A special joint council meeting Saturday brought together Watsonville City Council, City Manager Rene Mendez, other city and county leaders and the public for a discussion of the swelling homeless problem.
In 2023, compared to 2022, homelessness overall rose by 15% in Watsonville while there was a drop in Santa Cruz County by 22%, according to the point-in-time count that is mandated from the Department of Housing and Urban Development .
While Watsonville city leaders are ramping up efforts to deal with rising homelessness, they came up with differing views than Santa Cruz County staff on whether the plan should focus on services for unhoused people, or take aim at illegal camps and drug use.
The meeting included oral presentation by various officials, and breakaway discussion groups where participants chalked up lists of concerns.
Helene Schneider, Senior Regional Advisor, US Interagency Council on Homeless spoke of connecting federal resources to local efforts.
Watsonville Police Chief Jorge Zamora and Watsonville Fire Battalion Chief Jon Goulding spoke of current efforts that are underway by the City of Watsonville. Zamora and Goulding spoke of stretched resources. Goulding said the Fire Department responded to 228 fires, 475 medical emergencies and two vehicle/pedestrian crashes involving homeless people.
Parks and Community Services director Nick Calubaquib, Library Director Alicia Martinez and Suzi Merriam, Community Development director, shared their ideas as well.
Calubaquib said his department strives to make park and recreation spaces safe and easy to use, and that daily cleanup fees take about 600 hours every year.
Merriam stressed the importance of understanding who the homeless are, what their needs are and what the city needs to focus on.
“We need to understand what is doable and is affordable for our residents,” she said. “We need to understand what our current capacity is, as city staff, of what resources may be necessary to take the next step…Homeless affects many different departments in the city. “What can we really take on? What can we afford to do?”
Robert Ratner, director of the County’s Housing for Health Division, spoke of a shortage of mental health workers statewide. “We simply don’t have enough resources,” he said. “If we can help people on a voluntary basis, generally the outcome is much better.”
He said that lack of staffing and funds could amount to around six more years of the homelessness problem. We don’t have enough places for people to go for treatment, and we don’t have enough resources to provide high-quality treatment.
“I don’t know how many of you have ever had to get through depression or anxiety while not having a stable place to live, or a substance use issue,” Ratner said. “If you don’t have any place to sleep at night, one of the big triggers for struggling with brain issues is not having enough sleep; it’s really hard to sleep outside.
He added that going to treatment, but then returning to sleep in a tent can render that treatment ineffective.
“If you don’t have that stable place to be, I can throw a bunch of medications and treatment at you, it’s not going to be very effective because you need that place to land for safety and security,” Ratner said.
Watsonville’s strategies have not lowered the homeless population but have only increased it.
Stop providing services to the homeless and they will move on.
“The measure of society is how it treats the weakest members.”
― Thomas Jefferson
Couldn’t agree more.
What does it say for ourselves when we dismember tens of thousands of our unborn every year…..
Help a brotha out –
Jesus Christ
The homeless are the “untouchables” of today’s American society. To undo this stigma and classification they must be integrated into the rest of our society. That task rests with us to provide for these invisible members of our society and undo the harms that they are subjected to.
So why don’t you adopt a druggie homeless person and take them into your home, and buy them their drugs Elisa?
Homelessness is a systemic issue that can’t be solved by just one individual and it is not really a long term solution. Integrating homeless individuals into society requires systemic changes such as affordable housing, mental health support, and access to job opportunities instead of being treated as less than human beings by pea sized brained people like you. Get off the internet and learn some basic human empathy.
Unfortunately, homeless will never go away in Watsonville neither will the drug and crime situation residents will have to deal with it for the foreseeable future
You can only hope that a fire or an unfortunate natural disaster will not happen to you that will surely leave you vulnerable and in need of assistance Mr Pa Watsonville
People don’t choose to be homeless except for a few young people that can generally afford to live in their vehicles as free nomads for s few years, and that’s not who we are talking about here. You cannot arrest and evict your way out of a homeless problem and what kind of a human being are you if that is what you propose. Do you think they want to be too hot in summer, too cold and wet all winter, and looked down upon (even sneered at and openly insulted to their faces) by you as you glare down at their levee camps from your $80,000 air conditioned car on your way to your job where you literally sit in a comfortable chair all day looking at a screen and pressing buttons to manipulate the information on that screen? Do you think they love the lack of dignity in standing at an intersection with a (hopefully clever) sign begging you for your pocket change so they can not starve or die from alcohol withdrawal for at least one more day? Or carrying the weight of all that recycling so early in the morning after the night you roll out your can (because the trash trucks get there mighty early) trying to tip toe down the street quietly as a mouse past a sleeping cat praying to God you don’t call the police this time, lying that they have been trespassing and stealing, when really they are just trying to turn your unwanted waste into a few shiny quarters and dimes? More shelters, job training and referral, shelters where they can drink a moderate amount to keep from going into D.T.s! No forced rehab! No camping ticket for falling asleep in public! Did you know it is fact that in costs taxpayers more to arrest, jail them, emergency room visits they cannot pay for etc. etc. than it would to house them for free with no work requirement? Seriously.