Homeless shelter expansion OK’D
Businesses, neighbors ask RCS to address loitering, trash
After a long public hearing that included complaints about littering, loitering and other activities adversely affecting the residents and businesses near the Building Bridges homeless shelter on South State Street, the city of Ukiah this week approved modifying the facility’s permit to allow expansion into more areas of the building.
“There is a very familiar theme that runs through all of these comments, which are related to the primary use of the facility,” said Community Development Director Craig Schlatter, performing as the city’s Zoning Administrator during the Nov. 17 hearing, referring to the photos and written descriptions submitted by nearby property owners who requested that Redwood Community Services reduce the shelter’s impacts on nearby businesses by installing lights, hiring security guards and more effectively removing the trash left by the groups they said routinely congregate outside the shelter.
And while those issues were not directly related to the requested modification of the facility’s permit that he was considering Tuesday, Schlatter said “all the comments we received today will be part of the research that will be submitted to the Planning Commission for their report every six months; all of the comments are very valid and will be carefully considered toward potential modifications to the program manual, or the use permit conditions.”
The original use permit approved for the facility allowed for renovation of 4,600 square feet of the 7,000 square-foot structure, operation of a winter shelter for six months per year, and operation of a community center offering services such as showers,
laundry, counseling and medical care.
Due to the Covid-19 pandemic, year-round operation of the overnight shelter was approved by the city through April 30, 2021, with a temporary expansion into the now-vacant retail space to allow for greater spacing between the beds. The permit modification that Schlatter approved Tuesday allows “permanent expansion of the emergency shelter into that vacant space, with no additional exterior building improvements or signage proposed.”
In his application to the city, Dan Anderson, formerly the chief executive officer of RCS, wrote that “RCS has received HEAP (Homeless Emergency Aid Program) funding through the Mendocino County Homeless Services Continuum of Care ( MCHSCOC) to complete the remodel work on the Homeless Shelter. These funds need to be spent by the end of 2020, (and) for this reason, RCS needs to expedite the building permit process so is therefore only asking for a Change of Use for the retail space of the shelter building in this application.”
“Building Bridges is doing an inadequate job of managing and evolving their operations to address the evolving unintended negative consequences their client community is having on the State Street neighborhood,” states the letter that property owner Mary Golden read Tuesday. “I respectfully request that the operators of the facility be required to provide the following services for the other properties on the block … to mitigate the negative unintended consequences the neighborhood is suffering as a result of their compassionate services to the homeless: provide daily 24-hour security patrols for the area; provide bi-monthly trash removal services; install and maintain security lights on their buildings.”
In response Tuesday, Anderson described the complaints and requests by nearby property owners as “a concern that is complicated, and requires participation from both RCS, which is the host of the homeless shelter, but also from all of our other partners.” He pointed to the Covid-19 pandemic as creating new challenges that reduced the level of involvement from those partners, but “I do think we need to find a way to mitigate some of this impact in a more efficient and timely manner, and ensure that it doesn’t impede our neighbors’ ability to do business or (affect) their quality of life.”
Camille Schrader of RCS acknowledged that the homeless shelter likely exacerbated the problems caused by homeless individuals in the area, but that many issues were present prior to the facility opening.
And while Schrader said “we absolutely feel that we are a partner in figuring out what to do, a tremendous amount of rules and program models are going to be dependent on a relationship with our city police to enforce them, and our community members.
“I feel strongly that trash mitigation in general, not just around the center, is something that we all need to embrace and figure out,” said Schrader, adding that addressing the loitering also needed to be a group effort, because “we don’t have the authority to tell an adult where they can and cannot stand. “
When asked Wednesday for comment, Ukiah Police Chief Justin Wyatt said his officers don’t exactly have the authority to control where people stand either, as “loitering is not against the law.”
Wyatt said his officers will.respond and arrest people for criminal activity, but much of the behavior that neighbors and businesses near the shelter are complaining about do not violate any laws.
“If part of your business plan includes what the police department will or will not do, then you already have a failed plan,” said Wyatt, suggesting instead that staff at the shelter focus on finding ways to mitigate the concerns of their immediate neighbors. “I also think that transparency with the community is important.”
As to the improvements requested by the shelter’s neighbors, Wyatt said hiring security guards could certainly help deter unwanted activity, and that having more lighting could help as well.
In response to the requests for security systems, lights and more trash management, Schrader said “if there are things that need to be changed and additional funding needs to be found… so be it, let’s figure out a way to make that happen.”
Sage Wolf, the program manager for Housing and Homelessness for RCS, thanked the neighbors for their suggestions, describing some of them as being easily and quickly implemented, such as additional lighting. She also pointed out that an online community forum was scheduled for Nov. 25 (the Wednesday before Thanksgiving) at 6:30 p.m. on Zoom that will also be streamed on the RCS Facebook page.
“The real need here is for collaboration,” Wolf continued. “To get people at the table to talk about how homelessness impacts our community (as a whole), and what are the solutions that are effectively going to address homelessness. And what I’m asking the community to help with is to collaborate on solutions to the trespassing and the trash pick-up … to reduce some of the pressure on Building Bridges,” which she described as “not the solution to homelessness in the community.”
Current RCS CEO Victoria Kelly said that the organization has “looked at (hiring) security, (but) there are challenges with funding, And that is something that we are looking into for our next funding stream because we have identified that as (a need).
“It is our goal and hope to lessen the impact on the entire community that surrounds the site, while providing an amazing service to people who are generally pushed under the rug and fall through the cracks,” said Kelly, explaining that RCS staff would also be embarking on a “public perception campaign, and communicating out the successes seen at the site … so we can paint the picture of what is actually occurring at Building Bridges every day.”
“I do think we need to find a way to mitigate some of this impact in a more efficient and timely manner, and ensure that it doesn’t impede our neighbors’ ability to do business or (affect) their quality of life.”
— Dan Anderson, former chief executive officer of RCS