San Antonio Officials Open Haven For Hope: 37-Acre Campus For Homeless

In just a few weeks, a brand new 37-acre campus dubbed Haven For Hope will begin accepting its first homeless residents. The dorms will house thousands of homeless men, women and children, who will receive nutritious meals and mental health services. The program aims to rehabilitate the homeless and prepare them to move on to find employment and stable housing.

Comprehensive services like those provided at Haven For Hope are typically only available in state prisons.

If successful, this ambitious program could become a new national model for homeless services.

Local news stations KENS reports from San Antonio.

WATCH:

Comments

[times up]

01:23 PM on 05/28/2010

My concern when we build camps like this is that they become concentration camps to sweep off city streets and dump off the homeless, rather than incorporate these people into the community and go from there. Is this going to become a prison for the poor? Centers for exploitation? Imagine being a kid and having to tell the other kids at school you live in a homeless camp. I see multiple-bunk dormitories there as well. Are they going to strip-search these people too? I think we can provide the same services and also offer housing within the rest of the community. This should not just be a place where police can dump homeless people, so they can feel good about not calling it a jail. Will be interesting to see what becomes of it.

[OhgReaTone]

09:57 AM on 04/17/2010

This might just work. Homeless people often congregate in communities because of primal needs of tribal acceptance - they have no where else to go where they feel comfortable. We will watch the progress of this new community. ...............

http://thefiresidepost.com/2009/02/09/homeless-community/

[tompoe]

11:29 PM on 04/16/2010

I hope they work themselves out of a job, and soon. Marvelous model for national infrastructure funds.

[klbrz]

09:48 PM on 04/16/2010

One of the most important things about this project is all the access to resources under one roof. Most cities have all kinds of charities and government programs setup to help this population, but they are all over and hard for a homeless person to get to. And there are frequently problems with miscommunications and if the poor person does manage to get transportation to some agency or charity, they might find when they get there that they really should have been directed elsewhere, after they've spent all their money on a bus ride or time walking and have to wait yet another day.

I hope it works. They compare the shelter's resources to those in jails - but I bet the shelter is much, much cheaper (now and in the long run) by getting people back into society and being productive, so you get some of that money back in sales and property taxes when they are working again.

[bushguy]

07:27 PM on 04/16/2010

Not to be a killjoy, but this won't be successful.

[texastrixie]

09:56 PM on 04/17/2010

Maybe not, but its worth trying. And for anyone in Texas to put the funds and ambition together to make this facility a reality - now that is a miracle. I haven't heard a word about this locally, but I can only hope this idea comes to Austin.

[austinhomelessadvocate]

02:12 PM on 04/18/2010

Austin has been one of the first to address the homeless population and their needs. Thanks to great programs such as Mobile Loaves & Fishes, Austin has been able to get many off the streets and in to homes of their own. MLF is working with the City to start The Jennifer Gale Memorial Village which will be like this but in a much more easily managed, more likely to succeed environment. www.mlfnow.org.

[Roz0804]

03:23 PM on 04/16/2010

The riches country in the world and we have people all across the States living in cardboard boxes or sleeping in their cars and vans. I know we can do better than that. We need to get on the Slum lords and make them bring the rent back down to a price that people can afford. Any time your rent takes 2-3 of your pay checks a month nobody can survive. The rent is so high people can't afford to keep a roof over their heads anymore. With unemployment and people losing their homes it can only get worse if we don't make some changes real quick.

[bleubunny]

06:34 AM on 04/16/2010

I always wondered why people couldn't just live in dorms all the time. Why does anyone need more.

[ThirdSection]

10:53 PM on 04/15/2010

"Spend it on the jail or help spend it here and save a life."

Kudos to that way of thinking!!!!!

[jcd8822]

08:54 PM on 04/15/2010

This is really neat. It helps those that want and need temporary assistance.

I can remember some years back that you could not give a homeless person a place to sleep for one night. They just did not want it any more. It just did not make sense.

[Smirk]

05:26 PM on 04/15/2010

Kudos, SA.