VENTURA : Group Loses Grant for Homeless Shelter

Project Understanding, a nonprofit group serving the homeless, has forfeited a $200,000 grant from the city of Ventura because it has not found a suitable site to build a shelter.

The group has been trying since December, 1988, to find a site for the city’s first year-round shelter for homeless families, said Matthew Heim, vice president of the group’s board of directors.

The city grant, offered on the condition that Project Understanding purchase a site by June 30, was revoked after the deadline passed and the organization was unable to complete negotiations on a proposed site in west Ventura.

“We’re back to ground zero,” said Heim, adding that Project Understanding will keep trying to find another location and will reapply for funds in January.

The nonprofit group had hoped to purchase a motel in an undisclosed location that would have housed up to 60 people. However, the deal fell through when the owner refused to sell, he said.

Two earlier efforts to purchase property to provide temporary housing for the area’s homeless also failed.

Plans to convert the DeAnza Hotel on Ventura Avenue into a shelter fell through in early 1989 when the organization realized that it was not eligible for federal and state funding, Heim said.

An attempt in 1989 to locate the shelter on a vacant lot on North Ventura Avenue collapsed when the City Council wouldn’t guarantee city water to the site, he said.

The setbacks will delay the nonprofit organization’s plans to build a shelter for homeless families. “We’ll try to get the funding again, but because of our lack of performance, I’m not even sure the city would be interested,” Heim said.

Councilman Todd Collart, who is a member of a council housing subcommittee, said he would welcome future applications from Project Understanding.

The group is considering whether to purchase a building in downtown Ventura with private funds, a strategy that would place fewer restrictions on the way the shelter is run, Heim said.

“We would have to operate the shelter on a much smaller scale, but then we could pursue a type of program that governmental funding sources would not allow,” he said.