Sleepless San Diego to return for 8th year

By Dave Fidlin

The statistics remain startling.

On any given night, around 8,500 men, women and children seek refuge across San Diego in cardboard boxes and other makeshift devices.

Organizers behind an annual event are hoping to keep the reality of homelessness at the forefront of San Diegans’ minds. The San Diego Rescue Mission’s Sleepless San Diego event returns for its eighth consecutive year in mid-October.

As has been the case in prior years, the crux of the event is an optional, overnight activity that gives participants an opportunity to sample homelessness — albeit in a sanitized environment that still provides such comforts as security, portable restrooms and an opportunity to partake in morning coffee.

“This is not the real deal, and we know this,” said Herb Johnson, president and CEO of SDRM. “But we are asking people to give up a night from the comforts of their own home.”

Johnson said there are a few surprises in store during this year’s event, including a video shot by a sister organization in New York City that he almost guarantees will bring tears to participants’ eyes.

Other planned festivities include an art gallery and an opportunity to create care packages for people in need. Additionally, experts will be on hand to discuss the homeless epidemic and how San Diegans can pitch in and assist.

This year’s Sleepless San Diego program will again be held at Liberty Station within NTC Park in Point Loma. In prior years, the event was held in mid-September, but Johnson said a variety of factors — including cooler weather conditions — played into the decision to push it back a month.

The 2014 Sleepless San Diego program officially kicks off at 4:30 p.m. Saturday, Oct. 11, with an assortment of musical acts and educational videos. At 11 p.m., participants will be asked to unroll their sleeping bags and find a spot within a cordoned off area at Liberty Station.

While Sleepless San Diego has been an intergenerational event since its inception, Johnson said it has historically drawn a large youth population. He estimates about 75 percent of the participants who take SDRM up on its offer to sleep outside are youth and college-age students.

For this reason, he said a recurring theme this year will be the growth in the city’s homeless student population.

According to just-released numbers from the San Diego Unified School District, the number of reported homeless children has nearly doubled in year-to-year comparisons. In the 2013 – 14 school year, SDUSD hosted upwards of 3,000 children who were classified as homeless. This year, the number has risen to 5,448.

“This obviously is a very dramatic increase,” Johnson said. “We’re going to talk with the students about this. We’ll be saying, ‘[Homeless children] are just like you. They just don’t have a place to live.’”

Recognizing the growth of homeless families, earlier this month SDRM opened a new children’s center at the organization’s Elm Street facility Downtown.

“It’s not a daycare center,” Johnson said. “It’s an educational facility for children in need.”

Proceeds from Sleepless San Diego benefit SDRM’s ongoing initiatives and new programs, such as the children’s center. With a swell in participation in recent years, Sleepless San Diego has turned out to be SDRM’s largest annual fundraising effort.

The main program offered by SDRM, founded nearly 60 years ago, is an intensive rehabilitation program that lasts from 12 to 16 months. About 400 people are part of the program at any given time.

In addition to the children’s center, SDRM has also recently begun a transformation housing center that includes 28 beds for women and 20 beds for men.

“It’s designed to serve a much broader need for people who need shelter,” Johnson said, pointing out that the transformation housing center differs from the intensive rehabilitation program.

While he and other SDRM organizers have witnessed a number of triumphs in participants’ lives, Johnson readily realizes there is still a significant amount of work needed.

“It’s been very difficult because people can’t live in this city on minimum wages,” Johnson said. “We no longer have much of a manufacturing sector. There are people working two or three jobs and are still not making ends meet.”

The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development recently revealed San Diego moved down a ranking — from third to fourth — for homelessness. But the overall numbers continue to hold steady. The city trails New York, Los Angeles and Seattle.

The local rescue mission continues to evolve, Johnson said, but the overall mission statement remains the same.

“We want to help bring creative solutions through meaningful programs,” he said.

The eighth annual Sleepless in San Diego will be held Saturday, Oct. 11 from 4:30 a.m. until Sunday, Oct. 12 at 8 a.m. Participants will sleep outside in the elements at NTC Park, located at 2455 Cushing Rd. at Liberty Station. For more information visit sleeplesssandiego.org, sdrescue.org or call 619-687-3720. 

—Dave Fidlin has been a professional journalist for more than a dozen years. Throughout his career, he has contributed to a variety of newspapers, magazines and websites across the nation. He has a special affinity for San Diego and its people. Contact him at [email protected].