The idea was to create a new “low-barrier” shelter model that would let homeless people come in with their partners, pets and belongings, stay 24/7, and get unusually intensive counseling help for housing, drugs, mental illness or whatever else they needed to get stable. It was risky — running such a shelter costs twice as much, at about $100 a bed per night, as a normal emergency shelter, and no one knew how effective the extra attention would be.
According to figures from the city Department of Homelessness and Supportive Housing, 57 percent of the nearly 3,000 people who have come through the system got housed. More than a dozen cities from Santa Rosa to Seattle and Austin, Texas, are copying the model, and San Francisco plans to add two more Navigation Centers in the next year.
Jonnathan Mancilla, 38, is more typical of a Navigation client. Last week when he moved into the Minna Lee supportive housing complex on Sixth Street — it’s still being readied for full opening — he ended a lifetime of jail stays, rushes to emergency rooms from being shot or attacked, and general street aimlessness with a few jobs in between that began when he ran away from home at 14.
“I never trusted anyone or anything, but this HOT (Homeless Outreach Team) lady kept harassing me over and over until I thought, ‘OK, I’ll give it a try,’” he said as he hauled clothing and stereo equipment toward his room. “Nobody ever tried to help me before. I slept in a wooden box for a long time, but these guys?”
He paused as a tear squeezed out of one eye. “They didn’t just see me as a street guy. They saw me as a human. I never thought I’d see that.”
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