The X Street Navigation Center, located near Broadway and Alhambra Boulevard, will officially open Sept. 21 to serve up to 100 people experiencing homelessness.
In addition to shelter, the facility will offer life-skills classes, recovery assistance, medical care, financial counseling, and housing-placement services to help people transition from homelessness into more permanent housing.
Launched by the City of Sacramento in partnership with Sacramento Housing and Redevelopment Agency (SHRA), the center will be operated by Volunteers of America.
“The X Street Navigation Center is part of a larger City effort to meet the challenges of homelessness in Sacramento,” said Vice Mayor and District 5 Councilmember Jay Schenirer. “Along with SHRA and our operator, Volunteers of America, we are partnering with our local community organizations to create a model shelter that meets the needs of unhoused adults as well as being a good neighbor to the community. Housing the homeless is a moral imperative that will demonstrate our compassion as a city.”
“This shelter has been a long time coming, but it is now ready to become a key part of our comprehensive siting plan to address homelessness,” said Mayor Darrell Steinberg. “The X Street facility will offer shelter, food, health care, dignity, and hope for hundreds to get off the streets. These openings will continue in different forms throughout every part of our city in the many months ahead. Congratulations to Vice Mayor Schenirer and all the leaders who made this day happen.”
Located on property owned by Caltrans, the facility, which cost approximately $5 million to build and $7.7 million to operate for two years, was made possible in part by a $5 million grant from Kaiser Permanente. The center also received funding from Measure U and the State of California. The operating costs include rehousing for clients, outreach, neighborhood cleanup, security and other services.
“There is a clear connection between health and housing. That’s why Kaiser Permanente is joining with many community partners and actively investing in solutions to end homelessness,” said Patricia Rodriguez, senior vice president and area manager for Kaiser Permanente. “By improving access to shelter and supportive services, we are delivering on our mission to improve the health of the communities we serve.”
“Living on the streets can sometimes destroy hope for unhoused residents,” said SHRA Executive Director La Shelle Dozier. “The X Street Navigation Center is an opportunity to restore hope and change lives by providing a safe haven in a caring, supportive environment that can lead to permanent housing.”
Like the City’s Meadowview Navigation Center, which opened in October 2020, the X Street Navigation Center will have round-the-clock security and a robust good-neighbor policy to support the surrounding neighborhood.
“This shelter is the second of what we hope will be many such facilities that will bring people off the streets and into a dignified setting where they can begin to recover from the personal trauma, mental illness, and/or substance abuse that has led them to this point,” said District 3 Councilmember Jeff Harris. “VOA is a provider with deep experience in serving the unhoused population, and we anticipate that their work in this shelter will help people find a pathway out of homelessness and help the city to clean up our neighborhoods.”
“We are thrilled to be operating this new shelter and look forward to working with our community partners to walk alongside those experiencing homelessness as they make their way toward independence,” said Leo McFarland, president and CEO of Volunteers of America, NCNN.
The center will be open to adults by referral only — it will not take walk-ups. Priority outreach and placement in the center will be given to those experiencing homelessness in Oak Park, Curtis Park and on the Broadway-Alhambra corridor. People are accepted as they are, with their pets, partners, and possessions.
“DCR response teams, working with Hope Cooperative, have been contacting our unhoused community members in the area near the X Street Navigation Center” said Bridgette Dean, director of the City’s Department of Community Response. “Our goal is to provide access to services and offer them a safe, more secure situation where we can start to address their specific needs. The opening of this navigation center provides a collaborative opportunity for our sheltered and unsheltered community members, community-based organizations and local businesses to work together with the goal of housing for all.”