A VOICE FOR THE HOMELESS

Navy veteran strives to improve services in the Bay Area

When Claudine Sipili heads into one of San Jose's many homeless encampments, she wields a special superpower that allows her to connect with and help the residents there: She knows exactly what they're going through.

Sipili has been homeless herself and struggled with the same things many people on the streets do, including incarceration and addiction. She knows firsthand the indignity of going to a shelter, having her cellphone confiscated and then being assigned a bunk bed in a room with 15 other women. And she knows what the quicksand-like grip of homelessness feels like — how the harder you struggle to get out, the harder it seems to pull you back down.

Now, she makes it her mission to listen to the people currently living through those experiences, and to report what they say up the chain to the nonprofits, politicians and others in charge of making the county's homeless service system better.

“I was so ashamed. And I just felt like there was a label on my forehead that said, homeless or loser,” the Navy veteran said of the year and a half she spent bouncing between her car, the street and a women's shelter in Idaho. “And that's the reason why for me now in my work I really want to make sure while I'm out at encampments, or whoever is out in encampments, that's the first thing that we do is affirm the dignity of the humans that are out there.”

This spring, Sipili started in a role that will take her efforts to the next level: director of lived experience and innovation for Destination: Home. It's a brand-new role for the Santa Clara County nonprofit, and it comes at a time when homeless service providers are making an increasing effort to listen to the people who use their programs. For Sipili, her role means figuring out how to better amplify homeless voices. Those voices, she says, are the key to figuring out how to do everything from improving the quality of life for people living in encampments, to moving people into permanent housing.

She sat down with this news organi

PHOTOS: ARIC CRABB — STAFF PHOTOGRAPHER Claudine Sipili, left, director of lived experience and innovation for Destination: Home, visits with Rita at a homeless encampment in San Jose. Sipili has experience with homelessness, incarceration and addiction, and now works to improve homelessness services and policy.

Claudine Sipili, right, and Mike Eckhart, center, peer-to-peer outreach coordinator for Destination: Home, deliver supplies at a homeless encampment in San Jose.