The City of Santa Fe revealed a new plan on Tuesday to combat homelessness in the area. According to housing director Lia Azul Salaverry, the city is aiming to expand its system of microcommunities.
"The city's micro community model focuses on small, individual, non congregate shelter units that move someone directly from an encampment into safe private space as the first real step towards housing," she explained.
The newest microcommunity, which will be located on Richards Avenue, is slated to open this fall. The city’s eventual goal is to have a microcommunity in every city council district of Santa Fe.
Salaverry made the announcement at a summit for city leaders and community members to talk about how to best address the issue of homelessness. Santa Fe officials presented what they called a Homelessness Continuum Framework, which includes transitional and permanent housing alongside prevention measures, such as emergency financial assistance to people in danger of losing their homes.
While Salaverry acknowledged that there are many reasons people end up homeless, she said that the primary issue was affordability.
"As costs of living rise, we simply do not have enough affordable housing to meet the need," she said, noting that "while mental health conditions and substance abuse have always existed across human history, chronic large scale homelessness has not."
The city’s plan is based on a model called Housing First, in which homeless people receive housing for free with no strings attached.
State representative Tara Lujan, a Democrat from Santa Fe, said she was optimistic about the city’s ability to tackle the issue, but that she wanted to see more evidence for the Housing First model.
"I wanted more feedback from the public on that, to be quite honest with you, in how we move from the state perspective and really how we expand on that model,"
Municipal leaders made it clear that the summit was not the last time that they would discuss the issue of homelessness. Mayor Michael Garcia, in particular, stressed the importance of seeking public input.
"A critical social issue like homelessness is not going to be solved by us just in this room," he stated. "It's going to be solved by us as a community."
He encouraged audience members to reach out to him directly by email if they had any other ideas for reducing homelessness.
