The City has abandoned its controversial plan to convert H Barracks into a temporary, large-scale homelessness services shelter, instead proposing turning it into a Safe Parking Lot for vehicle dwellers.

A different location, an empty 65,000-square-foot warehouse at 3570 Kettner Blvd. near Vine Street in Middletown, has been selected by the City as the new proposed site to build a comprehensive 1,000-bed homeless shelter. If successful, it would become San Diego County’s largest permanent homeless shelter ever.

Asked about the City’s change of plans with H Barracks, Rachel Laing, director of communications for Mayor Todd Gloria, said: “It’s not a change; it’s just the announcement of the decision on how we intend to use the site. We’ve been talking with the community and homelessness stakeholders for months about what form of service/shelter should take place there. We stressed the entire time that we were considering an array of options, which always included Safe Parking.”

Added Laing: “Of all the potential uses, Safe Parking requires the least capital investment, and since the site will only operate temporarily – until Pure Water construction starts in about five years – it seems like the most prudent use. Plus, it’s an opportunity to nearly double the current size of the City’s Safe Parking program, which is in high demand and will be enormously helpful in getting folks living in their cars off residential streets and connected to services.”

Laing said turning H Barracks into Safe Parking will serve other purposes. “In addition, when we have available Safe Parking, we can enforce the Vehicle Habitation Ordinance, under a settlement of the legal challenge against the ordinance,” she said. “All of that being said, it’s the prospect of the 1,000-bed shelter that enables us to forgo the large tents. We will revisit this if we’re unable to secure city council approval for the site.”

In making the switch from making H Barracks a Safe Parking Lot rather than a large-scale homeless shelter, the mayor’s staff was scheduled to present that proposal to the City Council’s Land Use and Housing Committee on April 18. However, that presentation has been stalled, as Gloria’s office on April 12 noted the Independent Budget Analyst’s Office “raised an issue that merits additional analysis and possibly negotiation.”

The H Barracks homelessness shelter proposal was unpopular among some Point Loma residents, hundreds of whom packed a town hall meeting in Liberty Station on Feb. 26 held by nonprofit Point Loma Cares. At that meeting, residents express their unwavering opposition to the City’s plan. Point Loma Cares argued H Barracks was inappropriate as a homeless shelter site given its proximity to hotels and businesses in nearby Liberty Station with its nine schools and 3,000-plus children, who would be using playgrounds near the new shelter.

Asked if the mayor’s new proposal to make H Barracks a Safe Parking Lot rather than a homeless shelter with services was a more palatable choice, Derek Falconer and Margaret Virissimo of Point Loma Cares agreed, while warning the Peninsula community still has major concerns.

“We asked the City to find a better solution for this project and that’s exactly what happened,” said Virissimo adding if the City hadn’t dropped its large-scale homeless shelter plans at H Barracks that “we would have had to take this fight to the next level.”

“The biggest concern we have, if you read the fine print in the mayor’s proposal, is that the City is still considering leaving the option for having tent shelters on this site,” said Falconer adding, “That piece is unacceptable to [Point Loma Cares]. A safe parking lot is something we’ll do due diligence on and talk with the community about. But it’s not a hill we’re willing to die on. I think we’re willing to accept a safe parking lot – but absolutely no tent shelters.”

Virissimo concurred with Falconer’s view on the Safe Parking Lot option. “We’re going to monitor every detail of that proposal,” she said. “We’re asking to see the action plan to make sure it (parking lot) would still be safe for our community.”

Point Loma Cares had threatened to file a lawsuit against the City if it had tried to force its hand with the H Barracks homeless shelter “But we never wanted to do that,” Virissimo said. “Our mission was never to file a lawsuit but to find a resolution between the City, our community, and the homeless community. It was just that a 1,000-person homeless shelter wasn’t a good fit in that location. We’re all about finding a permanent, long-term fix for the homeless community.”

Of the prospective change in plans at H Barracks, Falconer said: “With the right parameters, it could be a good spot for a safe parking lot. But the community would still like to see things, like a hotline to call, if there are any issues.”

Falconer, however, voiced this caveat about the City’s business-as-usual approach to dealing with homelessness. “There needs to be some kind of stick, some little bit of toughness, to show people that it’s not an acceptable choice to live on the streets and do drugs,” he said. “They (homeless) have to know that if they’re going to go to a homeless shelter, that they’re going to have to do rehab: That it’s not optional.”