Santa Rosa’s safe parking program marks its ‘promising’ first year

Annie Mccarter turned to her “little teeny weenie” Ford Taurus for refuge after the Coffey Park home where she rented a room was destroyed in the 2017 Tubbs Fire.

It kept her off the street, but living out of her car began to take a toll, compounding the loneliness and sorrow she felt after the death of her mother, whom she had cared for, a few years before.

“It was depressing not having my own space, my own place,” she said. “I felt like I didn’t belong anywhere.”

A friend from work later invited her to move into his RV. It was an upgrade from her four-door sedan but came with new challenges.

The couple was constantly on the move, finding new places to station the camper to not draw neighbor complaints or police attention. Citations for prolonged street parking began to pile up.

Then a police officer told the pair of a city program where they could park round-the-clock without worry. Out of options, her friend, William, jumped at the suggestion and they were offered a spot.

Santa Rosa’s safe parking program has served 148 unhoused residents living in their vehicles since it opened on a westside city-owned parking lot in March 2022.

The program, operated by Catholic Charities, features about 50 parking spots and on-site services. It costs $1.3 million annually to operate and the city has authorized funding to keep it running through June 2024.

Kelli Kuykendall, the city’s housing and community services manager, said safe parking is key to the city’s broader effort to reduce homelessness and serves a population that may be reluctant to seek shelter at a congregate site like Sam Jones Hall.

Twenty participants have found homes in the first 15 months — including Mccarter, 64, who in November moved out of the RV and into her own 1-bedroom apartment near Coddingtown Mall — and officials hope to build on that success in the second year.

Kuykendall said people are living in an estimated 50 vehicles citywide though the number is likely higher. The program has provided the city a tool to disband vehicle encampments that have frustrated local communities, but there’s a need for more spaces, she said.

That need is likely to grow regionwide as similar programs shutter and local governments look to crack down on vehicle camping.

The program was one of a number of initiatives implemented or expanded through the pandemic to provide a wider range of shelter and housing options to homeless people, many of whom fell into the highest-risk categories for the coronavirus.

In the wake of that spending surge, the number of unsheltered people living in Sonoma County overall, including those in vehicles, dropped since last year to 2,266, according to the county’s January point-in-time count.

Kuykendall said city officials are looking for additional funds to keep the program open longterm.

“We have to have other alternatives and a variety of programs to suit the needs of the variety of individuals that are out there so we can get them to come in, get them off the street and into housing,” Kuykendall said. “Safe parking is a critical part of that.”

Program results ‘promising’

The safe parking program was one of the city’s first attempts to carve out a managed space for people living in their vehicles.

The site is open 24 hours a day and provides individuals with a hot meal, showers, weekly laundry services and medical care. Participants are also paired with a case manager who can help them find employment, get a license and other government documents and find housing.

People can stay for up to six months but participants can stay longer if they’re working to reach their housing goals.

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About 60 people were living in the lot as of early June, including some couples; an additional 40 people are waiting for a spot to open, Kuykendall said.

Most participants, about 84%, are considered chronically homeless and have experienced homelessness multiple times over the last three or more years. About half of participants work part or full-time.

Eighty-seven people have left the program in the first 15 months, including 20, or 23%, who moved into permanent housing, just shy of the city’s goal to house 25% of individuals.

Another 12 people transitioned to an interim housing program and the remaining 55 chose to leave or were asked to leave for not following the rules, Kuykendall said.

“The housing exits are promising, especially when looking at other emergency shelter countywide,” said Kuykendall, who noted countywide only 16% of people in emergency shelter moved on to permanent housing. “But we do definitely want to see our housing exits go up and decrease the number of people going back to homelessness.”

Kuykendall and Catholic Charities CEO Jennielynn Holmes said the case management component has been crucial to that success.

Catholic Charities previously operated an overnight parking program at local church parking lots before state funding ran out in 2018 but did not provide wraparound services, Holmes said.

The current model has allowed outreach staff to better engage with individuals, including some they’d been trying to bring into shelters for years.

“To see them come in was very, very exciting,” she said.

Kuykendall said participants have reported a greater sense of safety, stability and community, easing their path to employment, benefits, substance use treatment, mental health services and long-term housing.

Greater need for alternative shelter

Cities across California in recent years have opened safe parking lots as cost-effective and quick ways to address vehicle encampments, which have grown in number and size during the pandemic, according to officials.

Countywide, about

520 people lived in their vehicles, making up 18% of the local homeless population of about 2,900 documented during the 2022 point-in-time count. Findings from the 2023 census won’t be available until later this summer.

But there are far fewer secure and legal spaces for people to park.

In Santa Rosa, in addition to the safe parking program, two private sites offer up to 18 overnight parking spaces with access to restrooms and waste management.

A Sonoma nonprofit that has operated an overnight parking program since

2019 at the Sonoma Police Department parking lot announced in May it planned to close the site because of high costs, and development plans are moving forward for the site of a controversial Sebastopol safe parking site home to about 25 people that opened in 2022 over opposition from residents.

Meanwhile, city governments and Sonoma County have passed or eyed new ordinances restricting camping and RV parking in public areas.

Sebastopol last February approved rules that restrict RV parking on city streets during the day but allow overnight parking in some commercial areas, which is being challenged in court by a coalition of civil rights groups.

Kuykendall said a camping ordinance being presented to the Santa Rosa City Council in August will only address tent camping, not vehicle camping, and staff is not looking to make any immediate changes to the city’s parking rules.

Generally, vehicles can’t be parked in the same location for more than three days and must be in working condition, and violations can result in citations or towing.

Kuykendall and Holmes said more spots are needed and though they acknowledged permanent housing is the ultimate goal, these types of alternative shelters are important.

“We need to create permanent housing because if not people are just staying in homelessness, but we also need to get people ready to get into housing,” Holmes said.

Kuykendall said the city doesn’t plan to expand the program or open another site. For now, the goal inside City Hall is to maintain the program and find a funding stream to keep it operating beyond summer 2024, she said.