Early on the morning of Oct. 12, David Mays awoke in the Chevrolet he had been living in for 2 years, realizing at the present time could be completely different.
Safe Parking L.A. had been a blessing, offering a coated house in a downtown storage, with on-site safety and entry to a lavatory. That was higher than sleeping on the road with one eye open.
But Mays had been hobbled by the discomfort of sleeping in the driving force’s seat for months on finish, and the 69-year-old caregiver had developed well being issues of his personal. His legs had been stiff, swollen and sore, complicating his hope of returning to work. And he was starting to doubt guarantees that his look forward to a place of his personal would finish regardless of the most effective efforts of Demi Dominguez, his Safe Parking case supervisor, to get him indoors.
David Mays provides Demi Dominguez, his Safe Parking L.A. case supervisor, a hug of assist after signing papers for his new apartment.
(Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times)
And then it occurred. Dominguez realized in late summer season of a attainable slot for Mays at a soon-to-open apartment constructing in East Hollywood. The Wilcox was to be managed by The People Concern, a homeless companies nonprofit, with on-site supportive companies for adults 62 or older –- one of many fastest-growing segments of the state’s huge unhoused inhabitants.
Mays drove to the Wilcox on the twelfth, sat via an orientation and, lastly, was escorted to his new house, a small however comfy second-floor studio apartment.
He was not overwhelmed, as one may count on. It was an excessive amount of to course of.
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“To be honest,” he instructed me, seated in his eating nook a few weeks after shifting in, “I wasn’t aware. I wasn’t feeling it.”
Mays, who speaks intentionally, turned inward, looking for the proper phrases.
“I had been taught to be justifiably cynical for so long, that when it finally happened, and it was real, and we’re doing this — this is your apartment — my brain almost kind of took a pause,” Mays mentioned. “And then at some point, I realized — I think when I collapsed on that bed, and it took a couple of days for it to truly sink in –- this was my apartment.
After two years of living in his car, David Mays prepares to move some of his belongings into his new apartment.
(Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times)
“I had been out there so long that this was almost the equivalent of a daydream, because I had been so far removed from what I knew to be a normal life before it all went south, “ he said. “And then to come back to some semblance of that, after two years of nothing … it’s a quantum leap.”
Mays mentioned the expertise was “almost a shock wave … I’m lying there in that bed and I’m going, ‘Am I really here?’ I just laid out, and within 14 days, all the massive swelling went away. All of it.”
Mays’ story is a small victory in a metropolis with roughly 46,000 homeless folks, however it’s additionally a window into a societal collapse and a grinding paperwork that has lengthy been a image of presidency failure. Crippling housing and workforce shortages and a fragmented, dysfunctional response — together with entrenched poverty, unchecked psychological sickness and a raging drug epidemic — have produced a simmering humanitarian disaster seen to every one.
David Mays enters his new apartment on the Wilcox in East Hollywood for the primary time as neighborhood supervisor Daisy DePaz watches.
(Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times)
“The timeline for housing remains a multi-year process,” mentioned Emily Uyeda Kantrim, who runs Safe Parking L.A. and mentioned Mays was in the housing queue since 2021.
Mays readily admits to his frustration.
“I lost faith,” he mentioned, telling me he got here to consider that the “system” treats homelessness as a monolithic situation. In reality, it’s 46,000 puzzles, every with a completely different resolution, however key items of every puzzle are lacking.
Eventually, he was buoyed by Safe Parking’s continued efforts to make a connection for him. Safe Parking helps its purchasers — a third of whom are older adults — with car upkeep prices and different bills whereas they search for everlasting housing.
“They were with me through the whole process,” Mays mentioned, proper up to the time he moved into his new house.
David Mays shares his enthusiasm about lastly getting a place to dwell with Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass.
(Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times)
On Nov. 6, whereas Mays was in his room, L.A. Mayor Karen Bass was downstairs in the courtyard, presiding over the official grand opening of the Wilcox. Tackling the homelessness disaster was on the high of her agenda when she was elected a yr in the past, and I recall touring throughout town along with her when she was a candidate, as she talked about blowing up the paperwork, leveraging her contacts in Washington and Sacramento, working with — somewhat than at odds with — county supervisors, and reducing the price of new housing and constructing it quicker.
All of that is still a work in progress, however she will get excessive marks from some observers. Bass’ technique of focusing on problematic encampments, reducing via paperwork and leveraging her connections has modified the dynamic, mentioned Miguel Santana, director of the California Community Foundation. Her background as a doctor’s assistant has helped, too, he mentioned, as a result of she’s attuned to particular person wants.
“She has placed the priority on the person who is unhoused and tries to advocate for them, not for the system,” Santana mentioned. “She’s pushing against the system.”
“She has brought … real focus to this issue in a way no other administration has, and I’ve worked with several,” mentioned John Maceri, director of The People Concern. “Her executive orders and directives, in terms of streamlining things, are real, and that has really expedited a lot of projects that had been languishing in the pipeline for a long time.”
“I had been taught to be justifiably cynical for so long, that when it finally happened, and it was real, and we’re doing this — this is your apartment — my brain almost kind of took a pause,” David Mays mentioned.
(Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times)
Bass, like me, turned 70 in October. I had instructed her greater than a yr in the past that whereas I used to be considering it may be time to cut back my output, she was operating for what could be the hardest job of her profession. She instructed me she badly wished the job.
“It’s been reported that one of the fastest-growing sectors of the unhoused population are our elders, and it is a scourge on society,” Bass instructed a small viewers earlier than doubling down on the necessity to proceed addressing the disaster with a sense of urgency.
The mayor then wished to meet a number of the residents, and the primary one she visited was Mays.
“How are you?” Mays requested when she stepped into his room, and Bass volleyed the query again at him.
“I’m disoriented a little bit,” Mays mentioned. “I can’t believe that this is happening.”
They talked for a number of minutes about his profession and his well being, with Bass saying she wished to be certain he was linked to the assistance he wanted.
“You brighten up my day,” Bass mentioned. “This is what we’re trying to do. This is the goal.”
Before the mayor arrived and after she left, Mays talked about his plans, which don’t essentially embody a long-term keep on the Wilcox. He labored for years as a non-public in-home caregiver, with room and board included, however it’s a occupation in which purchasers transfer on to nursing properties or die, and Mays ended up out of labor and homeless.
David Mays walks previous a billboard with the message: “Create Your Future.”
(Genaro Molina / Los Angeles Times)
Given a number of well being challenges, he doesn’t suppose he may be a live-in caregiver once more, however he’d like to work day shifts if he can discover the proper match. He mentioned the issue is that if he had been to make greater than $1,000 a month, on high of his Social Security earnings, he’d now not be eligible for the apartment he simply moved into.
Mays mentioned he’s obtained to work out what to do about all of that, however emphasised that he doesn’t consider his arrival on the Wilcox as the tip of his profession or his aspirations.
“I have to work that out,” he mentioned. “This, for me, is another rest stop. And it’s a vast improvement over the last one.”
steve.lopez@latimes.com
