Shortly before dinner on Thursday, an unconventional family
gathered in their living room to chat and watch the movie
”
Goldfinger.
”
The big-screen TV was donated. The Christmas tree was donated.
And although they called each other brother and sister, they aren’t
actually related.
Shortly before dinner on Thursday, an unconventional family gathered in their living room to chat and watch the movie “Goldfinger.” The big-screen TV was donated. The Christmas tree was donated. And although they called each other brother and sister, they aren’t actually related.
The setting of this family scene is the county’s winter homeless shelter, which opened its doors on Monday for a second year of service.
“They’ve been very good to us,” ex-Hell’s Angel Johnny Gonzales said. “They’ve tried their best to provide for us and give us love.”
Six dorm rooms from the migrant working camp off Southside Road have been converted into one large room, which has been furnished with bunk beds. The shelter opens at 6pm and accepts people until 9:30pm, a half hour before lights-out. Those using the facilities will be bussed back into town at 6am. The shelter will be open until mid-March.
Gonzales, whose mane of black and silver hair has earned him the nickname “the lion king,” said he’s been homeless for 15 years. If it wasn’t for the shelter, he’d be out in the cold. And this week, the nights have been cold indeed, with temperatures sometimes dropping below freezing.
Gonzales, 50, said he first became homeless when his parents died.
“Since then, I gave up on life,” he said. “I’ve been in and out of jail.”
When he’s not at the shelter, Gonzales tries to make money by recycling cans. Much of his food comes from thrown-away meals and leftovers at local fast food restaurants.
When asked why he calls others who are homeless his brothers and sisters, Gonzales said, “We look out for each other.”
As for the future, Gonzales said he’s been praying and trying to pick himself up. Shelter manager Leigh Dietz thinks there’s hope for many of the those staying in the shelter.
“As long as they want to (improve their situation), they will,” she said. Dietz acknowledged that some people are homeless because they want to be. “But others, they’re tired of it now. They’re ready to take that one extra step to get an apartment, get a job, whatever their goals are.”
Dietz said 10 people checked into the shelter on Thursday night. Last year, the shelter housed 77 people overall; Dietz estimated that half of them stayed for more than two nights.
The community has been generous in its support of the shelter, Dietz said. She gets three or four calls a day from people offering to volunteer or donate, and she noted that everything in the shelter is donated, except for the bunkbeds.
Right now, the shelter is funded solely by donations and a two-year block grant from the county’s Community Services and Workforce Development division. The CSWD recently lost the funding for its transitional housing – a six-month housing program – and Deputy Director Maria Fehl has said there’s always uncertainty involved with state and federal grants.
When asked if she’s worried that the shelter’s financial future could be at risk, Dietz said, “I don’t know. I hope not.”
She added that the shelter is looking for other grant and fundraising sources. They made around $10,000 at the “Jazz Under the Stars” benefit, Dietz said; another fundraiser is scheduled for July at the Ridgemark Country Club.
Dietz estimated that around 80 percent of the homeless are in dire straits for family-related reasons. That’s true of Gonzales, as well as fellow shelter resident Maria Sandoval Rodriguez, who said she lost housing soon after her children were taken away by the government.
“I went down within a year quick,” she said.
Rodriguez, 40, said she’s been applying for jobs, and she’s starting to have hope. She said still sees her kids at church and around town, but their closeness is gone.
“That’s a tough one to get over,” she said. “But I can’t feel sorry for myself. I can’t look back.”
To volunteer or make donations, contact Dietz at (831) 801-9531.
Anthony Ha covers local government for the Free Lance. Reach him at (831) 637-5566 ext. 330 or [email protected].
