Fresno Mayor Has A New Plan To Help Homeless

Monday, October 01, 2007

By Maureen Naylor

10/01/2007 (KFSN) -- His first plan for the homeless failed. Now Fresno Mayor Alan Autry's "Plan B" is going before the city council Tuesday. The strategy is housing and help for the mentally ill.

The mayor wants to add more sheds to house 88 homeless along with a mental health facility.

Delilah Hernandez just celebrated her 33rd birthday and 5 months of sobriety and says living in a city- funded shed would help keep her clean.

"I would like to move into one of them so I would have a place to stay and I'd be warm, because right now I'm staying over in front of the mission and I only have 4 blankets," says Hernandez.

The Poverello House estimates hundreds of people like Delilah are sleeping on the streets of downtown Fresno, the majority with addiction and mental illness issues.

Fresno's Mayor wants to give them a step up, replacing an old gas station at G and San Benito Streets with 44 sheds like the ones down the street.

Bruce Rudd, Fresno City Assistant Manager, says "Those facilities are full 90 plus percentage of the time." Rudd says living in the sheds means no drugs or alcohol, or fires. The most important element he says is adding a county mental health services trailer to help some change their lifestyle.

"As far as condoning it, I don't believe we're condoning it. In fact we're trying to provide a temporary way for people to get from living on the street to some level of normalcy back in their lives," says Rudd.

The plan would initially cost the city $250,000, then $17,000 a month. $10,000 of that going to the Poverello House for blankets and staffing. The idea is Plan B, after an effort failed to set up a camp down the street and next to Rod Frankian's business.

"I think that's where it belonged from the beginning. The whole idea of our city government running a homeless shelter to me doesn't make a lot of sense. I think it should be left up to the people who know how to do it," says Frankian.

However several council members want more details. Jerry Duncan, Fresno City Council Member, says "My concerns are quite simple. I'm not convinced what's being proposed is going to work. It's one thing to build a facility, but if no one's going to use it, we just wasted a lot of money."

One way the city would try and get people to move is by getting rid of the porti-potties and security guard at the Monterey Street underpass and instead shift the funding to this new project.

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