County OKs Using Motel as Shelter for Homeless

A North Hollywood motel will soon begin providing its beds to San Fernando Valley residents under a federally funded program approved Tuesday by the county Board of Supervisors.

Larry Johnson, the county’s assistant director of community and senior citizens services, said homeless families and individuals will be provided vouchers by Better Valley Services, a social services agency. The vouchers will be good for a temporary stay at the Fiesta Motel, 7843 Lankershim Blvd., he said.

The program, which will use a $50,000 Federal Emergency Management Agency grant, will begin by March 1 and will be the first of its kind in the Valley, Johnson said.

77 Rooms at Motel

While some of the Fiesta’s 77 rooms are used by homeless persons, the rest of the facility will continue to operate as a motel.

The money for shelter vouchers will be administered by the Valley Interfaith Council, which is made up of churches and synagogues and has estimated that the Valley’s homeless population now ranges from 5,000 to 10,000 persons.

Johnson, who said the county estimates the Valley homeless population at 2,000 to 3,000, said, “There is a critical need here, and we need to respond to it.”

The Valley has only one organized shelter for the homeless, the Valley Rescue Mission in Pacoima.

Johnson said the voucher program, used elsewhere in the county at hotels, was proposed by several Valley social service agencies who have been serving the homeless “as best they can.”

He said the Valley program “won’t be anything like the Skid Row hotels” that are paid by the county to house the homeless and have been criticized for their poor conditions.

“It’s a decent motel in a nice, safe area,” he said. “The owners have even offered to set aside several rooms for counseling and staff.”

Johnson said the Valley’s homeless “are much different from the downtown homeless--there are a lot of families and children. You don’t get the typical street people, the mentally ill, or the down-and-outers.

“Our average is a family of three, often a single parent with two kids and out of work,” he said.

Most of the Valley’s homeless previously had jobs, lost them and could not find work after their unemployment benefits ran out, Johnson said.

Better Valley Services will process those who are seeking help, provide them with bed vouchers and a give them counseling, job referral and other services they might need to help them “get back into the system,” Johnson said.