Large homeless shelters in 2 Sacramento neighborhoods delayed. When will they open?
The openings of two large 100-bed homeless shelters in Sacramento have been delayed.
A shelter in Meadowview, originally planned to open over the winter, is now set to open in late June, officials said. A shelter under the W/X freeway near Alhambra Boulevard, originally set to open in late spring, is now set to open in early fall.
The California Department of Transportation, which owns the W/X site, recently gave final approval for the project, in addition to the Federal Highway Administration, said Angela Jones, spokeswoman for the Sacramento Housing and Redevelopment Agency. That approval was slowed down due to the coronavirus, Jones said in an email.
Officials will next select the contractor for construction and the shelter operator.
More than a dozen Oak Park organizations and nonprofits want to be involved in the shelter and have been attending advisory committee meetings, said Councilman Jay Schenirer, who represents the area.
“My main goal is to have the shelter invested in the community and the community invested in the shelter,” Schenirer said.
American Legion High School culinary students and the Sacramento Food Bank and Family Services could provide meals for shelter guests, and the Sacramento Urban League could provide job training, Schenirer said.
Those types of partnerships will not be requirements for the operator, when one is chosen, Schenirer said, but he is hopeful they will come to fruition.
The city plans to order and erect semi-permanent tent-like shelters called Sprung structures at both sites. Guests at both low-barrier shelters will be offered medical and mental health services as well as help finding housing and obtaining state identification cards and other documents often lost during homelessness.
Guests will not be turned away for having drugs or alcohol in their systems and will be allowed to bring their pets, partners and possessions. The goal is to move people from the shelters into permanent housing every four to six months, Mayor Darrell Steinberg has said.
The Meadowview shelter will open on city-owned property near the Pannell Community Center on Meadowview Road. Goodwill and Next Move will be the operators, Jones said. Volunteers of America was the operator for the other large shelters the city previously opened at Capitol Park Hotel downtown and Railroad Drive in north Sacramento.
When the City Council approved the controversial Meadowview shelter in August, it was going to serve women and children, but is now set to only serve only women.
City and county officials approved a plan to open nearly 1,000 beds in motels, trailers and existing shelters for homeless during the coronavirus pandemic. As of Tuesday, the county had placed 333 people into the motel rooms and five into the trailers since April 8. The trailers at Cal Expo are open to homeless people who have contracted the virus and need medical services. The motel rooms are open to those who are age 55 or older, are experiencing symptoms or have pre-existing conditions.
Unlike the covornavirus beds, homeless will not have to meet as many criteria to get a spot in the W/X and Meadowview shelters, but they will still need to be referred by homeless service organizations or police. Some homeless have rejected rooms because they would have to get rid of many of their possessions, which would not be required to be admitted to the new shelters.
Homeless activists have criticized the county for not moving homeless into rooms more quickly and point out that many homeless do not meet criteria to get one. A count conducted in January 2019 estimated there were 5,570 homeless people in the county on any given night, mostly sleeping outdoors and mostly in the city.
