Elizabeth Piña lost her blanket, a pillow, bikes, cookware and food — pretty much everything she owned — the last time authorities cleared her homeless encampment and tossed her stuff in the trash. It’s happened before. “Where do we go to place our belongings?” Piña, 56, asked. “Where do we have to live?” She said...
Life inside a cramped van: A look at San Jose’s safe parking program
Joe Castro has been homeless on and off his entire life. Now, Castro, his wife, Donna Slaughter, and their three children are living inside a cramped van, using the backseat to sleep five people and the front seat as a “kitchen” while they get back on their feet. “It’s hard because our kids go to...
Santa Clara County pegs $25 million for first-time homebuyers
Owning a home in Silicon Valley might seem like an impossible goal for most working families. With average home prices in San Jose now exceeding $1 million, according to Zillow, elected leaders fear the dream of home ownership might be out of reach for nurses, teachers and public safety officers. But a new program, presented...
Santa Clara approves first-of-its-kind housing with urban farm
A farmer’s market in your backyard? The newest trend in urban agriculture is a big hit across the United States that has both millennials and seniors agreeing: Sign me up. The “Agrihood” development plan, a farm-friendly housing project focused on building residential communities around urban farmland, was unanimously approved by the Santa Clara City Council...
Dozens hit the streets for San Jose homeless count
The usually quiet San Jose roads were taken over at 4:30 a.m. Tuesday morning by 115 people scouring the city, looking for homeless residents to count as part of the two-day Santa Clara County Point-In-Time homeless census. At this hour roadways are generally steady moving without congestion, and most homeless people sleeping on the streets have...
Struggling seniors hit hard by Silicon Valley housing crisis
When Manny Escarega began caring for his ailing mother six years ago, the 57-year-old moved into her home and was forced to put his search for employment on hold. But when she died, his brother rented the house to strangers, leaving an unemployed Escarega to fend for himself on the streets. Six years later and...
San Jose homeless crisis: This is where they sleep
Underneath your highways. On your sidewalks. In their cars. San Jose is home to more than 4,300 homeless residents. And when the lights go out in Silicon Valley, this is where the unsheltered homeless population sleeps. Rosalie Carrillo sleeps on the dirt beside a sidewalk near Story Road. She got hit by a car and...
Thousands raised for San Jose firefighters who lost Paradise homes
Retired San Jose Fire Captain Jeff Shackelford devoted 25 years to battling deadly blazes — then he lost his home in the most destructive wildfire in California history. Shackelford, 88, who’s battling dementia, lost his home in the devastating Camp Fire which charred about 164,000 acres. Shackelford now lives in a memory care facility. But...
San Jose State students explore legislation to combat homelessness
San Jose State University sophomore Bahati Burgess calls an old classroom at Grace Baptist Church his home. After being priced out of the dorms last year, the 19-year-old Oakland native became one of thousands of San Jose students experiencing homelessness while trying to earn their degrees. The downtown university has an alarmingly high number of...
Santa Clara County to overhaul its foster care system after critical report
After being shuffled from one foster home to another, Dontae Lartigue found himself homeless and without a job at 19 years old. Nearly a decade later Lartigue is at the center of a massive effort to overhaul the county’s foster care system — just weeks after a new report found Santa Clara County is failing...