A new housing complex for unhoused residents is set to open later this month in a Willow Glen neighborhood, despite what nearby residents and leaders from both the city of San Jose and Santa Clara County agree was inadequate community outreach.
A vacant building at 1185 Pedro Street — previously home to the Atria Chateau Gardens assisted living facility — has been repaired and updated to accommodate 91 housing units, as well as common areas like a kitchen, dining hall, recreational room, meeting room and laundry facilities.
The facility, which is set to begin welcoming new residents on May 17, will provide a temporary home for individuals who are in the process of obtaining permanent supportive housing but are waiting for a space to open up.
Local leaders hope more developments like this will help alleviate the region’s growing homeless crisis — which was worsened by the COVID-19 pandemic — and give more residents who are currently living without a roof over their heads a safe place to call home while they pursue more stable housing. In the past couple of years, San Jose has constructed five interim housing sites that serve a similar purpose.
While most residents in the surrounding neighborhood support the new use of the space, they have become frustrated with the lack of communication and information provided by county officials, as first reported by San Jose Inside.
On March 10, 2020, just days before the Bay Area enacted the nation’s first shelter-in-place to curb the spread of COVID-19, the Santa Clara County Board of Supervisors voted unanimously to sign a $20 million agreement to lease the building at 1185 Pedro Street through 2041 and approved a $19 million contract with Adobe Services to operate the housing site.
But many residents in the surrounding area did not learn about the county’s plans for the vacant building until many months later when county officials in November held the first of just two community meetings about the project. Residents said the first meeting lacked details on specific accountability measures — and then it was radio silence for more than four months.
In April, when county officials held a second meeting, nearby resident Gil Mendez, 74, still lacked the reassurance he had hoped for.
“We’re all for having the unhoused served, but we just want it to be done properly and with all the I’s dotted and T’s crossed,” Mendez said.
Specifically, Mendez and other community members wanted a written document that would hold the county accountable and provide more transparency about the project.
“I strongly support the work that the county is doing to address homelessness and provide an interim housing solution, but we want to make sure it’s set up so that it can be successful in the long term and that we can have procedures for how we deal with issues when they arise,” said David Zalatimo, 55, who lives near the project.
Under typical circumstances, a developer who wanted to transform a former retirement home into a housing development in San Jose would be required to go to the city’s planning department and obtain a conditional use permit for a special zoning change that would require a public hearing in front of the city’s planning commission.
In this case, Santa Clara County did not obtain a permit from the city of San Jose. The absence of such a document has led to a series of heated letters between the two parties.
Santa Clara County argued that it was not subject to San Jose’s building and zoning regulations because of “established principles of intergovernmental immunity” that exempt properties owned or lease from a county within another jurisdiction.
City officials in February 2019 allegedly told the county that there was no need for a new conditional use permit, but they changed their tune by October 2020 and asked the county to apply for one.
When San Jose officials in April again attempted to inform the county that they were required to submit an application for a conditional use permit, County Executive Jeff Smith called the city’s assertion “a political stratagem intended to kill the project.”
“I urge you to forego the façade and become a true partner in our effort to end homelessness,” Smith wrote in an April 29 letter to Chu Chang, San Jose’s acting director of planning, building and code enforcement.
Then, just earlier this week, San Jose City Manager David Sykes said that he was “surprised by the tone” of Smith’s letter and noted that several previous county projects had gone through the city’s typical land use entitlement process with “appropriate community outreach, transparency, and conditions of approval to address public health, safety, and welfare.”
In a statement to this news organization Thursday, Sykes said that he would not be pressing the matter further.
“We are not interfering with the proposed housing project on Pedro Street,” he said in the statement. “Rather, we believe there is great value in our Conditional Use Permit process that includes community involvement and considerations for how the housing project operates.”
Still, county officials conceded they did not sufficiently engage the public about the project.
In a letter to residents late last month, Smith acknowledged that the community outreach “did not meet the standards” that he and Supervisor Susan Ellenberg, who represents the district, expect.
Smith further vowed that the county’s Office of Supportive Housing would create “regular (likely quarterly) opportunities for interested community members to serve on an advisory committee” to monitor the operations at the property and bring forward any concerns they might have.
Ellenberg blamed the lack of sufficient community involvement over the project on the pandemic and the redeployment of county staff to pandemic-related issues. But she is looking for new ways to rebuild the trust.
In addition to holding an open house at the new Pedro Street site on Saturday, Ellenberg and Smith will also be hosting a community meeting on May 17. The supervisor also said she is working with Board Chair Cindy Chavez to develop community outreach standards for similar projects of this nature in the future.
“I know that trust isn’t built overnight, that it absolutely has to be earned and that is what I am working toward,” Ellenberg said in an interview Friday. “That process doesn’t end when residents move in. My hope is that this is an ongoing partnership with the community.”
San Jose councilmember Dev Davis, who represents the area where the new housing site is located, said she has been in close contact with Ellenberg’s office and is planning to take part in the anticipated community advisory committee.
“The county is not used to doing the same level of community outreach that we’re used to doing at the city,” she said. “But they’re learning, they’re trying to do course corrections now and I am confident that they will have a good model for outreach in the future.”
