For nearly 17 years, Carol Rogers struggled with homelessness, stretching from her time in New York to now in San Jose.
But last month, that all changed when she landed a spot at the newly opened 6.3-acre safe parking site at 1300 Berryessa Road, marking a new beginning for the 57-year-old. At last, she could find a permanent home and turn the page on her past.
“I just feel so privileged to be here because (it is) one step closer to my goal to get housing,” Rogers said. “This is the first place that had done anything to help me to get into housing (and) now that I had the encouragement and support from the community, the people who work here, the mayor’s office (and) everybody (else), I’m going to reach that goal. Next time you see me, I’m going to be in my own apartment.”
The Berryessa safe parking location is one of many interim or supportive housing sites San Jose has opened or is building over the next year in its quest to make meaningful progress in stemming the homelessness crisis.
While officials estimate that San Jose has an unsheltered homeless population of around 5,500, the city will add more than 1,000 spaces in the form of safe parking and safe sleeping sites, tiny homes and hotel and motel conversions this year alone.
Oversized and lived-in vehicles also have presented a public safety and health challenge, with an inventory completed by the city estimating at least 2,400 vehicles clogging San Jose streets.
Although the city initially thought the Berryessa site would cost around $16 million, the site’s costs came down closer to $10 million. The city awarded a $2.8 million contract to Palo Alto-based homeless provider WeHOPE to operate the site.
“When we look at homelessness, some people like to try to push it to the side,” said Pastor Paul Bains, president and founder of WeHOPE. “Some people don’t like to see it whatsoever, but these are people just like you and me who have gone through some type of traumatic experience in their life, and they want to do better. A lot of times, they like to classify our unhoused brothers and sisters in a category, but that’s not who everyone is, and we have to look at that, we have to solve it (and) we have to do it in a very humane way.”
District 4 Councilmember David Cohen, who represents the surrounding areas, touted the positive impacts of building safe parking sites.
Cohen recalled setting up a temporary safe parking site when he first came into office after an issue arose with RVs around an Apple-owned property in North San Jose. Although the site faced resistance from the community, Cohen said it was clear the city needed even more because it helped those who used the site find stability and move on to other housing.
He noted that the Berryessa site has already helped two residents find better living situations in the first month of operations.
“We know that over 60% of the folks who live here now have jobs, and they’re leaving the site, going to their jobs and coming back, so people are stabilizing their lives, getting back on their feet and are getting the services they need to make sure that they have a better life,” Cohen said.
Homeless advocates also were impressed with the Berryessa site and lauded WeHOPE for helping residents recover.
“The first time I went there, I was so blown away with how beautiful and spacious it was,” advocate Gail Osmer said. “The respect they’ve shown to the unhoused is something I’ve never seen before.”
But while city leaders took a celebratory lap around the opening of the Berryessa site Thursday, they acknowledged more work must be done, saying that while the interim solutions are intended to help more residents into permanent housing, the city still needs to build more.
“We know that we will need hundreds of additional placements if we’re going to actually, in a reasonable timeline, start to bring down the number of RVs on our streets, so that it really has a positive impact for all of our neighborhoods,” San Jose Mayor Matt Mahan said. “We are looking at additional sites. There may be opportunities in some of our interim solutions to use the available parking on site, not just to have people in a unit but also potentially do some safe parking on site.”
Mahan, who spent time in Sacramento earlier this week to champion a bill requiring counties to cover half the operating costs of city-built shelters, once again called on Santa Clara County, the state and neighboring cities to adopt the same level of urgency to get people off the streets.
“In our view, the city is very well equipped to manage property, to maintain it, to provide security, to pay for utilities, to provide food, but when we get into case management, counseling and other supportive services, we really need our partners at the county to meet us halfway and help with the operating costs on site,” Mahan said. “If we can get the county to take on half of the operating costs on site, we can build twice as many of these because we can afford to operate them.”