This post first appeared in the Nov. 2 Morning Report. Get the daily newsletter in your inbox for free here.
The city recently learned it will receive $2.5 million in state Encampment Resolution Funds to try to house 50 people now staying near the East Village post office.
Dozens of people have been setting up camp in the blocks surrounding the post office and the old Central Library. The city has now received state funds to try to help move some of them off the street.
Dave Rolland, a spokesman for Mayor Todd Gloria, wrote in an email that the city plans to focus on placing the now-unsheltered residents – most of whom are seniors and Black San Diegans – into supportive housing and where necessary, shorter-term bridge housing including nursing and independent living facilities.
Rolland wrote that the city plans to use hotel rooms as temporary landing spots for participants identified as candidates for permanent supportive housing to help them transition off the street as they await their new homes.
Rolland said the timeline for the project is contingent on when the city receives the state funds. For now, he said, city-funded outreach workers are engaging with homeless residents in the area and working to help them prepare for housing.
This skirts around the larger issue of making sure the homeless, often violent, are away enough from residents and the public in major areas. Move them to parking lots and less vital areas immediately.
Isn’t it “wonderful” the way this city wastes money on attempting to “house” those who WORK SO HARD AT MAINTAINING BEING HOMELESS? I have yet to see a homeless person with a gun at their head, or a knife at their throat forcing their homelessness on them! Maybe if they had the INTELLIGENCE to get mental health treatment, stop using illicit substances (and alcohol as well!), and figure out WHY they GOT THEMSELVES TO WHERE THEY ARE, then this issue could end.
This is so lacking in empathy and humanity, and so full of judgement and callousness it was not hard to “Stop. When you see something, say something.”
If you cannot help , then, at the very least – be kind.
..
$2.5 million for 50 people not counting any other programs. If you add city, state, county, and federal money, we are spending several hundred thousand dollars per “homeless” person each year as a baseline. This doesn’t count the damage they do to property, the increased emergency service costs and cleanup costs, the burden on every citizen, etc.
In CA, annual cost of detaining one person for a year is $100k. Put them where they belong—jail.