Mercury News: San Jose moves toward converting some hotels, motels for transitional housing
By: Leeta-Rose Ballester
A city initiative to transform some San Jose hotels into transitional housing for the homeless is picking up steam–from residents, politicians and hotel owners ready for change.
Hotels and motels on Monterey Highway, N. First Street, N. Thirteenth Street and The Alameda are among the first where city leaders hope to renovate existing rooms into temporary homes.
San Jose resident Timm Thompson said he spent years living in and out of hotels and, from 1995 to 1999, shared a hotel room with his two young sons. They sometimes stayed at Motel 6, but he came to prefer Super 8.
“It actually worked because they had a little section for the families,” he remembered. “There were a few families together. They had us segregated. On the back side of the hotel was the rugged side,” where drugs and prostitution were prevalent.
“I could barely afford it,” said Thompson, adding that saving for first month’s rent and a deposit was difficult as a single parent. “It was really tough, and that was 14 years ago. Now it’s horrid to try to come up with that money.”
The environment around hotels outside the downtown has gotten rougher over the years, he said, so much so that he didn’t like to go out of the room he had rented.
Either police would stop him and ask him questions about activity at the hotel, Thompson said, or people would proposition or solicit him. He said he watched as out-of-towners would leave before their reservation was up.
The planning commission’s plan would allow nonprofits to obtain permits for multi-year leases of underutilized hotel rooms that could be used as transitional housing.
Currently, code allows for people to rent a hotel room for no longer than 30 days at a time. The new initiative, approved unanimously at an Aug. 5 city council meeting, would allow for a Hotel Supportive Housing modification, though it would need to be “minor use” so the commercial zoning would be maintained.
There are droves of people settled around creek beds, the most infamous being “The Jungle” located near Happy Hollow, and along railroads, Thompson said.
“There’s homeless everywhere,” he said. “If they had a place for families, it would be wonderful.”
The unsheltered homeless population grew from 3,057 individuals to 3,660 between 2011 and 2013, according to the 2013 City of San Jose Homeless Census.
Leslye Corsiglia, director of housing, said that bids from nonprofits that could oversee the program must be brought to the city by Sept. 4, but it would take several months for it to be implemented.
District 3 Councilman Sam Liccardo, who started brainstorming the idea with hotel and motel owners in 2012, said he sees the initiative as a “win-win.”
“It’s an opportunity to supplant the incentive of motel owners to rent rooms to pimps with an incentive to house the homeless,” he said. “We can displace criminal activity, and help homeless get off the street and out of the creeks.”
Sandy Perry, a Willow Glen resident and homeless outreach minister, said, “For every person who can be housed, it’s a great victory.
“It’s a shame that we in Silicon Valley can’t do better than this,” he added. “It’s shocking. We’re supposed to be the center of innovation, and keeping a roof over someone’s head escapes us.”
Though Liccardo admits that the plan will not completely end homelessness, he believes that it is a step in the right direction to helping those who seek shelter.
“The cost of ending homelessness in our valley runs in the hundreds of millions of dollars, and we simply lack the resources to do the job,” Liccardo said in a press release. “The cost of doing nothing, however, is far greater, in both human and financial terms.”
Thompson, who struggled to pay for shelter in hotels, said he doesn’t think people should be given a “free ride,” but instead believes people should be involved in payback programs.
“They give money away but don’t have a way to help people grow,” he said.
The Planning Commission’s recommendation can be read in its entirety at sanjoseca.gov/DocumentCenter/View/31806.
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