San Diego explores transforming another private building into a long-term homeless refuge after a controversial plan to use an empty warehouse near the airport finally dropped last week.
The members of the council told the city’s independent budgetary analyst on Monday to study the amount of the rental or the purchase of what seems to be a three -story office building near little Italy. Staff members estimated that the site could be ready in a year.
The council rejected two other properties belonging to the city as possible shelters, at least in the short term, citing renovations which could have left the taxpayers to hook for tens of millions of dollars.
“If we do not want people to live in our canyons and our open spaces, if we want to reduce the risk of fire in our neighborhoods, we need more shelter beds,” said board member Stephen Whitburn. “We have to continue something.”
Only approximately 1 requests out of 10 for a place in a traditional refuge succeeded for a large part of last year, largely because the existing programs are often full, officials said. The breach of the deficit is the fact that the region has long been based on temporary structures, including some that have recently closed.
Mayor Todd Gloria thought he had found a longer -term solution when he threw his weight behind a warehouse of almost 65,000 square feet in the Middletown district which would have theoretically contained 1,000 beds. The many criticisms of the plan reported potential legal risks, environmental risks and the price of several decades – which was probably in hundreds of millions of dollars – led the mayor on Friday to abandon the idea.
He thanked the advice this week for examining another option. “Our sustained action in recent years is to turn the trend to this crisis, and an additional shelter will help ensure that our progress on the reduction of roaming and the end of dangerous camps are continuing,” said Gloria in a press release.
The new location is described in public archives as a building of 25,740 square feet on second avenue. So far, the leaders have refused to give an exact address, but the real estate broker Derek Hulse previously declared to the San Diego Union-Tribune that the city had interested a complex with this exact square feet at 1515 second AV.
We do not know what a lease or a purchase can cost. Lisa Jones, president and chief executive officer of the San Diego Housing Commission, said that the building mainly needed additional showers and that the renovations should be much $ 2 million.
The other sites discussed on Monday would have required much more money.
The biggest competitor was the city’s operations building at 1222 First Ave. that the complex has more than 217,600 square feet and needed an update estimated at $ 45.2 million. An even more expensive option was the old central library at 820 th ST. The aging structure has already been used intermittently as a small refuge for women, but the revision of the five floors could have required around $ 86.8 million.
The execution time was not as fast: the construction could have taken almost four years. The above-dollar amounts did not include operating expenses either. “I just don’t think that the strategy of making the city’s dilapidated and dilapidated buildings are profitable,” said the member of the Council Marni von Wilpert.
Monday’s vote also called on staff members to consider adding more beds to the Hills mission campus in the Veterans Village. This site has recently been redone as a more traditional homeless refuge after California Department of Health Care Services, citing “serious concerns about customer safety”, forced the non-profit organization to stop managing a drug addiction center.
Managers continue to consider the uses of the old central library, which has been largely vacant for more than a decade.
The presentation of Monday followed calls to owners requesting buildings which could house homeless. The city obtained 17 responses, the staff members said. Nine have been checked and five finally found potential.
The next refuge that closed is Rachel’s promise installation of 40 beds. While this program ends in June, the leaders hope to replace these spots thanks to a new partnership with Catholic Charities. A Promise Center Rachel’s for renovated women and children could contain more than 200 beds in the city center, including private rooms and space for the elderly, officials said.
The housing committee should examine this proposal during a public hearing on Friday.
San Diego continues to transform several vacant hectares next to the airport into a safe parking lot where homelessness can sleep in their vehicles. The H Barracks site should be ready in the spring – the city hoped before to start the start of the year – although this calendar could again change due to a trial brought by a property developer who thinks that the project is at both illegal and peril plans for a new hotel.
Seven members of the Council voted in favor of the ownership of the second avenue as a possible house, without any opposition. The members of the Raul Campillo and Jennifer Campbell council were absent.
The homeless in the County of San Diego increased each month for more than 2 and a half years before contracting slightly in November and December.
Originally published:
California Daily Newspapers
