I encourage everyone to familiarize with the McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Act to make sure every child is guaranteed their right to FAPE. The legal definition is any child who lacks a fixed, regular, and adequate nighttime residence. This includes kids living in motels, hotels, and trailer parks, or sharing the housing of others. Also, older children who are not living at home are considered unaccompanied and must also be provided services. The district is REQUIRED to transport these children to and from school and provide food aid plus a host of other services for which they received funding from the federal government. Make sure anyone you know in this situation is aware of their rights.

We've watched as rents soared into impossible territory for many people. The cost of operation / mortgage payments remained constant or even declined as interest rates fell. So what happened in Mountain View?

Greed, pure and simple. Landlords and rental property owners, if you want to see the causal factor for this homelessness simply look in the mirror.

Although this may come across as a malicious statement sometimes there isn't anyway around the truth except to face it head-on. If you can break even or make a small profit then why run a family, including their children, onto the street just because you can make a few more dollars doing so?

Greed can spell the death knell of a stable society. Fortunately the multiple apartment units being built almost everywhere should, assuming the laws of supply and demand are still in place, result in lots of vacant units and . . . rental price reductions.

"I think you would agree that families that sublease space or who live with relatives are not homeless, although the State Department of Education reporting protocol identifies them as homeless," Sarraf said.

Wow, Ms. Sarraf. And who do you sublease space from to speak with such authority? It seems like there is a disconnect here between the public servant the children she serves.

Due to repeated violations of our Terms of Use, comments from this poster are automatically removed. Why?

@ RankingJill of Monta Loma If this is the 'well informed on public policy' parent-of-students Jill I know in Monta Loma, you should be using your real (registered) name. If you are going to run for Board office this Nov., it might behove you to make sure the electorate (and others) know how well informed you are - and what you stand for.

I always admired Mr. Chris Chiang, since 2004, for doing this in his discussions on Public Policy. I have also admired it in Greg Coladonato and Ellen Wheeler.

Part of the MVWSD problem is to identify these students, to document 'need of services' and to do like MVLAHS Dist. does (Brigitta rah!) and get them ASAP signed up for federal meals program if they are not yet enrolled. This will/mightl get 20% more funds (ah - IF we were a 'state funded' district) for these students / above Basic Grant. It will get Title 1 funds per/student (thank you Dr. Skelly/Dr. Rudolp) for enrolling us again.

SN is a trustee of MVWSD. Usual disclaimer, These are his own opinions and not MVWSD's

"I think you would agree that families that sublease space or who live with relatives are not homeless, although the State Department of Education reporting protocol identifies them as homeless," Sarraf said.
No, I would not agree. Often these children are in very precarious situations and do not know where they will be sleeping at any given night.

"If this is the 'well informed on public policy' parent-of-students Jill I know in Monta Loma, you should be using your real (registered) name."

You just have to be the bully, don't you?

Do us all a favor, and LEAVE. Mountain View will be better off for it.

Double Sigh.

When my parent(s) lost a job, they didn't get ANY State support. One packed the bags and LEFT to go back to my Grandpa's farm while the other started the job hunt in the LOCAL ECONOMIC DOWNTURN in the SFBA. ( yes, this is a cyclical problem in the SFBA )
Life on the farm was " You Don't Work,, YOU DON'T EAT ". So we did adult work even as children. I even drove a tractor on public roads when I was 12.
NONE OF THIS " FREE " ( we actually pay this as a taxpayer ) help was available before. Our education was part California and part Wisconsin.
I wonder if what is needed is for families to go to other areas to broaden their outlook and learn the true values of hard work along with the true value of a dollar.

( I shoveled more S--t than most politicians )

Remember: NONE OF THIS IS FREE, THE TAXPAYERS PAY FOR IT!

Displacing lower income people is what you get when you resist increasing housing inventory in an area of growing population and income. You have a choice - accept more density, noise, and bustle and make life easier for your neighbors, or cling to things as they are, resist change, and watch higher income people displace ever increasing segments of the population. I'm a home owner, and I really do hope that we build a lot more housing, even if it makes my house worth less than what I paid for it recently, because it's better for the area and for the future of the area. I want my kids to grow up knowing a variety of people from all walks of life, not just working age tech people at the peak of their careers.

The Bay Area's job growth and wage growth hasn't been in teaching or retail or services, it's been mostly in tech and wherever that wealth trickles down, so statements like, "Silicon Valley may be the center of job growth and economic prosperity in California" don't make sense.

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I've lived in Mountain View for decades and never would I dream of the problems this city now faces. The willingness of the City Council to open the doors for more jobs, in the 1000s, near and around Google, without a concomitant dedication to increase housing accessibility has resulted in families being pushed out of their homes and traffic problems that are outright deadly.

I find it sickening that property owners raise rents so high that only a narrow demographic of renters can pay, and they do so with eyes wide open, and a smile. Yes, I have seen this smile and witnessed the glee in landlord's voices over their new pots of gold. And there is no stopping this greed. Without any kind of stops in place, landlords will do as they please and will continue to treat residents as objects of revenue.

