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Noni Ramos has some pretty big shoes to fill — and that may be the least of the challenges facing her. Ramos is the new CEO of Housing Trust Silicon Valley. She replaces longtime head Kevin Zwick, who helped the organization grow tenfold from a shoestring operation to a major player in providing affordable housing in...
Death of San Jose man spurs questions about homeless shelter capacity
On a cold and rain-soaked December night, Ruben Eldridge Hill slept beneath the entrance of an empty office building in downtown San Jose. And by 11:40 a.m. the next morning, the 55-year-old man, who’d lived on the streets for years, was dead. No one knows yet what caused Hill’s death. But many agree that his...
Collins: How does the 2021 housing market look?
Nine months ago when our world was turned upside down with a countywide stay-at-home order, none of us could have predicted the robust housing market we have been experiencing. Many of us were assuming similar outcomes as we experienced during the last great recession, but plummeting prices and mass foreclosures never materialized. In fact, sale...
Food trucks rescue Christmas dinner for San Jose homeless
A sea of RVs lined the road to CityTeam’s men’s shelter in San Jose, where the nonprofit distributed its annual Christmas Day dinner. Among them were two food trucks. Having to change plans after a case of COVID-19 was identified at the shelter and kitchen, the organization had 48 hours to find a way to...
How San Jose homeless shelters are adapting to the COVID-19 surge
COVID-19 has been tearing through sheltered living spaces in San Jose, but at least one operator of such facilities has managed to keep all of its women residents safe during the pandemic. CityTeam, which offers temporary housing to people in need, has so far kept its four women’s shelters in San Jose COVID-free, although it has had...
COVID-19 tries to cancel Christmas dinner for San Jose homeless — but fails
With a COVID-19 positive case forcing a quarantine and temporary closure of CityTeam’s kitchen, the San Jose nonprofit is scrambling to make sure its annual Christmas Day feast doesn’t sour. “We normally feed the homeless every day,” said CityTeam spokesperson Darlene Tenes. “But Christmas Day is a particularly special day because we invite them all...
Plenty of trash but little cash in San Jose program to pay homeless to pick up garbage
Weeks after San Jose Mayor Sam Liccardo announced a program to pay homeless people cash to pick up garbage around the city, people in the program say trash was left piling up and they weren’t paid for weeks — until San José Spotlight asked about it. On Dec. 19, a day after an inquiry from...
Tombstones honor 196 homeless people who died in Silicon Valley
Row after row of makeshift tombstones filled a plaza outside a county building in San Jose, each with the name of a homeless person who died on the streets of Silicon Valley this past year. “If we don’t do this, then people just don’t recognize the enormity of the problem and how many people are...
Rent prices fall 7.7% in San Jose, but mostly from a drop in demand for luxury rentals
Apartment rent prices in San Jose are falling, but that might not do a whole lot to help renters struggling to make ends meet in the pandemic-slammed local economy. The average rent in 2020 was $2,531 a month, according to a new report from apartment finder service RentCafé. That was down 7.7% from last year, one...
Airport panel rejects San Jose’s Diridon, Google project plans
A critical airport commission unanimously voted against San Jose’s Diridon plan and Google’s downtown megacampus, taking issue with proposed building heights that would disrupt the city’s international airport. Santa Clara County Airport Land Use Commissioner Glenn Hendricks admonished San Jose for failing to answer commissioner’s questions. “I’m extremely disappointed in the city of San Jose...