TITLE
Recommendation to request City Manager to work with relevant departments to take advantage of upcoming, available external funding with the goal of creating permanent, non-congregate bridge housing for people experiencing homelessness and report back within 30 days on how the City can leverage external funding opportunities to support permanent non-congregant housing options in Long Beach.
DISCUSSION
The findings of the 2020 Point-in- Time Homeless Count reveal that Long Beach identified 2,034 people experiencing homelessness in January 2020, compared with 1,894 people in 2019. Our homeless population is growing and many are finding themselves without housing for the first time. Of the 2,034 people counted, only 452 are considered sheltered in emergency or temporary transitional housing. That number is not due to the lack of more beds being available. According to the most recent counts, Orange Ave. Winter Shelter (80 bed capacity) is 71 percent occupied, the temporary shelter at Silverado Park (70 bed capacity) is 57 percent full, and the Martin Luther King Jr. Park shelter was closed due to its low occupancy (average occupancy rate of 30 percent).
The City of Long Beach has been looking for ways to get non-congregate shelters on the ground for our unsheltered population and for those who have been infected with the COVID- 19 virus. 133 units are online as part of the State/Federal funded Project Room Key (PRK). These rooms are for people who are over the age of 65, and/or have a chronic health condition. Currently, PRK has a 97 percent occupancy. The operation agreement is set to expire by July 31 st, leaving limited to no options for those who have been brought into shelter, many for the first time in years.
Although PRK was begun under a need to house the most vulnerable during COVID-19 the program has merit for other reasons as well. There is fear amongst our unhoused that congregate housing will lead to COVID-19 infection, but that is not the on...
Click here for full text