REDWOOD CITY — When native metropolis, county and nonprofit leaders turned over their symbolic first shovelfuls of grime in a vacant lot on a current sunny morning, they weren’t simply kicking off building of a brand new homeless shelter. They have been taking a step towards an formidable purpose — ending homelessness in San Mateo County within the subsequent eight months.
Homelessness has pervaded the Bay Space for years, presenting an epic humanitarian disaster that has confirmed extremely troublesome to resolve, and which has turn into much more seen through the COVID-19 pandemic. However in San Mateo County, officers say the tip is in sight.
It stays to be seen whether or not the Peninsula county can turn into the primary within the Bay Space to efficiently eradicate homelessness. Officers and consultants acknowledge it’s a stretch purpose, and that they want extra inexpensive housing and different sources to fulfill it. However they are saying the county already is making substantial progress.
A number of components are working in San Mateo County’s favor. Whereas the county has a smaller homeless inhabitants than different Bay Space counties to start with, it’s been racking up outsized homeless housing grants from the state.
“It’s all this stuff coming collectively. It’s the desire and it’s pondering broadly and out of the field and actually making an attempt to do one thing that everybody’s been making an attempt to do,” mentioned County Govt Officer Mike Callagy. “However we imagine that we are able to do it right here.”
Santa Clara County final yr pledged to finish homelessness for households with youngsters by 2025, and San Jose has constructed modular flats to function transitional housing. Oakland has opened a number of tiny residence villages for homeless residents, whereas Alameda County focuses on transferring folks out of non permanent accommodations and into sponsored housing. However no different Bay Space county has boasted it’s near primarily eliminating homelessness.
San Mateo County’s purpose is to achieve “purposeful zero” by the tip of this yr, that means each homeless one who desires to return inside would have entry to both a shelter mattress, non permanent housing or a everlasting residence.
There have been greater than 1,500 unhoused folks dwelling in San Mateo County as of the final depend — about 900 on the road, and roughly 600 in shelters. In Santa Clara County, the final depend topped 9,700, and in Alameda County, it was greater than 8,000.
“The scope is quite a bit smaller,” mentioned Aubrey Merriman, CEO of LifeMoves, which gives shelter and companies for homeless residents within the Bay Space. “So I believe the end line is one thing that's seen in San Mateo County.”
And the county has acquired a disproportionate quantity of state funding. Early within the pandemic, when Gov. Gavin Newsom started doling out “Homekey” cash for homeless housing, San Mateo County scored practically $34 million. That’s about $22,000 per unhoused resident — greater than double what every other Bay Space county acquired per capita. Precedence was given to early candidates, in line with state Homekey paperwork, and to tasks that met sure standards for racial fairness, neighborhood engagement, website choice and extra.
When Newsom launched a second spherical of Homekey, San Mateo County was the first within the Bay Space to win a grant. The governor’s workplace nonetheless is doling out funds, however up to now, San Mateo County has acquired practically $85 million. The area’s subsequent greatest winner — Alameda County — has received $43 million.
San Mateo County has bought 4 accommodations with that cash, and acquired a fifth with federal CARES Act funds. It additionally funded a 240-unit shelter and useful resource middle in Redwood Metropolis, which broke floor this month and is ready to open by December.
In all, the county is greater than doubling the variety of shelter beds it had previous to the pandemic.
On the day the Redwood Metropolis shelter and useful resource middle broke floor, small encampments have been scattered alongside close by Seaport Boulevard. Individuals at one camp laughed when requested in regards to the county’s plan to finish homelessness.
Joseph, who declined to present his final title, has been homeless for about 4 years and received’t go to an emergency shelter as a result of he refuses to go away his cats. (Redwood Metropolis’s new shelter and useful resource middle will permit pets, however many Bay Space shelters don’t.) Earlier this yr, a LifeMoves social employee put Joseph on a waitlist for inexpensive housing, he mentioned. However he hasn’t heard from that social employee in additional than a month.
Union Pacific Railroad employees lately bulldozed his camp, Joseph mentioned. Considered one of his cats escaped within the sweep, and he nonetheless hasn’t discovered her.
“All they do is just about kick everyone out,” Joseph mentioned, “after which everyone strikes to a different spot.”
Ending homelessness by the tip of the yr “is an aspirational purpose to make sure,” mentioned Laura Bent, chief working officer of Samaritan Home, which runs shelter applications in San Mateo County. However she’s already seeing optimistic modifications. Throughout the pandemic, there have been usually about 50 folks ready for a shelter mattress. Now, they often can place somebody inside 48 hours.
And San Mateo County — like many within the Bay Space — is transferring away from conventional dorm-style shelters the place folks sleep collectively in massive rooms. The Redwood Metropolis shelter, fabricated from pre-fab, modular models, provides people and couples their very own rooms. So do the transformed accommodations.
Individuals recuperate from homelessness extra rapidly in a non-public room, Bent mentioned. Within the first yr it’s been open, 42% of residents within the transformed Pacific Inn in Redwood Metropolis have discovered everlasting housing, she mentioned. In dorm-style shelters, that quantity is often nearer to twenty%.
The county has put up a “very appreciable effort,” mentioned Jennifer Wolch, a UC Berkeley professor of metropolis planning who makes a speciality of homelessness. However she suspects the most important impediment might be discovering or constructing sufficient everlasting inexpensive housing for everybody within the new shelters. And as soon as persons are housed, they want an revenue that can permit them to maintain their housing. Hire for a median one-bedroom residence in San Mateo County is greater than $2,600 a month, in line with rental database Zumper.
“These are issues which are much less thrilling than 5 new Homekey tasks and a shiny new navigation middle — which I’m all for,” Wolch mentioned, “however these different kinds of elements to the housing disaster additionally must be a part of the recipe, or the Rx, if you'll.”