The Alexandria Park Tiny Home Village in Los Angeles, which opened in April 2021
Homelessness is rising in the city. Meanwhile, two shelter programs based in Richmond hotels are closing this month, reducing the region’s inventory of temporary emergency beds as an increasing number of individuals and families struggle to find affordable housing.
On April 15, the city’s winter shelter closed, forcing roughly 134 people experiencing homelessness to go elsewhere. On Friday, April 22, an emergency shelter program for individuals and families created in March 2020 is also shuttering as federal funding runs out. The “noncongregate” shelter was established to help those considered at high risk medically during the height of the pandemic. There were 112 individuals at that facility (a Days Inn on Midlothian Turnpike) as of April 12, 50 of whom were children.
According to the most recent point-in-time count taken in January by Homeward, a nonprofit that serves as the region’s coordinating agency for homeless services, there were 739 individuals experiencing homelessness in the city and surrounding jurisdictions. There are 12 sheltering programs with 642 beds in the region, but on most days the majority of those beds are occupied.
And the problem is only expected to get worse as the state’s remaining pandemic-related eviction protections expire at the end of June.
“We have many families that are having trouble sleeping at night because they are having anxiety about where they are going to go,” City Councilwoman Stephanie Lynch, who is a clinical social worker, said during a City Council meeting last week. “Even as some of those families come and rotate off and may be able to go into other shelters, there are more families coming down the pike. That is imminent.”
Against the backdrop of an already overheated real estate market that’s spiking apartment rents and the cost of single-family homes, city leaders are scrambling to find a solution. To help offset the loss of the noncongregate shelter, city officials are working with Commonwealth Catholic Charities to expand an existing facility on Oliver Hill Way to add capacity, but it’s not enough.
The city has looked into purchasing an existing hotel or apartment building to accommodate the expected influx. It’s also exploring another option, one that has yet to generate much public attention: constructing a tiny home village.
It’s an alternative that’s gained considerable traction in other parts of the country, particularly California, where the homeless population topped 161,000 in 2020, according to the most recent data reported to the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.
The Alexandria Park Tiny Home Village sits next to Route 170 on a sliver of land that was previously considered too challenging to develop.
In Los Angeles, tiny home villages have popped up along freeways, where multicolored, shed-like abodes are laid out in rows in a miniature neighborhood grid. There are picnic tables, separate bathrooms and showers nearby.
The concept is straightforward: Tiny houses, which are typically no larger than 100 square feet, can be constructed quickly and more cheaply than larger shelters. They can offer privacy and some measure of dignity as opposed to traditional, more communal facilities, where individuals are often crammed together in large rooms.
During a City Council meeting last week, Sharon Ebert, deputy chief administrative officer for economic and community development, said her real estate services team is on the hunt for possible city-owned sites that could accommodate a tiny home village. How large the community would be, and the requisite costs, have not yet been determined.
“I’m having some positive conversations with [the Richmond Redevelopment and Housing Authority] to see if they have any sites available as well,” Ebert told members of Council’s Education and Human Services Committee on April 14. But there are obstacles: The city has plenty of 2- and 3-acre sites that sit unused, but many are located on former landfills. “Where do we have something that’s relatively flat, not contaminated and within walking distance of public transit is the challenge,” she said.
The tiny home village concept, however, hasn’t garnered much public discussion, which worries Kelly King Horne, Homeward’s executive director.
“If it’s well-managed and cost-efficient, then fantastic — that’s a win,” she says. “I think the option with tiny houses, it’s not inherently good or bad. The question is, ‘Is it meant to be shelter or housing?’ If you are talking about tiny homes because you want more shelter, have you thoroughly exhausted your existing capacity?”
In cities where shelter capacity is exhausted, such as Los Angeles, tiny homes may be the best answer, she says. But in places like Richmond, where the capacity issue is tied more directly to lack of funding, it may not be. In other words, would a tiny home village really be more efficient, and effective, than simply expanding the existing shelter programs?
Tiny home villages typically include small, shed-like houses that are no more than 100 square feet.
“We shouldn’t take any options off the table,” says Horne, who expects a cost-benefit analysis would show tiny homes are not the most efficient use of limited resources. “Adding a bit more money to your existing resources is probably more cost-effective.”
Karen Stanley, president and chief executive of CARITAS, a nonprofit that operates The Healing Place and other sheltering programs for those experiencing homelessness and individuals recovering from substance abuse, says tiny homes could be the answer.
With the growing crisis of housing affordability in the region, tiny homes aren’t necessarily a permanent solution, she says, but desperate times call for desperate measures.
“We are in unique times right now,” she says. “I just don’t know what the fault is in trying it.”
Both Stanley and Horne agree that the success of a tiny homes program will depend on cost and staffing, and not assuming it’s the right fit for everyone experiencing homelessness.
“In homelessness, there is no one silver bullet,” Horne says. “Maybe with tiny homes, it makes sense to do that. The question is, what’s our goal?”
