EXPERIENCING JOY OF PERMANENCY
Families struggling with homelessness find interim housing in San Jose’s newest community, made up of shipping containers
Like many 15-year-old boys, Dwon’ya looks up to his big brother, spends most of his free time doing what he loves most — making music — and can’t wait to finally return to school this fall with his friends.
But the highlight of his summer vacation, if anyone asks, was finally having a place where he, his 16-year-old brother Dwight and his grandmother, Ludia Burnett, can feel at home.
After more than a year of bouncing around hotels and sleeping in homeless shelters, Dwon’ya and his family moved into a studio in late May — one that was actually a shipping container, recycled for habitation. Today, they are members of San Jose’s newest community for unhoused residents on Evans Lane, near the Willow Glen neighborhood.
To some, their tiny 8-by-40-foot home might not seem like much. It kind of resembles a miniature dorm suite, complete with two small rooms — each furnished solely with a set of metal bunk beds — and a bathroom that serves as a buffer in between.
But the family has their own space, with four walls and doors that they can close at night.
And for them, that’s a giant leap from the gymnasium they previously lived in with dozens of others at a homeless shelter set up during the pandemic in San Jose’s Camden Community Center.
“I was really happy about the move because I didn’t want to be at the other place anymore,” Dwon’ya said with a beaming smile. “Now I won’t get distracted too easily, ’cause when I go into my room, I can close the door and just stay there.”
In 2019, Santa Clara County’s biennial count indicated that 269 families like Dwon’ya’s were experiencing homelessness. Nationwide, a third of the homeless population in 2018 were families, the majority of them headed
housing sites such as Evans Lane are precisely what it’s going to take to make sure more families and children get the stability they need to survive — and even thrive — in the Bay Area.
“This is the time frame in which parents need the most help,” she said. “And in such a short time since we’ve launched this program, I’ve seen such a drastic difference in their behaviors and their engagement and their trust for the system. I think that’s what is most important.”
Plans to turn the 6-acre plot into a community for unhoused residents had been in the works for more than a half decade, but the project kept running into delays, in part because of stiff resistance from some neighbors and also because of the original developer’s failure to secure sufficient financing.
City officials managed to get the project over the finish line partially thanks to private funding that came through to pay for the units and to pandemic-related state emergency orders that waived some timeconsuming red tape.
The interim homes take up about a third of the property and the city’s end goal is to transform the rest into an apartment complex that will serve as permanent housing for residents with a mix of incomes — from extremely low-income families, such as Dwon’ya’s to moderateincome ones.
“This is just one of multiple steps in the process,” Davis said. “But it feels really good to be providing a home for people as they are waiting for their forever home.”
Evans Lane is meant to give families dignity and a feel for what it’s like having a place of their own, but they are expected to transition into more permanent settings within 120 days of arriving.
And although Dwon’ya’s family is elated about their new space, the mission of the new community appears to be taking hold.
“I didn’t know what to imagine, but it’s definitely a godsend,” Ludia Burnett said. “I have a better peace of mind to try and figure out what our next move is going to be, and I’m ready to do what I need to do to further myself out there.”