The Need

Twenty thousand people are homeless in Santa Clara County each year, according to recent studies. On any given day, one can find approximately 650 chronically homeless persons residing in southern San Mateo and northern Santa Clara counties, as well as thousands of others who are at-risk of becoming homeless, having fallen through the gaps in our community's social safety net. Many have lost their homes due to the growing shortage of affordable housing in this area; there is an acute lack of truly affordable housing for very low-income persons in the Midpeninsula community. Many of these people live from paycheck to paycheck. Some live on little or no income. They have been left out of the prosperity of Silicon Valley, and need the opportunity to participate in the stable living that most of us enjoy.

Families with young children are most disrupted by homelessness, and they comprise a large segment of the growing homeless population. The Elsa Segovia Center, run by InnVision's Clara-Mateo Alliance at the Veteran's Administration Hospital campus in Menlo Park, provides a place for families to stop and rest, take showers, and get medical treatment. But these services need to be greatly expanded to meet the growing need. And the greatest need is for affordable permanent housing to help families stabilize their lives.

In Palo Alto prior to the completion of the Opportunity Center, only very basic drop-in services were offered to homeless/at-risk individuals, four hours each weekday in a small, outdoor area behind the American Red Cross building.

Some Alarming Facts About Homelessness:

• 700,000 Americans are homeless on any given night, and two million people will be homeless in the U.S. this year (National Law Center on Homelessness and Poverty, 1999)
• Children under the age of 18 account for 25% of the urban homeless population (U.S. Conference of Mayors, 1998)
• Veterans make up 40% of homeless men (Rosenheck et al., 1996)
• Domestic violence is a primary cause of homelessness identified by 46% of cities surveyed (U.S. Conference of Mayors, 1998)
• Severe and persistent mental illness afflicts 20-25% of the single adult homeless population (Koegel et al., 1996)