The number of beds available for the homeless in the Sacramento region during the cold-weather season is lower this Thanksgiving week than it was last year, according to Tim Brown, director of the Ending Homelessness Initiative. In addition, a Rancho Cordova city official expressed skepticism Monday about a plan to provide beds for 105 homeless people in that city. However, a multiagency task force still plans to achieve its goal of providing 269 winter shelter beds, Brown said in an interview.  As of Friday, 52 winter shelter beds were available for the homeless. This week, the task force expects to offer 82 beds because 30 motel vouchers are available, Brown said.    Still, at this tim

Thursday morning, journalist Lisa Ling, members of the City Council and the homeless and formerly-homeless community joined Mayor Kevin Johnson in launching the "Sacramento Steps Forward" initiative. A crowd of several hundred waved blue initiative flags and cheered as Johnson announced his goal "to end homelessness and focus on permanent housing." He applauded permanent housing shelters such as Mercy Housing, Turning Point and Martin Luther King Jr. Village, 3900 47th Avenue, where the launch was held. Johnson said the goal of Sacramento Steps Forward is to provide 2,400 "decent and affordable" permanent housing units over the next three years. That would nearly quadruple the amount of

Tuesday morning, Mayor Kevin Johnson was joined by a handful of Safe Ground supporters for a weekly press conference inside City Hall. After reiterating his goal to end homelessness in Sacramento, he invited Sister Libby Fernandez and Greg Bunker, the respective executive directors of Loaves and Fishes and Francis house, as well as a homeless man named Thomas Jackson Ashmore III, to speak. Johnson spoke about his meeting over the weekend with campers at the recently vacated 1220 C St. campground owned by Mark Merin. At the camp site, Merin had also been involved in a property dispute over the land with the neighboring Pedro and Gracilla Hernandez residence. Johnson mentioned that a compr

Religious congregations are assisting homeless families through a new housing program backed by Sacramento City Councilman Robert Fong. In the program, known as the Faith & Homeless Families Initiative, local religious groups find housing for homeless families with children. The program is emerging as local homeless shelters say they’re turning away families because of limited shelter space, according to Tim Brown, director of the Ending Chronic Homelessness Initiative, a local public/private partnership. “There’s a lot of newer homeless families,” he said. The program began in February and has linked six families to congregations. The congregations then found housing for the families,