Two homeless shelters, the Journey Home and the Golden State Triage Center, are closing in Fresno by the end of 2025 due to a lack of ongoing state and federal funding, which had previously supported their operation through Project Homekey grants.
The City of Fresno could have chosen to fund the shelter operations but opted instead to increase funding for the bloated police budget (see “$488 a Minute to Police Fresno,” July 2025 Community Alliance). The shelters, which were intended as temporary housing, will cease operations by Dec. 31, 2025, displacing more than 120 residents.
The Fresno Housing Authority claims it is assisting residents in finding new housing options, though it is also seeking additional funding to convert one of the shelters into permanent housing.
Where will people go on Jan. 1, 2026? When there is no housing available, and there is never enough housing available, those residents will be back on the street. Back to constant police harassment and forced removal from their locations. Back to getting arrested and cited for violating the inhumane no camping ordinance.
Back to getting cited for loitering, a new development on Blackstone Avenue because businesses are urging the City to do so.
When does the ineffective, expensive and inhumane treatment of our unhoused brothers and sisters end? They are human beings. The leaders of Fresno seem to forget this fact and seem to have no empathy for those who suffer every day on the hard streets of Fresno.
Blackstone Businesses Complain
A.J. Rassamni, president of the Blackstone Merchants Association, recently sent a letter to Mayor Jerry Dyer and the Fresno City Council saying, “On behalf of the 3,000 members of the Blackstone Merchants Association including 400 business owners, I would like to draw your attention to the injustice that has occurred as a result of the city’s consolidation of homeless along Blackstone Avenue.
“The Blackstone Corridor, our highest-revenue-generating corridor, is experiencing rising crime, blight, and safety issues that harm families, seniors, students, and businesses. Currently, the city is housing the homeless in sober living housing, and recuperative care facilities for drug addicts within a thousand feet of elementary schools, a middle school, a charter high school, residential areas with a high percentage of senior citizens and business and employment centers.”
There are currently only three facilities on Blackstone that provide or will provide housing for those experiencing homelessness. Soul Housing opened in May 2025 at Blackstone and Griffith and serves as a place for homeless individuals to recover after leaving the hospital.
Fresno Mission’s City Center Family Shelter at Blackstone and Dakota, a 72-unit family shelter, opened in February 2025 and provides housing, job training and other supportive services.
And Crossroads Village on North Blackstone is a former shelter that was recently converted into affordable housing. Some formerly unhoused individuals now live there.
It is certainly true that more unhoused individuals are present on the Blackstone corridor every day. Businesses have legitimate complaints and issues. However, this is the result of the City’s policy and practice of breaking up encampments and constantly forcing unhoused people to move.
It’s a result of the City’s failure to establish tiny home villages and to establish “safe camps.” With nowhere to go, unhoused residents wind up in the Blackstone business district, the Tower district and residential neighborhoods.
Housing Not Handcuffs
“While the [City’s] plan was well-intended, we all certainly want the unhoused population, especially children, to live in safe and sane conditions,” continues Rassamni, “we believe the city has fallen short of implementing solutions that address the concerns outlined in Article 25, Section 9-2502 of our city code.” (This code has language that warns of the serious harm caused by drug-related activity.)
Seeming to blame all crime in Fresno on the homeless residents, Rassamni states, “I’m sure the following facts are not a surprise to you or anyone at City Hall, 57 vacant buildings burned in the first 8 months of 2025, nearly half of all fires in Fresno are linked to 1% of the population, the unhoused. On average, six women are raped every night. More than 400 children are homeless. Businesses on Blackstone suffer break-ins & vandalism every night.”
As Rassamni points out in his letter to the City, people suffering on the streets of Fresno are 1% of the city’s population. Obviously, they cannot be responsible for the majority of crime in the city. In fact, unhoused individuals are preyed upon by criminals and are often the victims of crime.
Safe Zones, Where?
Rassamni’s letter continues: “Our association suggests the establishment of Safe Zones where individuals experiencing homelessness are moved from private and public properties into a secure, organized area. Safe Zones provide structure and dignity by concentrating services in one place.
