In this Bulletin file photo, homeless residents camping along Hunnell Road in Bend in November 2021.

A new regional office to address homelessness in Central Oregon named its first director, Cheyenne Purrington, on Thursday. The Coordinated Houseless Response Office is a joint effort from local city governments and Deschutes County to collaborate in responding to homelessness in Central Oregon.

“We have a unique opportunity to move our response efforts in the right direction and end the trauma of houselessness for our most vulnerable neighbors,” Purrington said in a news release. “Houselessness is a complex topic, but its solutions are quite simple. We know what works, and that’s what we’re going to do.”

Purrington was formerly the executive director at the Tahoe Coalition for the Homeless and a consultant in the San Francisco Bay Area. She has over two decades of experience addressing solutions to homelessness. 

“I look forward to having someone with Cheyenne’s experience provide important leadership as we work to find solutions on homelessness,” said Redmond Mayor George Endicott, a governing board member of the collaborative office.

The collaborative office includes a governing board of directors with a representative from the Deschutes County Commission, Patti Adair, and from the city councils of Bend, Redmond, Sisters and La Pine. 

Funding to create the collaborative office came from House Bill 4123, which allocated $1 million over two years to Deschutes County and the cities of Bend, Redmond, Sisters and La Pine to strengthen their responses to homelessness.