Homing in

As I watched the construction of the county’s new 240-unit Navigation Center, I somewhat naively thought that, with its opening, the majority of our local homeless individuals would voluntarily queue up, waiting to gain entry. As it turns out, though, things aren’t that simple. Many homeless people aren’t willing to abide by the rules and restrictions that come with living in most shelters. For instance, many shelters don’t allow residents to retain all of their personal belongings. Some house many individuals in one room, denying those individuals privacy and personal security. And in many, couples are separated. Rules like these exist for a reason but, understandably, many people opt to remain on the streets rather than put up with them. Fortunately, the county’s Navigation Center dispenses with some of the most common objections, with its lockable, private apartments for individuals and couples. It still takes much convincing to get many of our local homeless people to consider the Navigation Center. But given the many people now residing at the center, efforts by Redwood City’s Outreach Strategy Team and others — who pay weekly visits to each homeless encampment — seem to be working.

The Navigation Center, for all of its good points, is a transitional shelter: Residents can only stay for a limited number of months. While there, residents receive assistance in finding permanent housing. Of course, we don’t have enough available housing units at appropriate levels of affordability to accommodate everyone. Fortunately, Redwood City and San Mateo County have worked diligently to obtain federal, state and private funds to buy or help build a variety of housing options to help satisfy the need.

Project Homekey funds have been instrumental in transforming a handful of hotels throughout the county into permanent supportive housing. For instance, Redwood City’s Comfort Inn became “Casa Esperanza,” a 51-unit affordable apartment building. Similarly, the Marriott TownePlace Suites hotel on Twin Dolphin Drive (in Redwood Shores) is now a lovely 95-unit housing complex for extremely low-income seniors, some of whom experienced, or were at risk of, homelessness.

Of course, there are only so many hotels that can be turned into housing. Fortunately, a couple of highly regarded nonprofits are constructing all-new housing projects in which each of the units are leased at below-market rates. Just a couple of weeks ago, in fact, one of those nonprofits, MidPen Housing, submitted a proposal for yet another of these developments: a 110-unit affordable housing project to be built on a Redwood City-owned site at 1580 Maple St. As planned, each resident would have a 295-square-foot studio apartment containing, in addition to its main living/sleeping space, a generously sized private bathroom and a kitchenette. While the accommodations would be simple, they should be quite comfortable. As well as affordable, MidPen Housing is hoping to lease to those earning 30% or less of the county’s median income.

Redwood City conducts a count of the city’s homeless individuals and their living situations every two years (with the 2021 count having been deferred to 2022 due to the pandemic), and since March 2023 it has counted encampments monthly. Although the numbers fluctuate from one count to the next, this year’s number of homeless individuals is not only down (by 40 individuals since last year), it is below the average of all counts since 2009. As for active encampments, in March we had 34, whereas in October we only had 25. These numbers jibe with what I am seeing while out on my walks: lots of people in the Navigation Center, and fewer occupied encampments. This is good not only for the formerly homeless among us, but also for those who live, work or walk in those areas people were choosing for their temporary home.

Greg Wilson is the creator of Walking Redwood City, a blog inspired by his walks throughout Redwood City and adjacent communities. He can be reached at greg@walkingRedwoodCity.com. Follow Greg on Twitter @walkingRWC.