“[It would] clear encampments from all private and public properties, significantly reduce break-ins in the city by up to 80%, dramatically cut fire incidents by nearly 50%, boost small business revenue by 30–50%, significantly increase tax revenue for the city, improve the environment and allow police to focus on more serious crimes, and help residents feel safe in their neighborhoods.”
These exaggerated projections paint a rosy picture, but it is unclear where these “safe zones” would be and how much funding, if any, the City would provide to establish them.
Perhaps a short-term solution would be establishing self-managed safe camps until tiny home villages are built, supportive housing is established and more housing vouchers are provided. Other cities have done so successfully, however, Fresno has adamantly refused to implement safe camps as a temporary solution.
Fresno Fails Again
Fresno leadership has also failed its residents by losing its Prohousing status in May 2025 when the California Department of Housing and Community Development (HCD) revoked the designation due to the City’s failure to meet specific housing policy deadlines and goals, resulting in the loss of access to state housing grants and funding.
The state legislature established the Prohousing Designation Program to incentivize cities to adopt policies that accelerate housing production and to adopt policies for addressing residents experiencing homelessness.
These policies must comply with the U.S. Interagency Council on Homelessness requirements. Although the City of Fresno recently lost its Prohousing designation, it has been given the opportunity to reapply. Before reconsidering this status, the state should consider how the City deals with encampments and those experiencing homelessness.
The City of Fresno is required to meet the U.S. Interagency Council on Homelessness’s “7 Principles for Addressing Encampments.” It states that criminalization doesn’t solve the issue and that solutions should come with collaboration with those who are in the encampments and center on their needs.
In Fresno, there is no collaboration with the unhoused residents or advocates. In fact, over the strong objection of the unhoused residents and advocates, in September 2024, Fresno implemented a harsh “no camping” ordinance with penalties of up to a year in jail and a $1,000 fine for violations. To date, hundreds of unhoused residents have been arrested and cited.
Hundreds have lost their property in encampment sweeps, in violation of the Fourth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, which prohibits illegal search and seizure of property. These facts are well documented by advocates and unhoused individuals. In addition, although receiving state funding to establish a tiny home village in 2023, the City has failed to do so. It is unclear what happened to the $5 million granted by the state for the project.
The City has used several rounds of state encampment resolution funding to unilaterally destroy encampments and throw away property without offering housing while often arresting encampment residents.
Fair Treatment of Unhoused People is Required
According to the U.S. Interagency Council on Homelessness, the principles a city must follow to be redesignated as a Prohousing city are to “Establish a Cross-Agency, Multi-Sector Response (which includes those ensuring that the encampment residents needs are addressed, like the residents themselves, advocates, etc.); Engage Encampment Residents to Develop Solutions; Conduct Comprehensive and Coordinated Outreach; Address Basic Needs and Provide Storage; Ensure Access to Shelter or Housing Options; Develop Pathways to Permanent Housing and Supports; [and] Create a Plan for What Will Happen to Encampment Sites After Closure.” These are also the principles used for Prohousing consideration by the HCD.
The City has done none of the above, and unless specific commitments are made to address these clear deficiencies the City could be denied Prohousing status again, a severe setback for the development of affordable housing in Fresno.
Commitments must be made from the City to change its policies and practices, including but not limited to rescinding its harsh no camping ordinance before being redesignated as a Prohousing city. And the City must make every effort to requalify for Prohousing status.
Disturbing Trend
We must resist the trend to further dehumanize and criminalize the poor like President Trump and mainstream media pundits such as those on Fox News have done.
Here’s what they are saying:
Fox News host Lawrence Jones: “They have given billions of dollars to mental health and the homeless population. A lot of them don’t want to take the programs. A lot of them don’t want to get the help that’s necessary. You can’t give them a choice. Either you take the resources that we’re going to give you and/or you decide that you got to be locked up in jail. That’s the way it has to be now.”
Fox News co-host Brian Kilmeade: “Or involuntary lethal injection or something. I’d just kill ’em.”
It is incumbent on all of us to call out this insanity. It begs the question, how sick is our society?
