Agencies Ponder Uses of Prop. 95 Funds

If Proposition 95 passes on Tuesday, government officials will look to those now providing services to the homeless for advice on how to spend $50 million to $90 million in aid to the homeless.

The initiative would require county supervisors to survey the needs of the homeless and agencies that serve them in creating a master plan for dealing with the problem.

While some shelters and other facilities will be constructed with Proposition 95 money, most of it should be spent on making existing programs work better.

That is the consensus of service providers and government officials contacted by The Times to learn how they would use the Proposition 95 funds.

Minimum of $50 Million

By most estimates, the minimum of $50 million the initiative would seek to raise through new fines on violations of health, safety and building codes is easily attainable.

The California Grocers Assn., which opposes the measure, figured that the measure could raise anywhere from $35 million to $100 million from grocery store health violations alone. Restaurants, apartment buildings, health clubs and other businesses subject to the codes would potentially bring in still more, perhaps even the $90 million set as an upper limit in the initiative.

Gene Boutillier, director of emergency services for the United Way of Greater Los Angeles, said that at the minimum of $50 million, Proposition 95 would match the amount of money currently available to California from combined state and federal homeless programs.

In Los Angeles County, that would be about $15 million, he said. His figures do not include the cost of the county’s general relief program mandated by the state Constitution and other programs such as mental health that are related to homelessness.

The biggest question facing government officials and service providers would be how best to spend the money Proposition 95 would bring in.

Service providers such as Father Joe Carroll, founder of the St. Vincent DePaul Center in San Diego, say that many shelters are able to house the homeless but do not have the budget necessary to hire social workers, job counselors and doctors that can help the people deal with their problems, find work and get back into the mainstream.

Shelters, Carroll said, “need the money to finish the product.” The product is people whom Carroll and others hope to return to the ranks of those who are housed and working.

“Proposition 95 would put some services in the structures,” said Maxine Johnston, founder of the Weingart Center on Skid Row in Los Angeles. Johnston, whose center is the largest of its kind in the state, said she would apply for funds under Proposition 95 to provide case workers for job programs, drug counseling, additional medical services and expanded food services.

The Valley Shelter in North Hollywood, for example, already provides housing, medical care and job counseling. Under Proposition 95, officials said, they would apply for funds to provide still more necessary services such as child care while parents are looking for work.

The city of Los Angeles gave the Valley Shelter a grant to build a child-care facility, but Nancy Bianconi, director of housing operations for the nonprofit Los Angeles Family Housing organization that operates the shelter, said she now needs to find the funds to pay for a staff to actually operate the center.

‘Processing Centers’

“Shelters should be processing centers to get people into permanent low-cost housing,” and not be an end in themselves, Bianconi said.

Bianconi said Proposition 95 could also help fill in the financing gaps left by other government programs.

One federal program that helps support the Valley Shelter runs out in nine months, Bianconi said. Proposition 95 funds could keep that housing program running for the rest of the year and help provide continuity, she said.

20 Families Aided

The kind of one-stop shopping Proposition 95 proponents would like to see was illustrated Wednesday in an effort aimed at aiding 20 homeless families.

The families have been brought to a dusty tent encampment at the Sepulveda Dam Recreation area in the San Fernando Valley where they will be provided with one-stop shopping for social services. By week’s end, the sponsors of the Halfway Home project promise, the families will be offered a job and a place to live that they can afford.

“As a society we have an obligation to help those who want to help themselves,” said Conway Collis, a member of the State Board of Equalization and the major backer of the initiative. “That is why we are here today. And that is what Proposition 95 will do.”