportation. Southeast Health Center is one of the furthest clinics away from us, so that was one of the reasons we wanted to be out here. We also know there is a lot of health disparities in this community, so if we could be out here to just help support all of the great work that’s already being done, it just makes sense.
Q: ANY PREDICTIONS YOU CAN MAKE AFTER THE IMPLEMENTATION OF THIS PROGRAM?
A: As residents of the Bayview get referred to us, we work with them, but we want to do much more to connect with this community. So, Bayview, Hunter’s Point, the Mission, these are all communities that we’re looking to better engage, better work with, and just serve as many sick people as we can.
Q: IDEALLY, HOW MANY PLACES WOULD THIS VEHICLE BE THROUGHOUT THE CITY ON A WEEKLY BASIS?
A: As the demand grows, we could be here maybe twice a week to support all of the clients that want our services in a mobile setting. If we were in a community that works with more marginally housed or homeless clients, we will most likely want to be out there daily because we’ll be bringing hot meals. If they don’t have a place to store their food, we’ll bring hot meals and we’ve got a no-cook grocery bag. The no-cook grocery bag consists of non-perishable items that don't require a lot of preparation. So the frequency of this work really depends on the community and the needs of the client we’re working with.
Q: WHAT ARE YOU MOST EXCITED ABOUT?
A: It’s a new way of thinking. We’ve been serving clients out of our brick and mortar location and while we've always delivered to our home-bound clients, many of our clients have been coming to us for so long. Now, we are just meeting the clients where they are at, in their community. I’m excited to see what this could become, and to increase engagement with other areas of San Francisco that we don’t often connect with.
