HAGÅTÑA (The Guam Daily Post) — In two weeks, the Guam Behavioral Health and Wellness Center’s Manggaige Ham Crisis Counseling Program will be hitting the streets going door-to-door.
“We are going to start with Dededo. They have selected Astumbo to be the first place in Dededo to start. Our team has already connected with Mayor Melissa Savares on this, so she is aware. She has given her phone number to provide that support in case our staff need it,” Carissa Pangelinan said during the Interagency Council for Coordinating Homelessness Programs and Office of Homelessness Assistance and Poverty Prevention monthly meeting.
Pangelinan spoke with the project director and shared her experiences in canvassing the Dededo area.
“I was giving some safety tips and kind of just making sure that we are out there in numbers, and nobody is alone on the streets,” she said. “So we are getting ready to do that and all the training is done.”
Although the Manggaige Ham team has not begun canvassing, Pangelinan shared what she believes they could come across with regard to homelessness.
“We might encounter families who are living with other families. So they might have been displaced by the typhoon, never came to the shelters and may not be receiving services from us,” Pangelinan said.
The hope is that the canvassing effort will help identify families experiencing homelessness and get them the help and access to long-term services they need. The canvassing effort will deploy part-time stipend-paid workers under a federal grant.
“They will knock on doors, introduce themselves. They are really doing a quick screening and check-in,” Pangelinan said.
Pangelinan clarified that the workers are not licensed counselors and will not be providing counseling, but they have been trained to identify certain red flags.
“They are trained to kind of pick up on certain identifiers, so if they recognize certain symptoms and signs they will be providing resources to them … brochures with information of available services … not just Guam Behavioral Health,” she said.
Pangelinan said the door-to-door effort aims to reach individuals who may not have access to mediums like social media and share with them the services that are available.
“We are trying to just do a massive outreach to everybody,” she said.
This will be Manggaige Ham’s first time canvassing villages throughout the island.
“We will officially begin the RSP part of this program, which is the regular services program, on the 26th of this month, which gives us nine months,” Pangelinan said.
Canvassing efforts will begin in two weeks to find families still affected by Typhoon Mawar and get them the support services they need.
