The Sunnyvale Sun
News
Valley's homeless come in from the cold
By Stephen Baxter
On most nights, Richard Stephenson sleeps under a bridge on Berryessa Road near the San Jose Flea Market. Stephenson is 54 and homeless.
He has a patchy beard, wears wire-rimmed glasses, two sweaters and jeans, and he says he was born in Memphis, Tenn.
During some of the sub-freezing nights last week, he says he slept under the bridge with 14 sleeping bags. Down there, the only thing louder than the jets landing at Norman Y. Mineta San Jose International Airport is the rush of a drainage ditch below.
Many homeless people camp there, but nobody bothers Stephenson because no one sleeps on his side of the underpass.
One night last week, Stephenson left the bridge to spend the night in the emergency shelter at the National Guard Armory in Sunnyvale, where he was fed dinner and given a blue foam mat to sleep on the concrete floor. It was about 70 degrees inside.
"Being homeless is a lifestyle," Stephenson said. "No rent to pay...I never did like having a roof over my head unless it was raining."
Homeless advocates say some people will always choose to live outside. But many of the homeless who escaped the cold at the shelter last week said they have jobs but can't make ends meet financially.
Tom, 41, works at a construction site in Sunnyvale. Wearing a hooded camouflage jacket, he was the second person in a line of about 40 to get into the armory on Jan 16.
He' slept in the Sunnyvale shelter before and said he appreciated the 7 p.m. dinner and early breakfast. Movies are screened on an old TV on a metal stand the armory, which is set up like a gymnasium. A basketball hoop hangs near the administrative offices of the National Guard ,and up to 225 people can sleep on the court.
Tables and folding chairs are set up to serve meals, and more than 125 inch-thick mats are usually laid out in rows, generally about 18 inches from the next person.
The armory exceeded its regular 125-person capacity on most nights during the last few weeks when temperatures dipped as low as 29 degrees. A Santa Clara County state of emergency allowed the shelter to extend its closing time from 6 a.m. to 10 a.m. through Jan. 17.
EHC Lifebuilders, a San Jose-based nonprofit, said it would continue to exceed its normal capacity there, but it has returned to regular hours of 6 p.m. to 6 a.m.
At the shelter last week, a 6-foot-1, 220-pound, 49-year-old man named Blue stayed at the armory. He had slept there for 10 consecutive nights.
Dressed in clean blue jeans and work boots, Blue says he has driven trucks, done demolition work and even helped run a computer hardware company in better days.
"You see me and you'd never think I was homeless. Some people have bought into the homeless lifestyle," he says. "I view this as a temporary lifestyle.''
Not long ago, he spent a night in a ditch by a railroad line near the Sunnyvale Caltrain station. He's often worked temporary jobs for a labor firm in Mountain View, and he says he's trying to get his life back on track.
Stephanie Schaaf, a spokeswoman for EHC, said the type of shelter in Sunnyvale is not a long-term solution. The city needs more affordable housing, she said.
The group reports more than 7,000 people in the county regularly sleep outdoors. "Homelessness is a year-round problem," Schaaf says.
EHC Lifebuilders is looking for donations of old blankets, sleeping mats and warm coats, which can be dropped off at the armory at 620 E. Maude Ave. or at 2011 Little Orchard St. in San Jose. Food donations are also welcome in Sunnyvale. More information is available at www.ehclifebuilders.org.
