NORTH HIGHLANDS, Calif. — Suzi Young, her trailer, pickup truck, and dog Puzzle all stay along Roseville Road in Sacramento County's Foothill Farms community.
"There's a lot of us out here only because we can't afford the rent,” she told ABC10 this week along the busy road. “I'm ready to move in somewhere…I don't even like being out here. This street's way too busy for me."
She wants housing – but says it’s unaffordable.
"I'm on, like, the lowest income there is,” she said – around $1,100 a month. “If I get a place to live then I can't eat. Or I can pay the utilities—like the electric one month and then, like, the gas the next month, and so I'm always a month behind."
She’s one of the thousands of people in Sacramento County who face spending another winter unhoused, as they wait for housing opportunities.
In response to an outcry for more shelter, Sacramento County Supervisors approved nearly $23 million last week. It will go to purchase property at 4837 Watt Avenue in North Highlands, which leaders plan on turning into the county’s third Safe Stay Community.
The county calls Safe Stay Communities "low-barrier, full-service shelters located proximate to where unsheltered encampments exist in the community…(They) provide spaces where people living unsheltered can safely stay while engaging in necessary supportive services to aid them in exiting homelessness."
Emily Halcon – the county's Director of Homeless Initiatives – told Supervisors the Watt Avenue community is different from the other two in the pipeline.
"It is the first site that will allow us the ability not just to provide indoor sheltering but also provide safe parking. We know we have a lot of people currently living in their vehicles and unwilling or unable to give up those vehicles to come into a traditional shelter," Halcon said. “This is a really unique location in the unincorporated county…It's also in an area which has a lot of unsanctioned encampments up and along Roseville Road in the McClellan Business Park and elsewhere in this community."
Young says if the proposed parking at this Watt Avenue Safe Stay Community – just four miles from where she’s currently living - would accommodate her trailer and truck, she'd go in a heartbeat. After living unhoused for the better part of a decade, she said, she wants a safer place to park — with services, too.
“Maybe, like, a food service that comes out to help deliver food. Definitely the showers. Laundry area,” she suggested. “Mental health there, too. Mental health workers. Things like that. Maybe a visit from, you know, the doctors every once-in-awhile, every month or so."
Part of what makes the Watt Avenue site so attractive to county leaders is it’s adjacent to a health clinic that serves the unhoused community.
The site is in Supervisor Rich Desmond's district.
“We have responsibilities on this Board. One is to those who need help, you know, those who are unsheltered living in our streets and open spaces or in their RVs,” he said. “But we also have an obligation to ensure high-quality life for our small businesses and residents in their neighborhoods."
Leaders discussed this last week at the meeting where they approved nearly $23 million to purchase the land and building.
Rick Eaton of Sacramento Area Congregations Together called into the meeting to say he supports the project but has a few concerns, too.
"One is a little concern about equity. All three of Safe Stay Communities that are in the pipeline now – as of this one – are in lower-income communities. We think that's problematic that all communities should, if possible, share in providing solutions for homelessness,” he said. “Now, obviously, we recognize that a site of this size is simply not available in places like Carmichael or Fair Oaks, but we think there are opportunities, perhaps, to explore smaller footprints, more neighborhood-based sites that would be appropriate to other parts of the county.”
Supervisor Sue Frost said she’d like to see more shelters built so that people who are unhoused can be moved into them.
“We can hopefully continue to find other perfect locations so that we have the capacity to really take back control of our business districts and our residential areas and our parkways and our streets,” she said.
Halcon said the Watt Avenue Safe Stay Community would be intended as a longer-term solution, unlike some other more emergency-based shelters that allow only several-day stays.
“I do imagine this site would be a more permanent fixture in our sheltering community until the point we don’t need it,” she said.
At a community forum Tuesday night, some North Highlands neighbors brought questions and concerns to Supervisors Desmond, Frost, and Phil Serna — whose three districts either contain or are very near to the Watt Avenue site.
"My concern for North Highlands is that we are becoming a dumping ground," one woman said.
Shirley Marimee, who lives in North Highlands, said, “I think it's a possible solution, one of many."
Mark Lum agreed, saying, “when we're dealing with record numbers of homeless people, anything is beneficial."
The Watt Avenue Safe Stay Community is far from completion. At this point, supervisors have only approved the money to purchase the property. The sale is still being finalized. County staff members say more money will be needed for site improvements like restrooms, sprinklers, and kitchen facilities.
Meanwhile, the Safe Stay site proposal will return to the Board of Supervisors on Nov. 15, with more specific recommendations from staff on the design and operation of the site.
Young, then, faces another winter on the side of a road.
"I can't afford to heat my place, so I live out here without heat,” she said.
The other two proposed Safe Stay Communities are at 7001 East Parkway – which will house up to 45 tiny homes, with a maximum occupancy of 56 people - and at “8144 Florin Road, on the corner of Power Inn and Florin at the former site of a now razed grocery store,” a county news release said back in June. “The site will house up to 100 Pallet sleeping cabins – both single and double occupancy, bathrooms, and communal gathering spaces. At any point in time, it can shelter up to 125 people.”
The two sites are less than three miles apart, near South Sacramento, in Supervisor Patrick Kennedy’s district.
