This post originally appeared at The Nation.
At dusk, Thomas Goodwin, a worn but upbeat man in his mid-50s, drives his car into a parking lot in central Santa Barbara. There, he settles his young daughter to sleep in the back of a second vehicle — a van lined with her clothes — while he dozes in its front seat. The family has been sleeping and living out of the van for almost a year.
The Goodwins are not alone. In Santa Barbara, over 500 people sleep every night in their vehicles, unable to afford a home with a front door, roof and bed. They, in turn, are among tens of thousands of unsheltered Californians — men, women and children from up and down the state who have fallen through the wide cracks in the economy only to land smack on the hard surface of the street.
What are people like Goodwin to do? Twelve years ago, the Safe Parking program, run by the nonprofit New Beginnings Counseling Center, began offering a provisional solution. Its program places those sleeping in their vehicles into 20 private parking lots scattered around the city and provides bathroom facilities and some security. The parking lots are available only overnight and the cars must move by early morning. The group estimates they take 125 vehicles off the street every night and help more than 750 people a year.
[For more of this story, written by Jennifer Dworkin, go to http://billmoyers.com/story/ho...a-barbaras-mansions/]
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