Homeless housing proposal sparks concern
Organization wants apartment building on the old Dick’s Supermarket site
A proposal to build housing for formerly homeless people has some San Jose residents concerned it will make their neighborhood less safe and increase parking and traffic problems in an already busy area.
The organization People Assisting The Homeless — commonly referred to as PATH — wants to develop a four- or five-story apartment building on the old Dick’s Supermarket site at the corner of North 4th Street and East Younger Ave., just north of Japantown. For homeless advocacy organizations, the location makes sense. It’s near public transportation, not far from a homeless shelter where potential residents might currently sleep, and close to organizations like LifeMoves that provide supportive services. And PATH — which is building similar housing called Villas on the Park near St. James Park and works across the state — has committed to having staff and support on site.
But at a community meeting Tuesday evening — which overlapped with a City Council meeting, thus precluding the area’s councilman, Raul Peralez, from attending — some neighbors pushed back at the idea. They raised concerns about everything from crime and drug use to density. The lot sits near a number of low-slung single-family homes, and some residents worried the project — which could include more than 100 units — would be out of place.
“We’ve had in the past couple of years quite a bit of problems with homelessness,” said Gene Yoneda, the owner of Minato Restaurant, a short walk away.
Already there is a neighborhood Facebook group where people are opposing the idea, saying the area lacks infrastructure to support the project. There isn’t a functioning grocery store within close walking distance, and residents complain of a slow police response to transients causing disturbances in the area. Pair those concerns with the fact that Union Pacific recently started blasting train horns in the middle of the night on the nearby train track, and
some residents are losing patience.
“It’s the straw breaking the camel’s back,” said one woman who declined to be identified.
Megan Colvard, the regional director at PATH San Jose, said the organization wanted to hear community feedback and was already taking it into account. For instance, PATH is exploring the possibility of putting a grocery store on the ground floor.
Responding to complaints, Colvard said getting people off the streets will solve problems such as their storing items on sidewalks or not having a place to go to the bathroom.
“We are most helpful in the neighborhoods where people are experiencing the impact of homelessness,” Colvard said. “We’re very experienced in this model.”
“Of course people have concerns,” acknowledged Jen Loving, the executive director of Destination: Home, another homeless advocacy organization. “It’s hard to understand what it could look like.”
However, Loving said at the meeting, residents should be glad to have PATH exploring new projects to address homelessness in San Jose, where more than 4,000 people lack stable housing on any given night.
“They’re top shelf,” she said.
But Tamiko Rast, who lives near the site, is concerned about what could happen if the funding PATH relies on to offer such housing runs out in the future.
“We need to give this facility careful consideration because the people it aims to serve are not dollar signs,” Rast said. “We have to be respectful of the care they will require, not just now but in the future for their own long-term health.”
Rast pointed out that residents may struggle with challenges such as substance abuse.
“So putting them next to a bar probably is not the best idea,” she said, adding that she’d be open to seeing housing for teachers on the site.
Right now, it’s unclear whether the project will move forward and there is no set timeline, although Colvard said typically such projects take several years.
While the site is currently zoned for commercial use, San Jose allows projects that offer 100 percent affordable housing and meet a few other requirements to be built on such land. The city has not been able to keep up with demand for affordable housing and rents are some of the highest in the nation, with many families at risk of falling into homelessness.
Yet some neighbors said their downtown district is being asked to take on more than its fair share of the city’s homelessness problem.
Loving understands that sentiment, but said “everyone has to do more.”
“It can’t just be in a few districts,” she said, “but that doesn’t mean this isn’t a good location.”