And the traffic? How many people have to be killed while standing on the sidewalk, or riding their bikes in the bike lanes? Running red lights has become the norm in many of our intersections (Grant and E Camino is just one) and there seems to be no effort to address this problem.

Both the Mountain View City Council and to some extent MV law enforcement seem to have been lulled into a dreamy sleep that renders both entities ineffective and unable to take care of Mountain View residents.

Wake up Mountain View leaders.

Judy, landlords treating residents as objects of revenue. What would you have them treated as? Objects of entitlement?

@mvresident2003 -- How about treating them as human beings? Or is that a concept you can't wrap your über-Libertarian mind around?

@Judy you nailed it. you stated very clearly exactly what I feel and probably many others.

@Resign Nelson, you too

@Judy: The land lords who won't raise rent to market rate are a very rare bunch, most will adjust it as fast as they can. The only way to stop them is to have sufficient housing inventory for the iron fist of the market to drive rents down.

sorry, can't let this go, keep coming back to it and frankly, I don't know if I should laugh as it's so silly or cry that it's so silly.

"continue to treat residents as objects of revenue."

Shame on those landlords expecting to get revenue. Shame on them!

sigh

@mvresident2003 -- I guess in your world, you only see dollar signs.

Maybe if saw human beings as human beings, you *might* understand what Judy is trying to tell you. *Might*.

@Steven Nelson of Cuesta Park

"Jill I know in Monta Loma, you should be using your real (registered) name."
...
"Part of the MVWSD problem is to identify these students, to document 'need of services' and to do like MVLAHS Dist. does"

It's a self-defeating problem. Trying to get these kids/families to list themselves as homeless is like trying to get a list of all lawful gun-owners by going door to door asking them. Only the very politically connected or the very stupid will say "yes", the majority will all lie and say: "No, we don't own guns, never have, never would."

People who go homeless are often in violation of multiple local ordinances or have a reasonable fear that they might be. Parents of homeless kids have a fully reasonable fear that child-protective services will come take away their kids and put them into the nightmare of our foster care system.

It is vastly worse for native Spanish speakers who have plenty of reason to fear Immigration as well, even if they are hear legally. Worse yet, to potentially have a similar name as someone on the bloated "terrorist-watch-list". Nobody even knows how names get on that list and there is no process to get off it.

And consider this, if a kid gets listed with the school District as being homeless and thus can have all sorts of benefits from being on the list, how do you suppose the people they are living with or living in a car in someone's driveway will feel to find out this kid is registered as homeless?
You think they are going to want to take a chance that the list causes a visit to the location which may then expose other stuff to the authorities?

No, it's not such an easy problem as holding out some food cupons and telling the kid all he has to do is register as homeless and the government will give him all sorts of goodies.

You got to come up with a much more sophisticated method that people will trust.

Again, imagine your goal was to find out who might be in danger of committing suicide in order to offer them help. Since 66% of gunshot deaths are suicides you might want to know who has guns, but If you go around asking people if they own a gun, almost everyone is going to lie and say "NO". That wont get you anywhere and is irrelevant to helping the people who need the help you're offering.

Offer help to homeless kids in a way that CANNOT result in them getting into trouble or getting their families/friends in trouble.

Then you have a starting point.

The government always runs to "registration" as the panacea for all things, but rarely does registration accomplish much of anything significant until the registration is abused by that government and then it's too late to get unregistered.

@mvresident2003

What is "market rate" in the Bay Area? People either pay, or are homeless. We're not talking about Rolex watches here.

The affordability index in MV gets worse and worse. It is what any financial advisor would call dangerously irresponsible even WELL above median income.

But to you, it's fine because people keep finding a way to pay it because they don't want to uproot their kids. Forget they work 2 or more jobs. Forget they now save $0. Forget they teeter on the verge of homelessness even with *engineering* jobs. Forget that people have 3 room mates in a 2 bedroom at 40 years old.

As long as you keep gettin your sweet pay day it's all good. Too bad those "suckers" were "too dumb" to buy 15 years ago, right???

Well if it's OK with you, we'll all start voting. Let's see over the next few years who has more numbers on their side. Might just be interesting times for you ahead.

&janon it seems you're under the mistaken opinion that I'm a landlord here in MV. I'm not, I'm just a homeowner who pays dearly to live here but doesn't expect others to pay for me. I also don't drive a Tesla, own a Rolex or any other foolish things that seem to be so important to you.

MV is exorbitantly expensive. Either you can afford it or you can't.

Do you honestly think any of us care about how "bad" you have it here? You are missing the point of this discussion completely -- long-time residents are being pushed out of Mountain View by the likes of people like you.

Obviously, that doesn't bother you, but as I've said before, this isn't about you.

You're right, it's not about me, it's about everybody thinking it's their inherent right to live here whether they can afford it or not.

Let me ask you a question. I really really want to live in Los Altos, should everyone who is there now subsidize me since I can't afford it? See, the difference is, I don't expect anyone to, I realize that I can't afford it and have to live elsewhere.

Now let's take it from another perspective. There are thousands who live in abject poverty and would consider you wealthy beyond their imagination. Are you helping them to live in the place they want to be?

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