...Title
Compassionate San Jose - Bold Housing Solutions. (Mayor, Peralez, Jimenez, Foley, Mahan)
...Recommendations
1. To meet the goal of the Community Plan to End Homelessness to double shelter capacity to by 2025, have 1,000 pandemic-era emergency interim housing community (EIHC) units and 300 Homekey motel units under construction or completed by December 2022-including those recently completed-to accelerate our response to our homelessness crisis. This work should include the following tasks necessary to achieve rapid acceleration of our efforts:
a. Identify the requisite amount of Homekey, ARPA, HHAP, or other eligible public funding for an additional six EIHCs in every Council District not currently hosting an EIHC or Bridge Housing Community (BHC), and work with the Mayor’s Office to identify additional philanthropic support;
1) A single slate of six sites shall be approved at a single Council meeting, no later than June 2022, in a single “up or down” vote on the entire slate. Sites that are ready before June 2022 can be voted on and approved by Council at an earlier date.
2) Site selection will occur collaboratively with the participation of every councilmember and the community, but ultimate decision-making will remain the domain of the entire Council.
3) Any alternative sites suggested by any councilmember must be deemed feasible for near-term housing development by the City Manager prior to qualifying for Council consideration.
4) At least one location shall provide homes for unhoused individuals in employment or training programs, such as SJ Bridge and the Conservation Corps, and at least one location shall provide a home for women and children who have endured domestic violence, with appropriate discretion. Resolve all legal and regulatory issues to enable this.
b. Discuss with the County of Santa Clara their willingness to begin to provide basic mental health and addiction treatment services for EIHCs for a specified duration, so that one-time City resources can be better focused on expanding our inventory of units;
c. Densify existing sites with the space and non-profit capacity to accommodate additional tenants, such as the existing EIHC at Rue Ferrari, prioritizing unhoused residents in the immediate vicinity;
d. Make any modifications to City building code necessary to safely enable multi-story EIHC development;
e. Resolve all legal and regulatory issues to enable the City to prioritize EIHCs for unhoused residents in the immediate neighborhoods to ensure that local neighborhoods directly benefit from the presence of EIHCs;
f. Direct Public Works and Housing staff to work with Caltrans staff, Mayor’s Office staff, and philanthropic partners such as Sand Hill Properties, in our joint exploration of creative use of Caltrans-owned land around and under freeway intersections and exits for construction of safe, dignified housing on low-cost land prioritizing districts who have not identified a site;
g. Improve the financial sustainability of EIHC and BHC operational budgets by identifying opportunities for (a) cost efficiencies, (b) partnering with the Santa Clara County Housing Authority to explore program alignment for funding to offset the annual operational cost of these communities, (c) employing work-ready EIHC residents to perform tasks otherwise paid for through contracted companies, such as security, maintenance, shuttle driving, and management;
h. Explore funding opportunities, including any savings identified in the above work on cost efficiencies in the operations budget, for an “enhanced services” program for the surrounding neighborhoods who host EIHCs and BHCs, as outlined in Councilmember Jimenez’s 2020 memo that was previously approved by Council;
i. Work with Comcast and other telecommunication partners to include access to internet connectivity on the sites, leveraging the efforts and resources of the Mayor’s Office of Technology and Information (MOTI);
j. Explore incentives for private land owners with underutilized surface parking lots willing to host an EIHC, which may include negotiated ground lease revenue, waived fees on the development of the EIHC, or waived parking requirements on their future redevelopment project.
2. In response to the Biden Administration’s plea for leading cities to identify clear goals for addressing homelessness by December 2022 of (a) “the number of people experiencing homelessness to be placed into stable housing,” and (b) “the number of new units of …housing serving people experiencing homelessness to be added to the development pipeline,” by 2022, report the following specific goals for the next 16 months:
a. Rehousing: Housing 1,500 San Jose residents by December 31, 2022
This goal reflects the funding capacity we have estimated for housing individuals with the assistance of San Jose Emergency Housing Vouchers (369), anticipated County Emergency Housing Vouchers allocated for San Jose residents (455), Rapid-Rehousing slots (300), and units of completed PSH housing (200), and if HUD allows consideration of new completed EIHC housing (300+).
b. Homeless-Serving New Units: Providing a total of 2,300 new permanent and transitional units serving homeless individuals that will be under development or construction by December 31, 2022.
This goal reflects the approximately 1,384 units we believe can emerge from new permanent supportive projects funded by the City and County, 239 units from two hotels for which we are submitting Project Homekey applications, and 683 units from EIHCs that will be in the pipeline.
3. Continue to partner with Councilmember Jimenez to temporarily locate a “safe parking” RV site at or near the future police training facility in his district. Determine how a registry or other mechanism could help ensure that the facility will provide primary priority to serve Council District 2 residents, rather than merely attracting RVs from other communities unwilling to serve RV residents in their area.
4. To facilitate the identification and implementation of drug treatment options, explore with the County of Santa Clara the creation of a detention facility for individuals arrested for minor criminal offenses-such as disturbing the police, simple assault, public indecency, or vandalism-where the person:
a. is under the influence of methamphetamine or another stimulant or psychoactive substance at the time of their arrest;
b. poses a safety or crime risk that makes the person inappropriate for voluntary detention in the County’s Mission Street Recovery Center/ Sobering Center;
c. is kept a sufficient duration to enable the individual to become free of the influence of the substance prior to release, within the duration proscribed by the courts and the Due Process Clause; and
d. is provided information about treatment options.
Potential sites for such a facility might include either of the existing jails or Mission Street Recovery Center/ Sobering Center, among others.
5. Direct City Staff to outreach to County staff to coordinate on joint efforts to:
a. provide drug treatment, mental health, and related services at EIHCs, described supra;
b. identify and lease sites under County control for future development of EIHCs;
c. create a drug detention facility, as described supra