Navigation center debate roils Fremont
Fremont is one step closer to implementing an idea from San Francisco to help homeless people: navigation centers. The East Bay city is mulling over two different locations to build a site that will open in 2020 and house up to 45 people for up to six months with the intent of transferring them into permanent housing.
But the city’s plan has drawn intense opposition from residents, similar to the complaints San Francisco has faced.
Residents say a navigation center near their neighborhoods and schools could raise the risk that they or their children will become victims of crime. Online petitions urge residents to speak out against the various proposals the City Council is considering.
On Tuesday, more than 100 people
crammed into the council chambers and even more people filled multiple overflow rooms. Despite the opposition, the council narrowed its location choices from 11 to two on Tuesday night. The project will be built either in a City Hall parking lot at 3300 Capitol Ave., or at the Decoto surplus property site at 4178 Decoto Road.
Both are near public transportation, schools and food services. By September, the city will choose a location. The City Hall parking lot garnered the most support from residents.
“All it takes is one incident of grandma being mugged or a kid being accosted for this to blow up in your face,” Tim Pitsker, a Fremont resident, told the council. “You will be known as politicians that don’t protect the community. Good luck getting reelected.”
Many people wore stickers that read, “Keep our kids safe” and “Location matters most.” One woman had a green sign that read, “Good cause bad location.” Eightyseven people signed up to speak during the public comment period.
“It’s been a messy process,” Vice Mayor Raj Salwan told The Chronicle. “We need to help our homeless neighbors and be compassionate. It just hasn’t been as easy as you’d think. Everybody wants to help the homeless, but (they) say, ‘Don’t do it near me; let somebody else take care of it.’”
“Very frustrating,” Salwan said. “They say it’s all drug users, and we are like, ‘No, not 100%.”
San Francisco officials experienced similar opposition over a proposed 200bed navigation center on the Embarcadero that resulted in months of emotionally charged public meetings — including one where Mayor London Breed was shouted down by opponents — and tens of thousands of dollars raised by groups both for and against the center. Despite the backlash, the San Francisco Board of Supervisors has authorized the project to be built.
In Fremont, Hui Ng, 61, collected more than 3,000 signatures on a petition urging the council to pick the City Hall site.
“People are getting increasingly concerned,” Ng said of the location options.
The Decoto Surplus Property isless than a mile away from an elementary school.
“Aw, come on,” one woman said when she heard the proximity to the schools.
Some people spoke in support of the center, urging the council to move ahead with picking a location.
In a recent count, Alameda County had a 43% increase in homeless people — to 8,022 — from 2017 to 2019. The homeless population in Fremont, the fourth largest Bay Area city, increased by 27% from 497 in 2017 to 608 in 2019, according to the PointInTime Count. Salwan said the navigation center is just one way to “chip away” at addressing the crisis.
“There is definitely a need,” Salwan said before the meeting. “We need to help our homeless neighbors and be compassionate. I definitely support it. I think it’s the right thing to do.”
The site will be modeled after centers in Oakland and Berkeley and will be run by Bay Area Community Services. The Henry Robinson MultiService Center in downtown Oakland, opened in 2013, has 137 beds and serves about 300 people per year, said Jamie Almanza, executive director of the organization.
In December 2018, Oakland opened its second center, which has 90 beds and offers a place to stay for four to six months.
In June 2018, Berkeley opened its first navigation center, also run by the Bay Area Community Services. The facility has two airconditioned trailers, with portable toilets, where 45 people can stay up to six months.
“Once the individual moves in, the first day we are working with them to move them out into permanent housing,” Almanza said. “That is the core, you’re only living at the navigation center for as much time as it takes you and us to find permanent housing.”
The center will also help residents with finding and maintaining employment, addiction treatment, family reunification and getting medical insurance.
Fremont received about $2 million from the state’s Homeless Emergency Aid Program, some of which will be used for the new site, along with other city funds. Operating the center will cost about $2.4 million a year, according to Bay Area Community Services. Startup costs are generally below $1 million, but that depends on the site location.