WORK has begun on a new, small village that will house a select group of people rent-free later this year.
Last month, city officials in San Jose, Calif., approved a 10-year, $1-a-year lease to build tiny homes on land owned by John A. Sobrato.
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The billionaire Silicon Valley developer proposed the idea of renting out his 2-acre property on Via Del Oro after hearing about the city’s struggles finding space for homeless shelters.
“We live in the area with the greatest concentration of wealth in the world,” said Sobrato, at the start of work on the land on Wednesday, by Mercury News.
“It’s known as the center of innovation. We should be able to figure out how to solve this problem.”
The new village with 75 houses will house around 150 people who will be housed in shared huts.
When the houses are completed in the coming months, homeless people within a 2.4 kilometer radius of the new development will be offered a bed.
Once these individuals are housed, the city will clear encampments in the area and enforce a two-block “zone of no return” around the facility.
Cities are increasingly turning to tiny homes as a way to provide homeless people with temporary shelter that can help them get back on their feet and find permanent housing.
Without concerns about security and privacy, individuals can make the most of other services offered to them, which can lead to work and other positive changes.
DignityMoves, a non-profit organization, has been created to manage the site and this will include providing counseling, job training and case management to residents to find permanent housing.
With private bathrooms and the opportunity to move into the small village with partners and pets, the new transitional housing will be a welcoming community for homeless people in San Jose.
Site plans also include shared kitchens and laundry facilities, as well as outdoor seating and parking for 46 cars.
“This is about stabilizing people more quickly and connecting them to the support services that allow them to regain some control in their lives on the path to self-sufficiency,” said Mayor Matt Mahan.
According to Mahan, the city has sheltered about 1,500 homeless people over the past three years, placing them in small transitional homes, and half of them have ended up in permanent housing.
Meanwhile, 70% have stayed off the streets, the mayor said, but with more than 4,000 homeless people in the city, there is much more work to be done.
Mahan previously expressed hope that other owners will follow in Sobrato’s footsteps.
“This brings private property into play in the effort to end street homelessness,” he said last year.
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“There are a lot of underutilized private properties that until now have been left on the sidelines because there hasn’t been a good replicable model to engage these owners.”
The increased focus on building small, temporary homes is also expected to help surrounding neighborhoods by eliminating local encampments.
“If a neighborhood takes on the solution to homelessness — which is shelter, housing and supportive services — that neighborhood should be better off, not worse off, because of that investment,” Mahan said. Highlight São José.
Sobrato’s son, John, previously praised his father’s proposal, calling it an “admirable effort to help one of San José’s most vulnerable populations,” according to a Mercúrio News report.
The Sobrato Family Foundation also donated $5 million to a homeless shelter in other parts of the city and to a Bay Area homeless shelter that opened last spring in Redwood City.
This story originally appeared on The-sun.com read the full story
