Oakland's homeless population may get an unconventional new housing site – a former army base.
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On Tuesday the City Council decided to review the space's potential and cost as the city's largest shelter. The 22-acre base could house up to 1,000 people, according to reporting by the San Francisco Chronicle.
"The City of Oakland is in the middle of an unprecedented homelessness crisis, which has been further exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic," Council Member Carroll Fife, who introduced the idea, wrote in a council report, according to the paper.
The city has been struggling to address its growing unhoused population for some time, an issue only exacerbated by the pandemic over the last two years.
Oakland has a number of alternative housing sites already, but none to this scale.
The new shelter at the army base would need to get approval from the California Department of Toxic Substances Control, the paper reported.
Additional changes would also need to be made, such as "environmental remediation," according to the paper.
Long-term, the site could potentially become the new home for the California Waste Solutions and Custom Alloy Scrap Sales recycling operation.
The proposal to use the base as a homeless shelter will move forward with the city administrator conducting a report, which will be given to the council for review next month, according to the paper.
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