130-Bed Shelter Planned for Women and Children

The San Diego Rescue Mission has bought a 42,000-square-foot tract just southeast of downtown on which it plans to build a 130-bed facility for homeless women and children, mission President David L. Shepersky said this week.

The $3-million Rachel Grosvenor Family Center for Women and Children will be the largest women’s shelter in San Diego County and is planned “in direct response to a critical need for facilities for the estimated 2,000 or more homeless women and children roaming our streets daily,” Shepersky said in a statment.

Work on the center is scheduled to begin next month and is expected to be completed by September, the statement said.

There are fewer than 300 beds available for single mothers and their children throughout the county, said Frank Landerville, director of the Regional Task Force on the Homeless. The new center will raise that number by half.

From 500 to 700 homeless families roam the county’s urban centers, the “overwhelming majority” of them headed by single mothers, Landerville said. Most of the mothers are victims of abuse, or were abandoned by their spouses and families, he said.

Most facilities available for women and children are on an emergency short-term basis, but the Grosvenor Family Center will offer a full rehabilitation program to help the families get back on their feet, said Al Busse, who is in charge of raising funds for the project.

The Rescue Mission so far has raised $2.25 million in its $5.75-million campaign, a goal that includes funding for a transitional center for homeless people and an underwriting endowment. Busse said he is busy seeking money from foundations, community organizations, businesses and individuals.

He would not disclose how much was paid for the lot, at 16th Street and National Avenue.

The Grosvenor Family Center will offer job training and child care. Families will be allowed to stay for extended periods, probably up to a year, Busse said.

The Rescue Mission now operates a 250-bed facility for men at 11th Avenue and J Street, but has no facilities for women, he said. Increasing numbers of homeless women and their children have been showing up in the mission’s food lines, about a dozen women and about 20 children each night.

“I think that’s what caused this whole thing to get started,” Busse said. “More and more women have been showing up for the evening meal . . . and have been asking whether they can stay for the night. We have to say no, and then they walk away, and we wonder where they’ve gone.”

The St. Vincent de Paul-Joan Kroc Center, the county’s largest shelter, houses 30 to 40 homeless women and children a night, said Harvey Mandel, director of the shelter’s operations. He said growing numbers of women and children are applying to stay at the shelter, and are taking advantage of the cold-weather program, which served a record 450 people Monday night.

“You’re going to see more and more single women and children that are going to wind up on the streets,” he said, explaining that single mothers and their children suffer most in a slow economy because the mothers usually have limited job skills, making them especially vulnerable to layoffs, and are also often the sole wage earner in the family.

“They’re always living on the edge,” Mandel said.

Women will be housed at the new center in 21 single-family rooms, with four beds and a bassinet or crib in each, Busse said. Each room will have a closet and will share a bathroom with one other unit. There will also be a dormitory with 30 beds.

Other facilities planned include a clinic, nursery, child-care center, chapel, beauty salon and outdoor playground. There will also be classrooms, a library and recreation-meeting room.

Four of six buildings on the purchased land, previously occupied by a furniture manufacturing company, will undergo a “massive renovation,” Busse said. The other two will be torn down.

As part of the project, a transitional center is scheduled to break ground in the fall. It will provide men and women from Rescue Mission shelters with a stable environment while they ease back into society.

The Grosvenor Family Center was named in honor of Rachel Grosvenor, who, with her husband, a San Diego businessman and hotelier, donated $1 million to the project, Busse said.