Tents, shopping carts, and sleeping bags line the sidewalks of many California big cities including San Diego with entire pavements held by nomadic neighborhoods with homeless people.
There is one downtown, however, that seems to have escaped a homeless problem: Coronado.
Mayor Richard Bailey recently made national headlines by appearing on FOX News and KUSI to discuss how he’s found an answer to homelessness.
However, The Coronado News found that the key reason the city has virtually no homeless people is that the Coronado Police Department rounds up homeless individuals and takes them to shelters in San Diego. And, Bailey acknowledged that it’s challenging for homeless people to get onto the island.
California haven for homelessness
California, and especially Southern California, has become an attraction for the homeless with its mild weather and policies by officials in several metro cities who have allowed homelessness to expand, according to critics.
In San Diego, former NBA superstar and broadcaster Bill Walton last fall publicly crusaded against Mayor Todd Gloria for what Walton called the city’s lack of effort to move homeless people off the streets.
Catherine Augustine, a homeless woman living on the outskirts of downtown San Diego, told The Coronado News that the weather is what brought her here – and she’s not alone.
According to the Downtown San Diego Partnership’s Monthly Unsheltered Count, there were 1,837 homeless people in downtown San Diego in February.
For 2022, there were 4,106 unsheltered homeless people, according to the San Diego Regional Task Force on Homelessness.
One homeless person in Coronado
In Coronado?
The 2022 report found one homeless person.
That 2022 report would seem to agree with Bailey’s statement.
Yet, that report also shows that Coronado went from 16 homeless individuals in 2020, to just one last year.
And, another Point in Time count, the annual count estimating the number of homeless persons in San Diego County, shows that there were only six homeless individuals in Coronado in 2016, when Bailey was first elected.
Geographically protected
While records show there have historically been few homeless people in Coronado, there seems to be several factors as to why the Crown City has managed to escape an issue that has affected larger communities.
Bailey said the low number is attributed to “our geographic location…and our approach. And that approach is making a sincere effort to connect people with the resources they need to get back on their feet.”
With only a few points of entry to Coronado including a bridge with no room for pedestrians, about 7 miles of highway along Silver Strand between Coronado and Imperial Beach, and a ferry to and from San Diego, there are limited ways to get onto the island.
Miss T.J., a homeless woman living in downtown San Diego said that there is no reason for her to go to Coronado when she has a stable place on the sidewalks of 16th and Market streets.
“It doesn’t make sense for me to go over there.”
-Miss T.J., a homeless woman in San Diego.
“If you just recently lost your job, it makes sense to stay [in Coronado]; but it doesn’t make sense for me to go over there,” she says.
But there are those who do make it to Coronado.
No shelters in Coronado
City of Coronado spokeswoman Andrea McCullough told The Coronado News that 58 homeless individuals who were found in Coronado in 2021 were taken to homeless shelters in San Diego.
These homeless shelters include St. Vincent de Paul Village, which is located just south of East Village in downtown San Diego on Imperial Avenue and the Joan Kroc Center, according to Bailey.
There are no shelters in Coronado.
Police approach
In a 2021 Sheltered: Housing Inventory Count (HIC) report by the San Diego Regional Task Force on the Homeless, the numbers show that around 20 to 30% of the housing provided for people experiencing homelessness were not being utilized in 2021.
In an interview with KUSI, Bailey said that, “if anyone wanted shelter space, there was shelter available for people that legitimately wanted help.”
These shelter spaces include permanent, emergency and transitional housing.
According to McCullough, the Coronado Police Department has a Psychiatric Emergency Response Team (PERT) clinician in Coronado four days a week who provides emergency assessments and referral for individuals in behavioral health crises.
Coronado’s police officers are also trained on working with people with mental health challenges, with a specific officer designated as the Homeless Liaison Officer.
That officer’s role includes providing a list of assistance programs and other resources to department employees, and developing training to assist officers in understanding current legal and social issues related to the homeless, according to the police department’s policy manual.
