Homeless man pursues dream of a Mountain View shelter
Jess Santana has a dream: a shelter with real beds and hot meals for every homeless man, woman and child in Mountain View and surrounding cities.
In the three years that he’s been homeless, the 80-year-old former Los Altos resident has sampled local shelters – and he doesn’t like what he’s seen.
For example, the Sunnyvale National Guard Armory features paper-thin mats and a lack of privacy. He noticed a woman breast-feeding her baby in front of “all these creeps.”
In addition to being short on privacy, the cold-weather shelter needs more space to house people comfortably.
“These people are humans,” said Santana, who added that the dinners and breakfasts provided “wouldn’t be fit to feed the hogs” on his family’s Fremont ranch.
....
If Santana has his way, Mountain View will have its own homeless shelter where men and women shower and sleep separately. He would see to it that medical care, employment help and other social services are offered. He would contract with local hotels for decent food.
He has plenty of ideas, and he’s working night and day to make them happen.
In the meantime, he continues to sleep in his Silverado pickup truck in the Walgreens parking lot at the corner of Grant Road and El Camino Real. The Mountain View police check in on him from time to time, but they don’t bother him. As long as he stays on private property at night, he can’t be arrested.
http://www.losaltosonline.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=20278&Itemid=198
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