The Police Department has now hired eight of the nine community outreach workers, approved by the City Council this summer as part of this year’s budget, to help connect homeless people to services and to help keep a lid on minor street crime associated with transients. Three of the nine will wear powder-blue polo shirts and khaki cargo pants; their function will be to connect with as many people on the streets as possible and direct them to the appropriate nonprofit or government agency. The rest will wear yellow polo shirts bearing the insignia “Community Service Liaison,” and their job will be to discourage aggressive panhandling, public intoxication, and other forms of misbehavior. The department has also assigned one more officer to what’s known as the restorative policing detail, bringing the total to two.
