Mayors across the Bay Area are coming together to tackle the serious issue of homelessness.
Keeping people in homes and off the streets is a problem that continues to plague the Bay Area. Many areas are getting creative, with San Francisco recently introducing a "sleep safe village" full of tiny homes for the city’s homeless and San Jose considering prefabricated housing in some very unusual public spaces.
However, all the innovative ideas in the world won’t be as effective as they could be if cities don’t work together, San Francisco Mayor London Breed said. "Say we fix all the problems and we’re ok. We’re not going to be ok if Oakland is not okay, we’re not going to be okay if San Jose is not okay, we’re not going to be okay as a Bay Area if we are all not doing well," she said.
San Jose Mayor Sam Liccardo is considering building housing in the middle of cloverleafs, the off-ramps which allow two freeways to cross. "I know that sounds crazy, freeway cloverleafs, everybody would be concerned about safety for obvious reasons, but they are selling $2 million homes in Cupertino right on Wolfe and 280 and people are paying for them," Liccardo said to KCBS Radio.
Liccardo, Breed and Oakland Mayor Libby Schaaf all agree that there is strength in numbers and collaboration, especially when it comes to lobbying the state for funding and policy changes.
