San José Announces Location for First Safe Sleeping Site in City History
Located along the Coyote Creek, the site will bring relief to neighbors, restore Watson Park, and help City meet environmental mandate
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
September 5, 2024
Media Contact:
Tasha Dean, Chief Communications Officer, Office of Mayor Matt Mahan; [email protected]
SAN JOSÉ, CA - This week, the City of San José took a significant step toward establishing a safer, managed alternative to unsheltered homelessness at 1157 E Taylor St. This location was selected from eight potential sites that the San José City Council unanimously approved for further analysis in June of this year. If it continues to prove suitable, it will be the first safe sleeping site to open in San Jose, likely in early 2025.
“Last year, we did a clean-up at Watson Park, and the conditions were shocking — a greenspace that should be open and available for all was covered in human excrement, filled with debris and overrun by shopping carts. We can’t allow our public spaces to fall into squalor any more than we can allow our homeless neighbors to live in it,” said San Jose Mayor Matt Mahan. “This area will be the first to see the benefits of this new solution to homelessness — one that will preserve our park and protect it from re-encampment. We’ll be working with the neighborhood every step of the way to ensure this solution benefits everyone.”
In this year’s budget, the City Council voted unanimously to allocate dollars toward the creation of several Safe Sleeping Sites with the capacity to serve a total of 500 homeless people currently living on the streets of San Jose or along one of the City’s many waterways. The magnitude of the homelessness crisis has affected the health of City waterways, and this initiative is a part of broader budget investments designed to maintain the City’s stormwater permit and comply with the Clean Water Act by reducing pollution in the rivers and creeks that flow through San José — 88% of which is attributed to unmanaged, unsheltered living conditions along these waterways.
Located near the Coyote Creek and Watson Park, both of which are heavily encamped and require frequent calls for service, the Taylor St. safe sleeping site will serve unhoused residents in the immediate vicinity first. To preserve progress, the City will establish no camping zones within a two-block radius of the site to prevent unmanaged, unsafe encampments from returning, bringing relief to the surrounding neighborhood.
"As the Downtown Councilmember, I recognize that addressing homelessness is no easy task, and it requires immediate, effective solutions,” said Councilmember Omar Torres. “While District 3 has taken the lead with the most supportive housing sites and tiny homes, it's clear that this approach should serve as a blueprint for our entire city. This humanitarian crisis isn't just a District 3 issue—it's a citywide challenge. I hope my colleagues will join me in exploring safe sleeping and other alternatives in housing our unhoused in their districts. We have to tackle this crisis together as a city.”
This week, representatives of both Mayor Matt Mahan and District 3 Councilmember Omar Torres’ office canvassed the area to notify neighbors of the site and invited them to participate in a community meeting.
“I’ve lived in San Jose for several decades, witnessing the increasing plight of people living in the streets, the creeks, or anywhere they could find,” said Jeff Levine, a local resident and spokesperson for the Roosevelt Neighborhood Association. “I applaud and support 100% the City creating safe sleeping sites. Our neighborhood understands that solving homelessness requires all neighborhoods throughout the City to be supportive of plans to get people out of the creeks, highway overpasses, streets, parks and into supervised housing.”
This announcement follows a recent visit to San Diego by Mayor Mahan and housing staff to tour one of the City of San Diego’s safe sleeping sites, O Lot, guided by San Diego Mayor Todd Gloria. The site, which opened its doors in October of 2023, contains 400 raised, insulated tents and provides on-site amenities and services, including meals, restrooms, showers, laundry, storage trailers, case management, basic needs assistance and resource referrals. Mayor Mahan was introduced to service providers, participants and health care professionals who ensure the site has the tools required to serve the unhoused population who call it home. Like San Diego, San José’s safe sleeping sites will be one option in a menu of placements for the city’s most vulnerable residents. This year’s budget also prioritized investments in the interim housing pipeline to bring 628 additional tiny homes online before July 2025.
The City of San José is addressing homelessness with a combination of interim housing, safe parking, upstream prevention strategies and now, safe sleeping sites. These investments represent the most strategic investment in ending unsheltered homelessness within San José, and could serve as a model for other cities that want to relocate unhoused individuals out of unsafe, unmanaged encampments and reclaim shared public spaces for all.
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About the City of San José
With nearly one million residents, San José is the largest city in the Bay Area and one of the nation's most diverse and creative. San José’s transformation into a global innovation center in the heart of Silicon Valley has resulted in the world's greatest concentration of technology talent and development.