Outreach Services

NEOCH coordinates outreach workers from a variety of service providers. Our outreach collaborative helps us get a sense for the issues and problems affecting the homeless on the streets. We are also able to provide critical donation items to the homeless through the collaborative.

Need Help?

Call NEOCH before calling law enforcement if you need help with a person experiencing homelessness by calling 216-432-0540. NEOCH can assist if you have issues with homeless people in Cuyahoga County.  If you worry that a homeless person is in your neighborhood and in danger because of the heat, the cold or just for their own safety that they may need help.  Feel free to call NEOCH and we can send professional staff out to check in with the individual.  We have contact with the Mental Health Services PATH and OPP staff, Care Alliance health care outreach, Volunteers of America, the Veterans Administration, the Salvation Army and Lutheran Metro Ministry 2100 Lakeside staff.

This is an alternative to calling law enforcement.  We can typically respond within 24 hours, and we can work with the individual to provide shelter, health care, food, blankets, or transportation to a safe place.  Please feel free to call if you have a concern over homelessness downtown, on the near West Side or in your neighborhood.  We regularly help people who are staying in foreclosed and abandoned property or sleeping in cars.

Outreach and Donations

During the winter months, we collect blankets and other donations which we distribute on the streets of Cleveland.   Here are the items that we collect. We give these items to the Outreach Workers who are very familiar with the needs of each homeless individual. In the winter of 2015, we joined with Metanoia, St. Paul's Church and Care Alliance to purchase hard to find items for the winter.  We have distributed blankets and scarfs and hats for years.  This year we purchased items that we do not typically receive through donations such as boots, gloves, hoodies and long underwear.  We packed all of these on the military grade backpacks and distributed them throughout the winter.  We also assisted people with housing during the extreme weather.

Testimonials on the Importance of Outreach

In 2014, NEOCH expanded our outreach efforts with the support of Community West Foundation.  We added an outreach trainee position in the hopes of bringing together the volunteers, religious groups and students who go out and serve the population along with the "professional" outreach teams from the various agencies.  Our goal is to maintain the number of outreach teams and demonstrate the importance of these teams to the community.  To that end we have produced the following videos to show the importance of outreach services for Greater Cleveland.

Testimonials by Outreach workers: