Child Girl, as she’s recognized on the road in San Jose, has been homeless for almost eight years. She has little want to maneuver indoors.
The 39-year-old with darting blue eyes has PTSD and extreme anxiousness relationship again to childhood, making it virtually unimaginable for her to remain in shut quarters with others at homeless shelters, she stated. After so lengthy with out a roof over her head, she’s grown accustomed to life in encampments.
“I have a phobia of windows, doors and walls,” she stated. “And I can be violent and confrontational.”
Whereas consultants agree that folks like Child Girl make up a minority of the unhoused inhabitants, Bay Space officers say “shelter-resistant” homeless residents are essentially the most entrenched in harmful encampments, use essentially the most emergency companies and are amongst these most definitely to die of an overdose on the streets.
In response, annoyed native cities are more and more looking for methods to compel homeless folks to just accept a shelter mattress, or are clearing extra encampments with out providing shelter in any respect. Many adopted the extra forceful approaches following a U.S. Supreme Courtroom resolution final summer time permitting native governments to shut camps no matter whether or not shelter beds can be found.
RVs are parked close to a homeless shelter on Cimino Avenue in San Jose on Monday, Could 5, 2025. (Dai Sugano/Bay Space Information Group)
In San Mateo County, officers final yr made it unlawful for homeless folks in unincorporated areas to repeatedly refuse shelter. Months later, Berkeley up to date its encampment coverage to permit authorities to brush camps with out providing a mattress.
Fremont adopted a strict encampment ban in February. Oakland has just lately ramped up sweeps, with plans to clear considered one of its largest encampments this week. San Francisco — the place officers submitted their frustrations over shelter refusals to the Supreme Courtroom — has begun citing and arresting extra folks for public tenting.
In San Jose, officers are actually contemplating a controversial proposal by Mayor Matt Mahan to quote and arrest homeless residents who flip down a number of shelter provides.
Mahan stated he has no intention of jailing unhoused folks below the coverage. As a substitute, he stated the purpose is to work with Santa Clara County to refer these refusing shelter to dependancy or psychological well being remedy, although county officers have dismissed the proposal as “ineffective and a distraction.”
“We believe holding people accountable for coming indoors to housing or treatment will save lives and benefit the broader community,” he stated.
The shelter beds at The Hope Heart adjoining to the Berkeley Meals & Housing Mission in Berkeley, Calif., on Thursday, Oct. 13, 2022. The Hope Heart is a newly constructed facility that has fifty-three rooms of everlasting supportive housing for homeless and disabled women and men. Thirty-two shelter beds for homeless grownup males and twelve transitional housing beds for homeless male veterans. Residents can obtain onsite help like medical companies and meal applications. (Jose Carlos Fajardo/Bay Space Information Group)
Together with county officers, consultants and repair suppliers are skeptical that threatening homeless folks with legal penalties will persuade them to maneuver off the road. In addition they notice that whilst cities like San Jose work so as to add shelter house, most lack wherever close to sufficient beds for everybody who wants them. And so they argue that opting to clear camps with out providing shelter usually accomplishes little besides pushing homeless folks from one neighborhood to a different.
Labeling homeless folks as shelter-resistant additionally ignores the truth that shelters aren’t at all times well-managed or maintained, researchers say. Amenities might not be outfitted to accommodate bodily or behavioral well being points, or the residents’ histories of trauma, which might make it exhausting to really feel protected in a bunch setting and foster a mistrust of these providing assist.
“There is still a mismatch between the way that shelter is designed and the needs of this very diverse and vulnerable population of people,” stated Jamie Chang, a homelessness researcher with UC Berkeley’s Faculty of Social Welfare.
A Yale-led evaluation final yr of varied surveys of homeless folks recognized eight predominant obstacles to accepting shelter: Security considerations, on-site drug use, strict guidelines or curfews, perceived insufficient care, unsanitary circumstances, obligatory remedy necessities, a scarcity of lodging for relations or pets, and restricted accessibility for these with disabilities.
Most homeless individuals who’ve spent any important quantity on the road within the Bay Space have bounced out and in of shelters or short-term housing sooner or later of their lives. They’ve usually been discharged from a shelter program over conflicts with different shelter residents or workers, and generally harbor deep suspicions about outreach groups and repair suppliers.
However for a lot of, turning down a shelter supply doesn’t imply they haven’t any intention of ever accepting a mattress.
Mike Roman, a 71-year-old homeless man with a thick white beard and weathered complexion, stated he declined to maneuver to a shelter in Morgan Hill as a result of it’s too removed from the place he lived in Palo Alto earlier than shedding his housing. He desires to discover a mattress nearer to that metropolis. However till then, he plans to remain on the road in San Jose.
“This is where my friends are,” Roman stated. “It’s what I know right now.”
Unhoused residents Mike Roman, 71, middle, and Jose Cadenas, 41, speak throughout an interview in San Jose, Calif., on Monday, Could 5, 2025. (Dai Sugano/Bay Space Information Group)
A homeless man who goes by the title Draco and lives at a West Berkeley encampment together with his two pit bulls, Luna and Tanner, stated he desperately desires to discover a everlasting residence. He ended up on the longstanding camp at eighth and Harrison streets — about wihch metropolis officers have repeatedly complained that homeless residents flip down beds — after short-term stays at shelters and supportive housing within the space.
One of many predominant challenges to securing an enduring residence, Draco stated, is discovering a program that may settle for multiple pet.
“If you want me off the streets, you’re going to take my dogs — my kids,” he stated. “Because those are the only reasons I get up every day. Period.”
A homeless man often known as Draco hugs his canines Tanner and Luna, Tuesday, Could 6, 2025, close to his tent on the Eighth and Harrison streets homeless encampment in Berkeley, Calif. Bother discovering shelter that permits pets has stored him on the road for years. (Karl Mondon/Bay Space Information Group)
To make shelters extra accommodating, Bay Space cities in recent times have begun opening a brand new sort of facility often known as interim housing. In contrast to conventional dorm-style group shelters with strict guidelines and little privateness, interim websites supply residents particular person rooms to offer a extra secure and welcoming atmosphere for these receiving case administration and different companies.
SAN JOSE, CALIFORNIA – SEPTEMBER 21: Tiny Properties are lined up for unhoused residents on Mabury Street in San Jose, Calif., on Wednesday, Sept. 21, 2022. (Shae Hammond/Bay Space Information Group)
Interim housing can embrace tiny properties, cabin shelters, modular models or renovated former motels. Pets and relations are typically welcome. The purpose is to maneuver residents into everlasting properties, although that always proves difficult given the area’s extreme scarcity of inexpensive housing.
In San Jose, officers purpose so as to add round 1,000 interim housing placements by the tip of this yr. To pay for the websites, Mahan desires to make use of cash that had been put aside for inexpensive housing, a contentious technique amongst housing and homelessness advocates who contend that shifting funding away from everlasting options is a short-sighted technique.
Jose Cadenas stated he’s been on the wait listing for a bunch shelter in San Jose for the previous three weeks. He stays in a tent simply throughout from the location. And whereas he’s not uncomfortable remaining outdoor, particularly now that hotter climate has arrived, he’s keen to maneuver into the shelter and have entry to a mattress and bathe.
“I would go there right away,” he stated.
Unhoused resident Jose Cadenas, 41, talks throughout an interview in San Jose, Calif., on Monday, Could 5, 2025. (Dai Sugano/Bay Space Information Group)
