The City of San Luis Obispo has yet to find a safe parking spot for homeless people living in their vehicles. RV parks are expensive in our county and for most homeless people these fees are out of the question. Plus, there is a limit on the number of nights you can stay.
The County of San Luis Obispo has a Homeless Services Division with staff dedicated to the homeless situation, but they still haven’t managed to come up with additional safe places for people to park. The City of San Luis Obispo has a dedicated Homelessness Response Manager but other than Prado parking (that is always full) there are no other safe parking sites for the homeless population.
Santa Barbara has had safe parking since 2004 with 31 parking lots serving 200 homeless people. Why can’t we manage at least one safe parking site? Making it additionally arduous for homeless people is a new city ordinance in Morro Bay that you can only park for 24 hours in a spot and then must move on. Advocates for the homeless in the county, such as Hopes Village, have struggled to fill the widening gaps in available housing and parking sites for homeless people. Hopes Village has now housed 140 veterans and their families in RVs. There are now no legal places at all for homeless people to be – on public land or in their RVs. How can we allow veterans to be homeless? At least giving them a donated RV is better than sleeping on the ground – especially as the weather cools and the rainy season comes.
Sadly, now the police are ticketing people sleeping in their cars, criminalizing homeless people. Available homeless shelters are few and far between. Prado homeless shelter is always full, and they allow RVs but no trailers. Apparently, there are 400 people on the waiting list to get into Prado. Perhaps priority at homeless shelters should be given to handicapped people, veterans and women with children and more safe parking spaces created for people that are one step away from being on the street or at our neighborhood parks.
Kate Albert
Cayucos,