Concord Growing Homeless Problem Up for Debate
Categories: Featured, Focus on Concord
Written By: Concord Blogger
As if the Mayor didn’t already have his hands full with taxes, hookers, cranksters, and internet scandal. Bill Shinn is having to open up the debate on the land use plan of the Naval Weapons Station and making room for the growing homelessness problem. I though his “Quit Having Sex” policy was going to do the trick but I guess not.

City leaders are debating how to accommodate some of the county’s homeless population on the shuttered Concord Naval Weapons Station.
City Council members are trying to decide whether Concord should put $25 million into a trust for homeless services and housing throughout the county, or instead approve a plan for 260 “homeless” housing units on the former military base. The federal government, through its base closure laws, requires that communities overseeing a base closure dedicate part of the land or money made off it to homeless causes.
Required by law…Looks like Billy better figure something out quick. Nothing I heard about in the land use discussions had anything to do with the homeless. Lots of clustered villages, road construction and parks but nothing for the Concord homeless.
But the best quote from Bill Shinn came later in the article.
“Yet we have the experts here telling us that people only stop being homeless if they have permanent housing, so I’d just like more information.”
I don’t know about you Bill but that just sounds obvious and I wouldn’t need an expert to tell me!
I would think that creating jobs and putting these people into drug rehab and giving them other support mechanisms would be the key.
There are about 4,000 homeless people countywide, and in a given year 10,000 to 12,000 utilize services offered by soup kitchens, food banks or the like, said Councilman Bill Shinn.
“We have to be careful when we talk about the homeless — they’re not under bridges and peeing on trees,” he said. “That’s a stereotype.”
I’ve read many stories in the Contra Costa Times and on other local blogs about homeless people sleeping under bridges and peeing on trees. First off, under a bridge is a great place to sleep if you don’t have a home and where else are these people supposed to go pee? Sure we don’t have the issues like in cities like San Francisco where people are defacating in the streets but to say that homeless people don’t pee on trees is a bit ridiculous. People with homes pee on trees if their drunk enough.
This is going to be an interesting story to follow. What Concord decides to do is going to have a major impact on the city. You can throw the buzz word “World Class” into it if you want but I doubt it will be anything close.
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November 29th, 2008 at 4:00 pm
I think the city should put the money towards support for the homeless and not towards housing. Are we going to turn part of the Naval Weapons Station into Hunters Point in SF?
November 29th, 2008 at 4:20 pm
Good one Bill Shinn. You should really think before you speak. You just said that you spent a bunch of tax payer money to find out that homeless people are no longer homeless once they have a home.
November 30th, 2008 at 2:01 pm
Giving them houses isn’t going to fix them. Setting up a homeless colony outside Concord is not a good idea either. Use the money for services to get them jobs and subsidized housing. The real Mayor sounds like a piece of work.
November 30th, 2008 at 5:36 pm
I think this debate is going to put the city into the spotlight in many ways. The community will want a large say in what happens with the homeless people of the entire County. Since this is the largest land grab of our city, I can only imagine the surrounding cities of Contra Costa County like Richmond will want a say also.
Concord Blogger’s last blog post..Concord Growing Homeless Problem Up for Debate
December 2nd, 2008 at 11:18 am
Where did all these homeless people come from? I’d bet 99% of them are not from Concord. How did they get here and why do we have to support them?
December 6th, 2008 at 10:43 am
Yeah most are NOT from concord, Shin is a baby hes loven them homeless who he thinks can do no wrong. These are no the Andy Griffin Homeless, the sooner he learns that the better. Why may I ask are we suppporting hte counties homeless? thats a lot of money for services the county should pay for.
December 16th, 2008 at 6:49 pm
Stan, the city is obligated by the govt. to do something with the land that includes homeless services. These are not just Concord’s homeless, this is to support the entire county.
Concord Blogger’s last blog post..Homeless Students MDUSD