Groundbreaking Wednesday for new homeless center Groundbreaking Wednesday for new homeless center (May 05, 2004)

By Marion Softky and Jane Knoerle
Almanac Staff Writers

A Wednesday groundbreaking will mark a milestone in the six-year effort to provide a center where the homeless and near-homeless on the Midpeninsula can come for an array of services ranging from coffee and a shower, to counseling and even some housing.

The Opportunity Center of the Midpeninsula should open early in 2006 at 33 Encina Ave. in Palo Alto, off El Camino Real between the Palo Alto Medical Foundation and Town and Country Shopping Center. The Rev. Jeff Vamos of the Community Working Group (CWG), which has been planning the new center, invites the public to come at 10 a.m. May 5 "to celebrate the milestone."

"I have been waiting for a long time for a project like this to come along. I think our community has really needed to pay more attention to the problem of homelessness," said Susan Packard Orr, honorary chairman of the capital campaign. "This is way past due." The Packard Foundation has given $1 million to the campaign.

More than 600 homeless people stand to benefit from the new center, according to estimates by the Community Working Group. These include more than 150 people who visit the Palo Alto drop-in center operated by InnVision/Urban Ministry, and more than 50 women and children served by the Clara-Mateo Alliance at its Elsa Segovia Center at the Veterans Affairs hospital in Menlo Park. The center will also help people at risk of becoming homeless through job loss or family emergenies.

On the first floor of the new five-story building will be a wing, with a separate entrance, for homeless and at-risk women and children. Operated by the Clara-Mateo Alliance, the Elsa Segovia Center will also set up shop at the new center, said program director Steve Chapralis.

Services at the Elsa Segovia Center now include a library, light meals, food and clothes closets, health services, counseling, and child care. Mr. Chapralis expects to expand and reorganize the services, with some at each site. "It depends on the need," he said.

Another drop-in center on the ground floor will provide the general homeless and at-risk population with a wide range of services, from laundry and snacks, to transportation vouchers, a clothes closet, and computer help. There will also be 89 units of permanent and transitional housing for the very poor.

Funding is nearly complete for the $24 million project. Public funds from federal and state sources will provide $15 million toward construction, including $450,000 from San Mateo County. A community capital campaign, now underway, has a goal of $8 million, with $6 million already in hand.

The idea of a permanent homeless center originated in 1998 after El Nino rains temporarily flooded the present Palo Alto Drop-in Center. The Community Working Group was formed by representatives from Stanford University, the Palo Alto Human Relations Commission, the Urban Ministry, Palo Alto Chamber of Commerce and Peninsula Interfaith Action.

A first community meeting in 1998 drew more than 250 people to explore the need for a permanent structure to serve the homeless. It was sponsored by First Presbyterian Church and All Saints Episcopal Church in Palo Alto, founders of Peninsula Interfaith Action, which now works with a coalition of 18 parishes in the Midpeninsula, including Trinity Parish in Menlo Park.

The CWG was charged to find a site and the funds to develop a center. Architect Rob Quigley contributed the design. After a long process, the Palo Alto City Council voted unanimously in favor of the project in March 2003.

Jim Burklo, formerly of Menlo Park, will be honored as a catalyst for helping the homeless in local communities. Now a resident of Sausalito, Mr. Burklo worked with and for the homeless for eight years with the Urban Ministry, and later as a campus minister at Stanford.

"We tried for years to find an indoor drop-in center," the Rev. Burklo said. "Not for love nor money -- and there was no lack of either -- could we find anyone to rent to us. This effort has been blessed and it's so wonderful to see it finally happen."

For information or to donate, call 814-6518, or visit www.opportunitycenter.org.

Art for Opportunity Center

Paintings and collages by JoeSam, the mixed media painter and sculptor whose work will adorn the new Opportunity Center for the homeless breaking ground this week in Palo Alto, will be on hand, along with the artist, Friday, May 7, at 7 p.m. at the Pacific Art League, 661 Ramona St. in Palo Alto. For more information, call 321-3891.

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