MCHD provides incentives for clients. These include personal hygiene items such as socks, deodorant and razors. Coffee, juice and candy are also given out when the van is parked. MCHD has been very successful in recruiting volunteers directly from the client base. These volunteers have been extremely effective in getting the word of the exchange out to IDUs and providing knowledgeable, respectful services at the exchange sites.
Volunteers receive vouchers to a local supermarket as incentives.
An added benefit has been that volunteers use this opportunity as motivation to get clean and stay in recovery. It has become an effective way for many of these individuals to begin to prepare for work in more traditional settings. Eighty percent of the individuals spoke English as their native language and 17 percent were Spanish speaking. Seventy percent of the clients were male. Over 40,000 clean syringes were distributed and close to that number were collected and destroyed.