City Shelters Struggling To Move Homeless Residents Into Homes

By Lisa Halverstadt, the Voice of San Diego

April 11, 2023

As the city works to supply more homeless shelter options, its existing shelters are getting worse at helping unhoused people secure permanent homes.

From July through February, just 11 percent of the 2,385 people and families who departed city shelters overseen by the San Diego Housing Commission moved into permanent homes, according to agency data. Another 9 percent found other long-term housing in places such as a family member’s home or a transitional program.

By comparison, a quarter of homeless residents and families who left city shelters in 2019 secured permanent homes and 8 percent moved onto other long-term housing.

Shelter providers in San Diego have long grappled with a tight housing market but surging housing costs plus a drop in new supportive housing projects and resources that ramped up during the pandemic have made their task even more challenging. Staffing shortages and burnout during the pandemic added more complications.

Lisa Jones, the Housing Commission’s executive vice president of strategic initiatives, said the city and its shelters are now in a “resource desert” following a previous influx of hundreds of new units and federal emergency housing vouchers. She said people who receive rental aid have also relied on that aid for a longer period due to spiking house costs, meaning there are fewer slots available for others in need.

That’s meant there have been fewer options for unhoused people who qualify for subsidized housing.

“We’re in a dip,” Jones said.

Tamera Kohler, CEO of the Regional Task Force on Homelessness, said homeless service providers elsewhere in the county are facing similar challenges securing housing for their clients.

Last year, 17 percent of people exiting shelters countywide moved into permanent homes compared with 26 percent in 2019, according to Task Force data. Task Force data also showed a nearly 18 percent spike in the number of days unhoused people in shelters spent waiting for permanent homes.

“It’s taking a housing navigator a month or two longer to find a unit even though we have more people sheltered,” Kohler said.

Indeed, the city alone added more than 700 shelter beds – about a 70 percent increase – since homeless residents and providers left the Convention Center shelter in spring 2021.

That’s meant more unhoused people are staying in shelters, hoping for a permanent home.

Jones said the city is preparing to apply for state Homekey dollars to try to increase housing options for formerly homeless people.

Dave Rolland, a spokesman for Mayor Todd Gloria, said the mayor has also pushed forward two housing reform packages aimed at making it easier to deliver affordable housing in the city, a new program to expedite permits for low-income projects and an initiative to provide direct city investment into such projects, including those serving formerly homeless people.

Robert Dukes, 58, is among those now waiting for housing. He has been living at Alpha Project’s Barrio Logan shelter for about two years. He never imagined he’d still be there.

“Temporary has turned into two years and it’s very disheartening,” said Dukes, who had a stroke last April.

Dukes, now unable to work after years as a forklift operator, said his first two Alpha Project case managers made little progress helping him secure documents and other resources he’ll need to move into housing.

For now, he makes $1,133 in disability income each month, which has led him to focus on securing a permanent supportive housing unit where he’d have a long-term subsidy.

He’s yet to find something. He’s been offered temporary rental assistance, but fears he won’t be equipped to cover the rent on his own once assistance runs out.

Quarlo “Q” McSwain, case manager supervisor at Alpha Project, is trying to help Dukes gather documents to get permanent disability in hopes it will help him secure housing.

“I really want something to happen for him,” McSwain said. “He ain’t won the lottery yet.”

McSwain, Alpha Project CEO Bob McElroy and Jones acknowledged that staffing challenges throughout the pandemic have only complicated matters.

For example, McSwain said, Dukes’ previous case manager juggled multiple roles at the shelter.

McElroy said the year after Alpha Project resumed shelter operations at its own shelters rather than the Convention Center was especially trying.

“A lot of things happened, and unfortunately, guys like (Dukes) get caught up in the dysfunctionality systemwide,” McElroy said.

The Housing Commission found last May that the vacancy rate for direct positions in city-backed shelters was as high as 29 percent, though Jones said vacancy rates have since fallen to 13 to 15 percent.

Ann Oliva, the lead author of the city’s 2019 homelessness plan who is now CEO of the National Alliance to End Homelessness, said San Diego’s predicament isn’t unique.

“We’re going to have to expand the tactics that we use in this in order to make progress in this housing environment that we’re currently in,” Oliva said.

For example, Oliva said, communities should try pairing unhoused people with roommates where that’s workable or try master leasing units to make apartments more accessible.

Both the city and Regional Task Force’s homelessness plans call for further exploration of roommate and master leasing models. Last year, two San Diego nonprofits also received a $200,000 grant to try to expand the shared housing model throughout the region.

In the meantime, Housing Commission data shows 17 percent of unhoused people and families who left its shelters between July and February returned to the streets while another 58 percent left without sharing their next destination.

Jones said she suspects at least some who left without reporting their next move found housing on their own. Countywide Task Force data shows most San Diegans who exited homelessness over the past year ultimately rented their own unsubsidized homes. She also noted that shelter providers work to help unhoused people get jobs or other income so they are better equipped to rent and hold onto an apartment.

Robert Fausto, 62, spent months last year at Father Joe’s Villages Paul Mirabile Center shelter. He said his case manager suggested unsubsidized apartments ranging from $1,200 to $1,500 despite his monthly income of just over $1,000.

“They found me places to live that I couldn’t possibly afford and that was the end of it,” said Fausto, who now sleeps in a tent on the outskirts of downtown.

Casement said case managers work with clients to identify housing options even if they don’t qualify for subsidies.

“Attempts are made to locate housing within established budgets, but that can be difficult due to the local rental market,” Casement wrote in a statement.

Richard O’Malley, 52, recently became one of the lucky ones.

Last month, he moved out of the Alpha Project shelter where he spent almost a year and half and into a Grantville supportive housing complex where he now has a studio with a kitchen, bathroom, heat and air conditioning.

O’Malley, who has heart failure and diabetes and no monthly income, is grateful to the Alpha Project and county workers who helped him along the way.

“I was shocked I got housing,” O’Malley said.

Julie Tucker, 51, is still holding out hope.

She’s been waiting a year and half for housing at the shelter O’Malley recently left. She was matched to a San Ysidro permanent supportive housing project last July and her move-in date has repeatedly been delayed.

Tucker also emphasized the support she’s received at the shelter but said she’s eager to have her own space to host her out-of-state grandchildren. Her patience has been waning recently.

“That apartment will change my whole life,” Tucker said.

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