Expanding Safety, Cleanliness, and Health in Salem

At our October 13th City Council meeting, we approved a budget to expand services in three key areas that directly reflect our community’s top priorities: safety, cleanliness, and health.

These improvements matter because they respond to what we’ve been hearing from residents throughout the year — and what our recent Community Satisfaction Survey confirmed — that public safety and the impacts of homelessness remain the most pressing issues in Salem.

Here’s what the expanded pilot program includes:

• Safe: Adding two new officers to the Homeless Services Team (HST), allowing the team to provide support and outreach seven days a week instead of four.

  
  

• Clean: Expanding Salem Outreach and Livability (SOS) Team cleaning services from four to seven days a week, helping address encampments, support clean-up requests, and connect people to resources.

  
  

• Healthy: Launching a new Community Health co-response program in partnership with Marion County, where a paramedic, EMT, and mental health clinician will respond together to behavioral health and substance use crises.

These changes are part of a long-term effort to make Salem a safe, clean, and healthy city for everyone — and they’re already taking shape. The SOS team’s expanded schedule is in place, and the new co-response model is set to begin in January.

I’m also grateful to our local business community, including the Salem Main Street Association and Salem Area Chamber of Commerce, for contributing funds to help make these improvements possible. This collaboration between the city, county, and community partners shows what’s possible when we work together to meet Salem’s most urgent needs.