PHILADELPHIA – Today, City officials convened in Kensington to provide Mayor Kenney an update on the progress of the Philadelphia Resilience Project, the City of Philadelphia’s emergency response to combat the opioid epidemic.
For the last six weeks, representatives of more than 30 City departments, offices, and agencies convened at an Emergency Operations Center to carry out the directives outlined in Mayor Kenney’s Opioid Emergency Response Executive Order 3-18.
Over 100 immediate-, short- and long-term goals were established to address the following seven priority mission areas:
- Clearing major encampments.
- Reducing criminal activity.
- Reducing the unsheltered population.
- Reducing trash and litter.
- Reducing overdoses.
- Increasing treatment options.
- Mobilizing community response.
Immediate goals had a target date of today, November 16, and mission area leads reported that the majority of the goals are complete. These include, but are not limited to:
- Clear Frankford Avenue encampment by November 15
- Begin outreach to clear Emerald Street Encampment by January 15
- Increase safety measures for children using foot and bike patrols, and daily school checks
- Strengthen existing Safe Corridor routes for travel to and from school
- Implement Police Assisted Diversion program in East Police Division
- Conduct large-scale clean up along Kensington Ave
- Place disposal containers at McPherson Square and targeted SEPTA stations
- Recruit volunteers with lived experience to assist with regular cleaning
- Use bicycles for mobile collection of discarded syringes
- Prevent transmission of HIV and Hepatitis by screening, vaccinating, and linking to medical care
- Deploy mobile outreach team including medical professionals to provide Medication-Assisted Treatment (MAT)
- Create a community calendar to encourage neighborhood engagement by highlighting programming across all mission areas
- Create a Philly311 unit for specialized information and assignments in the Kensington/Fairhill area
“We set out to accomplish some very ambitious goals in the first 30 days of the Philadelphia Resilience Project and I’m very pleased with the progress that has been made so far,” said Mayor Jim Kenney. “We know that we aren’t going to fix the opioid crisis overnight, but the successful completion of most of our immediate goals shows that this new approach is working and setting us up for long term success.”
A full update on all immediate goals is available HERE.