Guest Opinion | Sonja Berndt: Pasadena Must Act Quickly to Meet the Urgent Needs of Our Unsheltered Residents

Last week, city officials hosted an emergency community meeting in response to increased gun violence in our city. According to an article appearing in Pasadena Now on October 29, Mayor Victor Gordo stated the following:

“I’m concerned about what’s happening in our neighborhoods. I’m concerned about what’s happening in our parks, and I’ve got to tell you that as we look for long term solutions — and we need long-term solutions in keeping young people away from gangs and away from trouble that ends up in violence in our parks and on our streets — but we also have a responsibility to do something in the interim.”

I am grateful that our city leaders recognize the urgent problem of increased gun violence and that the city has a responsibility to do something in the interim while we wait for long-term solutions to yield positive results.

But there is another urgent problem that is in need of both long term and short-term solutions that the city has failed to address on an urgent basis: the lack of shelter for the nearly 300 residents of our City who sleep on the street every night.

A. The Continued Delays in Addressing the Unmet Needs of Our Unsheltered Residents Cause Needless Suffering

At the City’s budget hearings last June, community members raised the urgent need for more interim housing (“bridge” housing between living on the street and permanent housing) to shelter our nearly 300 unsheltered residents who sleep on the street every night. They also expressed shock and dismay at how very little of the General Fund is appropriated to the Housing Department for its critical programs: only $1.475 million out of nearly $287 million (total General Fund appropriations) for FY 2022.

At the June 21, 2021 Council meeting, Councilmember Hampton asked Housing Director William Huang how many motel vouchers are needed to “supply the need” for housing our unsheltered residents. Director Huang stated he felt that the Department currently has enough vouchers, but advised he would come back to the City Council in about 60 days with “more studied” numbers.

Director Huang was asked to make a report/presentation at Pasadena’s ED Tech Committee. The August ED Tech meeting was cancelled. Housing Department staff advised me in September and in October that the unmet-needs report prepared with the assistance of a consultant would not be completed in time for the ED Tech meetings held in those months. I was advised that it would be on the agenda for the November meeting. But the November ED Tech meeting has been canceled. According to City Manager Mermell, the unmet-needs report will be agendized at the December 8th ED Tech Committee.

Meanwhile, our hundreds of unsheltered neighbors continue to suffer on the street. Even worse, winter is fast approaching and the community is in the dark about what the City will do to ensure that all of our unsheltered residents who wish to receive shelter in freezing temperatures and rain will receive it. While permanent housing for all of our unhoused neighbors is the goal, that is clearly a long-term goal. Obtaining permanent housing can take one unhoused person up to a year. There needs to be a sense of urgency to address the unmet needs of our unsheltered neighbors and a recognition that our city has the responsibility to “do something in the interim.”

B. Interim Housing is Critical to Meeting the Needs of our Unshelters Residents

There are various types of interim housing to meet the needs of our unsheltered residents: “tiny shelter” communities (small single or double-occupancy cabins), re-purposed motels, congregate shelters, and “scattered site” motel vouchers (i.e., individual vouchers for motel rooms in multiple motels in a local area). While permanent housing is our goal, we do not currently have nearly enough units of permanent housing to house our over 500 unhoused neighbors.

Unsheltered persons are extremely vulnerable due to substantial, chronic health conditions; undiagnosed and untreated mental illness; substance use disorders; malnutrition, and/or other substantial problems, including threats to their personal safety. (See Pasadena Homeless Count—2020, pp. 23-25.) Interim housing provides personal safety and security for belongings, toilets, showers, laundry facilities, meals, assistance with medical needs, and linkage to benefits.

C. Our City Can Meet Its Moral Obligation to Provide Basic Shelter and Services for our Unsheltered Residents if the City Council is Willing

1. The City Must Find a Dedicated Funding Stream for Interim Housing

Our Housing Department gets a scant $1.475 million from the General Fund reportedly because its programs are funded in large part by federal and state grants. But this reasoning is deeply flawed since it is clear throughout our City that the non-local funding received fails to meet the housing needs of our unhoused residents. Moreover, using one-time funding and/or non-guaranteed annual funding through state and federal grants to address the chronic problem of homelessness is illogical.

2. The City Must Implement a Variety of Interim Housing Options on an Urgent Basis

By letter dated January 6, 2021, Mayor Gordo advised Jessica Xie, Chairperson of the Human Services Commission, that he would not allow the Commission’s proposal for a tiny shelter project to be agendized because “the Housing Department believes . . . there is a faster and better alternative solution which utilizes vacant motel rooms to provide emergency shelter capacity.”

This statement confuses emergency shelter with interim housing needs. The interim housing needed is for much longer than a few nights “here and there” during inclement weather. Further, motel vouchers as interim housing is only “faster and better” for our unsheltered neighbors if there are sufficient vouchers to cover all who wish to be sheltered.

Moreover, once a person uses a motel voucher, it is gone. While it may have achieved interim housing for that one person, it does nothing to benefit the next person in need of interim housing.

Contrast that with tiny shelter communities and re-purposed motels. Once a client obtains permanent housing and leaves their motel room or tiny shelter, their unit, as well as onsite services, become available for the next person in need of interim housing. Additional advantages of tiny shelters and re-purposed motels are that outreach workers can provide services to many clients all at one facility and clients can obtain assistance with medical and other needs right where they live.

The City of Los Angeles has opened several tiny shelter communities. Additionally, under the state’s Project Homekey program, cities have taken advantage of substantial state funding to purchase and re-purpose entire motels, first for interim housing, and then conversion to permanent housing.

Last September, Governor Newsom signed a multibillion-dollar package of bills to ease the homelessness crisis. Through these bills, California will invest billions of dollars in building up an infrastructure of more than 44,000 new housing units and treatment beds for persons exiting homelessness including $5.8 billion to add more than 35,000 new housing units through the state’s Project Homekey program. (Pasadena Star-News, 9/30/21.) Is our city taking advantage of this substantial funding opportunity?

D. Conclusion

Please email members of our City Council and ask them to agendize the issue of the unmet needs of our unsheltered residents on an emergency basis at a City Council meeting. In addition, ask them to approve a plan that will actually meet the needs of our unsheltered residents, including the funding to achieve that plan. Our unsheltered residents are among the most vulnerable residents of our city. Please be their voice. Thank you.

Sonja K. Berndt, R.N. (inactive) is a retired state prosecutor