SACRAMENTO, Calif. — The Sacramento City Council unanimously decided to move forward with a master homeless plan crafted by Mayor Darrell Steinberg.
The plan calls for 20 temporary safe ground shelter sites of campsites, tiny homes and emergency shelters, mostly in the areas of North Sacramento, Stockton Boulevard and along the W-X corridor.
Temporary housing programs are also part of it.
This includes large campuses, motel conversions and vouchers. It also includes a long-term plan of building a shelter and resource center site, meant to serve as a one-stop-shop for folks experiencing homelessness to get back on their feet.
It is all built on Good Neighbor policies to ensure cleanliness and safety. The $100 million dollar plan is designed to help 9,000 people in Sacramento who are experiencing homelessness.
Mayor Steinberg announced on Wednesday that he's expecting some of the sites to be up and running within a couple of months.
"We want you to help us - help us, give us some jobs, something we can do," said Jennie Wells, a woman that's been staying in her RV near Commerce Circle and Lathrop.
Wells has been living on the streets of Sacramento for nearly two decades.
"When I turned 18, two weeks after my birthday, they dropped me off at a Greyhound bus station with $100 and said 'Good luck,'" she said. "I did the best that I could."
Recently, she's been living on the edges of the Commerce Circle business park, where the city just towed away about a dozen cars and trailers last week.
Wells said the $100 million plan meant to get people like her back on her feet again isn't good enough. She said it's simply a bandage on a much bigger issue, and she worries there won't be enough case workers to go around for everyone.
"That's ok, that's ok. We'll just surround that place with our trailers and our tents, not inside, we'll just surround that place because we're done," Wells said. "Give us some jobs, give us some opportunities because we're done. We'll accept it. We will all go but we will go around it; we're doing a protest. We are done."
Mayor Steinberg said that this plan passed unanimously, and that he's working to implement a "right to housing" and an obligation for people to accept it when its offered.
"And even if they refuse, I would never criminalize it, never fine them. That's not what I'm into, but I'm into saying that... if you're offered a safe and dignified alternative then you can't live here," Steinberg said.
Places like Commerce Circle would specifically be one of the places where people experiencing homelessness would be told to leave, according to Steinberg.
He said extensive outreach is needed to convince people like Wells who are hesitant to take advantage of the city's new services.
"The vast majority of people will say 'yes.' It may take ten touches because it requires the building of trust," he said.
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