Kennel Plan for Homeless Loses Backers

In a surprising twist to the homeless debate in Irvine, an official for a nonprofit group that supported a plan to convert an animal shelter into a center for the homeless said Tuesday that the plan no longer meets the group’s needs.

Malcolm Lewis, chairman of the board of the Irvine Temporary Housing group, said that a vacant dog kennel at the Irvine Animal Care Center is not large enough to house a 50-bed homeless shelter.

Earlier this month, Lewis’ group, along with the city, received a $496,000 grant from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development to convert the kennel. Late last week, HUD ruled that the city would have to decide by Friday whether to take the money and push ahead with the project or risk losing the grant. The agency also told the city that Irvine cannot use the grant for anything other than the kennel conversion.

At a city council meeting Tuesday night, Lewis urged the council to accept the grant but to try persuading HUD officials to allow the city to use the money for other homeless project options, such as placing modular units at the animal-care site on Sand Canyon Avenue.

Lewis also urged the council to endorse efforts to raise money in the private sector to support the city’s homeless project.

He also said the national attention focused in recent weeks on the city’s homeless debate and the conversion of the dog kennel has triggered interest within the Irvine business community to aid the homeless in Irvine.

Councilman C. David Baker said that he supports expanding the current program to house homeless families in apartments scattered around the city but added that he still has serious concerns about a central facility.

He said such a facility would act as a magnet for chronic homeless and vagrants. In a letter Baker sent to many residents, the councilman--citing his own impressions and no police reports or statistics--said national attention drawn to the Sand Canyon animal center proposal had already attracted a growing number of transients to the city.

Speculation ‘Out of Place’

In response, Mayor Larry Agran, a proponent of a centralized homeless facility, called such speculation “irresponsible” and out of place.

The council was expected to make a decision about whether to accept the HUD grant or adopt a new course of action, but a vote was still pending late Tuesday night.

In September, Agran and council members Ray Catalano and Ed Dornan voted to set up some sort of shelter or “transitional housing” at the 20-acre Irvine Animal Care Center. The city agreed to help establish the centralized homeless shelter, but nonprofit Irvine Temporary Housing was to operate it.