San Diego Unseen: An Urban Portrait
At the corner of First Avenue and Elm Street, at the cusp of Bankers Hill and downtown, a light-box sign announcing the future home of the San Diego Rescue Mission is, for now, a question rather than a declaration.
Up until a couple weeks ago, the Rescue Mission planned to move its homeless-services program out of East Village, where the mission is currently split between two buildings, and into the six-story former Harborview Medical Center at 120 Elm St. Upon completion, the new facility would offer drug and alcohol treatment programs, counseling centers, transitional living units and an emergency shelter. The City Council also approved a morning meal service that would be phased in over six months to ensure that pre- or post-meal loitering doesn't become a problem.
These plans, however, came to a halt on July 14 when Superior Court Judge Wayne Peterson ruled that the city of San Diego failed to fully analyze whether the number of people the Rescue Mission expects to house (anywhere from 450 to 750) exceeds the limit the number of residents allowed-for obvious safety reasons-in Lindbergh Field's "approach zone." The judge also found that the city broke its own law forbidding homeless services within a quarter mile of each other.
Spearheading the lawsuit was a parent group from Washington Elementary School in Little Italy, attended by roughly 370 students and sitting five blocks west, across Interstate 5, from the new Rescue Mission building. The suit was filed shortly after the City Council approved the Rescue Mission's move in November 2002, said Rescue Mission spokesperson Keith Hammond. Though City Council support was unanimous, the Rescue Mission's new neighbors argued vociferously against it, claiming it would become a magnet, prompting homeless migration from East Village.
Hammond said Rescue Mission staff held five community meetings since March to give locals a chance to voice their concerns. "We were definitely moving forward," he said. "We have done and continue to do everything on our end" to ensure safety and security.
Several hundred thousand dollars of Rescue Mission money has already gone into rehabbing the building, and the mission has sold its East Village property to condo developers. If Peterson's decision stands, the Rescue Mission will be without a home come November. Rescue Mission CEO Jim Jackson said his organization plans to appeal the judge's ruling. He said the Rescue Mission spent two years getting everything in order to move to the new facility, and he thought they, as well as city staff, had considered everything. The judge's ruling, he added, "surprised everyone. The neighbors who brought this suit were very creative."
Deputy City Attorney David King said city staff felt they had fully accounted for the Rescue Mission's impact on the airport. Regardless, the problem could be remedied by a more thorough study as to whether the Rescue Mission would put too many people in harm's way, said Jackson. That study would take an estimated six months to complete.
The real issue, Jackson and King concur, is the violation of a city law that, in theory, seeks to prevent a ghetto of homeless services. By law, there must be a quarter mile's space between, for example, an agency providing free meal service and another that offers an emergency shelter. As Peterson put it in his ruling, "homeless facilities may not be located within one quarter mile of another homeless facility."
King said Peterson's finding could be read as one person's interpretation of the law. Nothing in the law explicitly states that one can't provide a variety of services under the same roof, he said. "[City law] doesn't seem to preclude this particular facility."
For now, King said, the ruling applies only to the Rescue Mission. However, if the ruling is upheld in appeals court, future applicants looking to set up a multi-faceted outreach program-also known as continuum of care programs-would be denied an operating permit.
