In what’s become a repeat annual drama, it looks like Orange County won’t be offering any countywide cold weather shelter to people living on the streets.
Ironically, what used to be acknowledged officially as an oversight – the lack of county walk up shelters for people sleeping on the streets – has now become official policy across Orange County.
In recent years, National Guard armories in both Santa Ana and Fullerton used to open during cold weather. But that’s no longer happening. Last year, Anaheim stepped up at the last minute – offering shelter through a network of churches.
This year, it’s unclear if any agency will offer walk up winter shelter.
The lack of walk up shelters comes at a time where many city officials – frustrated by their inability to curb homeless camps at parks, libraries and public areas, along with aggressive panhandling – have initiated camping crackdowns in the wake of a conservative Supreme Court majority decision, along with direction from progressive state leaders like Gov. Gavin Newsom.
“Efforts to help people obtain shelter and get out of the weather is a year-round effort and focus for the County of Orange,” stated county spokeswoman Molly Nichelson through an official statement when I asked about the lack of walk up cold weather shelters.
“The County remains committed to building a System of Care that best meets the needs of people experiencing homelessness and other vulnerabilities,” Nicholson added.
“As such, the transition to an inclement weather shelter model, as opposed to solely a cold weather shelter model, which was determined in support with the Commission to Address Homelessness, allows the County and the Homeless Service System to respond to severe and inclement weather events, including cold weather, rain, and extreme heat,” she stated.
Nichelson accurately summarized that the County of Orange has indeed really expanded shelter offerings – with two main county shelters in operation as well as a host of navigation centers in several cities like Huntington Beach and Buena Park and several emergency shelters in places like Tustin.
“The County operates two emergency shelter programs, Bridges at Kraemer Place and the Yale Navigation Center, with a total bed capacity of 625 beds, and provides funding to more than 12 other emergency shelter programs, providing approximately 1,000 beds,” Nicholson noted.
County officials indicate that people who are seeking shelter at Bridges at Kraemer Place and the Yale Navigation Center can contact the County’s Outreach & Engagement team for support. Their phone number is 800-364-2221.
Yet if you push through the large numbers of homeless beds announced by officials, it’s easy to see the gaps.
According to the county’s own estimates, there’s only about a dozen shelter beds available in their main shelters. And most of these shelters require a referral
The current occupancy at Bridges at Kraemer Place is 190 while maximum occupancy is 200, according to figures forwarded by the county. .
The current occupancy at the Yale Navigation Center is 413 with a maximum occupancy of 425.
In addition, the most critical gap areas can be seen in the areas with chronic homeless populations – such as Santa Ana’s First Street or Beach Boulevard in Stanton and Anaheim.
These are people that city officials often label as “service resistant,” but come out whenever nonprofit groups like Wound Walk come to them and meet them where they are at.
“We are told that with the new beds there wasn’t much of a need,” said Michael Sean Wright, director of Field Medicine, Lestonnac Clinics and founder of WoundWalk.org, which offers medical services to people living on the streets.
“Absolutely nonsense,” is what Wright said about the official reasoning for the lack of walk up shelters and services.
He added, “We know that those with disabilities will not have adequate access to beds. We have a shortage of beds like every year. It makes no sense that we as a county have decided that the suffering should continue.”
Earlier this month, I spent some time with Wright on the streets in Santa Ana, near the DMV where waves of homeless roam the streets amidst working class neighborhoods, where residents are desperately trying to defend their own quality of life.
The scenes on these streets are stark, enough to make one question how human beings can survive on such tough streets and how officials can consistently keep missing these people despite millions sent by taxpayers through a series of propositions, taxes and initiatives.
At the same time, homeless deaths have skyrocketed across Orange County — so much that the Sheriff’s Department initiated a study to examine the trend, concluding that most deaths were attributable to drug overdoses.
[Read: Does Orange County Need Another Homeless Survey? Report Shows Increase in Deaths]
Wright – who spends a lot of time with chronically homeless people – notes that many of the people who land on the streets aren’t drug addicts at the start of their journey, but quickly get addicted as they work to self-medicate deep wounds that are heightened by street life.
Religious leaders also have noticed the trend, establishing an eerie holiday tradition of recognizing the dead.
This Saturday, the ninth annual Homeless Persons’ Inter-religious Memorial Service will take place at 7 p.m. at the Lutheran Church of the Cross in Laguna Woods, timed to coincide with the first official night of winter – the longest and often coldest night of the year.
The service includes reading out loud the names of each person who has died on the streets this year.
For each name, a candle is carried across the sanctuary space and placed alongside the others, becoming a stark reminder of the magnitude and tragedy.
Last year, a record 511 names were read aloud.
The Homeless Persons’ Interreligious Memorial Service has included representatives from the Catholic, Episcopalian, Jewish, Zoroastrian, Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, Assyrian Church of the East, African Methodist, Bahá’í, Muslim and Lutheran faiths.
OC Supervisor Vicente Sarmiento acknowledges the gaps in the system as well as the strain on neighborhoods that are struggling with chronic homeless people, adding that he is pushing county officials to explore a network of housing pods in public areas that could provide those on the streets with the ability to regather their senses.
He expects to bring back options in January.
Every month in Voice of OC’s community opinion section, Father Dennis Kriz of St. Philip Benizi Catholic church in Fullerton writes an article naming every person who died on the streets the month prior.
This year, he predicts over 400 people will die on the streets.
Kriz, who routinely advocates for and provides direct help to homeless people, not only lists the deceased in his monthly articles, but also details how some families struggle to get into Orange County’s limited shelters.
“A member of a local service provider said that in October there were 22 families with children with disabilities in North OC who were waiting to get into shelter, and 32 families where the family head was with a disability who were waiting to get into shelter.”