Montgomery County TESS Team
The bilingual team (Spanish and Amharic speaking) at the Takoma East Silver Spring (TESS) Community Action Center continues to play a vital role in delivering critical services during the pandemic. After the COVID-19 shut-down order, the team quickly mobilized to serve the community virtually, losing only one day of service in the transition. MCAP 2G Pilot funding from Maryland's Department of Human Services, originally intended to initiate coaching, was redirected to add staffing hours at TESS. Working remotely, TESS staff enroll people in SNAP, Medicaid, emergency housing assistance,address legal needs, and connect people to food and nutrition programs. Staff also are supporting families who have been quarantining, are hospitalized, or who have passed away due to the pandemic.
Food assistance providers, many of whom are Community Action partners with contracts administered through the agency, in the last week alone, distributed 234,265 pounds of food and 8,397 prepared meals to over 15,500 community members, with staff, partners and volunteers providing language assistance in Amharic, French/French-Creole, Chinese, Korean, Spanish, and Vietnamese.
TESS and other agency staff remain at the forefront of the County's Department of Health and Human Services' response and recovery planning, working on food and shelter teams, the COVID public health phone line, expediting info and referral resources to partners, and distributing the County's Emergency Assistance Response funding. Staff are engaged in designing a new model to support wraparound services for impacted residents. The agency's VITA program is restarting with a virtual model to remotely provide free tax assistance to residents who had appointments cancelled. The Community Action Board and Head Start Parents Policy continue to meet virtually, maintaining quorum to support decision making and advocacy.
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