The City of Redlands will apply $30 million in state and federal grants to convert the Good Nite Inn into a full-dimensional shelter for the community’s chronically homeless.
Redlands is the second San Bernardino County city to obtain sufficient funding through the State of California Homekey program to establish and operate a large scale homeless facility. The award, which allows for the retrofitting of the hotel located at 1675 Industrial Park Avenue, comes less than two months after the City of Victorville accepted $28 million to construct a 170-bed facility, essentially from scratch.
In Redlands’s case it is to receive $24,142,000 in federal American Rescue Plan money with which the hotel is to be purchased, renovated and augmented with the support facilities to house, support and educate those to be welcomed there and another $5,858,000 from the State of California to operate for what is anticipated to be seven years. Upon conversion, the hotel will have 98 permanent supportive housing units, each with a kitchenette. The grant money will also be used by the city to fund the hiring of David Rabindranath as Redlands’ homeless services coordinator, a staff position.
As of this week, the Good Nite Inn was yet operating as a hotel. It entails roughly 100 guest rooms, none of which have cooking facilities or kitchens.
Under the terms of the grant application that was accepted by the California Department of Housing & Community Development, the conversion must be underway in three months and the facility must be fully operational within one year of the March 14 conferring of the grant on Redlands by the California Department of Housing and Community Development. The city has said the project should be up and running by December.
The Homekey program directs available grant money to projects deemed responsive to the goal of providing permanent housing to the homeless. Under the terms of the application, in keeping with the application for the grant, the facility is to be managed and the program it offers administered by Step Up, a Los Angeles-based organization dedicated to providing housing and social reconstruction to the homeless. Step Up is coordinating with Shangri-La Construction, which is to reconfigure and remodel the units, including installing stoves, ovens refrigerators and cupboards. It is not clear how many of the existing amenities of the Good Nite Inn, such as its swimming pool, will be retained in the makeover. Elements of the hotel, such as its computer room and common areas, will likely be converted to a classroom or educational lab to fit with the goal of offering residents training, counseling, recovery and metal health services.
The city is working with representatives from several Redlands charities, including Inherit the Earth Outreach and the Redlands Charitable Resources Coalition to compile a list of local unhoused individuals who will be eligible to move into the facility. Those involved include the Reverend Raymond Morehouse and Lorrie Hinkleman and Rick Ferguson, who have been involved in lesser or greater degrees in running the city’s only emergency homeless shelter, which is set to close at the end of the month.