> ## Content Index > Fetch the complete content index at: https://www.smdp.com/llms.txt > Use this file to discover other available public pages before exploring further. # OPCC puts compassion first - URL: https://www.smdp.com/opcc-puts-compassion-first/ - Published: 2002-09-02T15:00:00.000Z - Updated: 2026-10-23T00:42:48.000Z - Author: Carolyn Sackariason - Tags: Community, Ocean Park, #archive-import, Homeless, Homelessness *Homeless seek refuge, new life at city shelter* The city’s increasing homeless population has area shelters turning people away, unable to provide services to the thousands of people in despair throughout Santa Monica and surrounding communities. The Ocean Park Community Center, one the largest and oldest homeless shelters in Santa Monica, is almost at capacity, handling up to 300 people a day who come for a daily meal, groceries, clothes or a place to sleep. Roxann Smith, OPCC’s development director, said the number of homeless people who come to the organization’s access center has doubled in the past four years. It’s increased even more in the past year. “They line up everyday at 9 a.m. and come here to make an appointment to take a shower or to see a case manager,” she said. “Most of these people don’t want to be here. This is kind of the entry point and almost everybody that is homeless comes here.” But the number of people who come to the access center doesn’t even scratch the surface of the city’s thousands of homeless that don’t seek out help, Smith added. On Thursday morning, hundreds of people waited in line at the OPCC’s access center on Seventh Street and Colorado Boulevard. Some waited in line to get a sack lunch; others waited to get some new clothes, which are donated by community organizations. Some will make an appointment to see a case manager who will help them get back on their feet. If nothing else, the access center and the OPCC’s other programs offer a safe place where people can feel human again. “We are getting people off the street for at least a couple of hours,” Smith said. OPCC officials have worked to offer a variety of services in one location. Every day the access center offers a different service. On Thursday, a physician from the Venice Family Clinic was on hand to give people free medical check-ups. The OPCC was founded in 1963 and started as a grass-roots, volunteer organization to provide assistance to the growing number of homeless and working poor congregating in the Ocean Park neighborhood. OPCC is funded partially by the city, state and federal governments. In the past four decades, OPCC has grown from a small program at the Church at Ocean Park on Hill Street with a few volunteers to a network of shelters and services that serve more than 12,000 people annually throughout Los Angeles County. Its budget is $5 million annually and has 110 staff personnel for all of its services. The access center employees about 15 full-time staffers. The goal of OPCC is to provide assistance to homeless people and help them return to living self-sufficiently. “We try to build a relationship of trust so when it’s time for them to move on, they feel comfortable with us and start talking about the next step,” Smith said. The first step The OPCC has an outreach team that combs the streets of Santa Monica. The first thing they do when they make contact with a homeless person is tell them about the access center. “They let them know where they can be or where the police don’t want them,” Smith said. “They also get calls from business owners who know certain individuals who need help and are worried about them.” Of the thousands who are helped each year by the OPCC and its six projects, 98 percent of them live below the poverty level; 85 percent are homeless and 50 percent of them are mentally ill. “The majority of all the people that come here have fallen through the cracks,” Smith said. “It’s so easy for us to say ‘go get a job,’ but they have no support system so we become their support system. Many of them have a mental or physical disability.” One of those disabilities is drug and alcohol addiction. Many of them turn to drugs and alcohol just to be able to cope with living on the street. One homeless man who was waiting for assistance in front of the access center on Thursday said it gets busier at the end of the month when people have spent all of their money — usually on drugs. Living on the street for even a short period of time will alter a person’s mental state quickly, said Christina Erteszek, one of 278 volunteers at the access center. “After two weeks on the street, you suffer mentally,” she said. “Being homeless is everything you don’t wan to be — dirty, an outcast.” There are countless stories of people who have lost their jobs, or developed a serious medical condition who are now unable to find work. And in today’s society where many people live beyond their means, there are thousands of people who are only a paycheck away from becoming homeless, Smith said. “It’s not like they have a savings account to draw on,” she said. “A lot of people think they are lazy and don’t want to work, but it’s just not true.” OPCC officials say about 75 percent of their clients graduate from transitional housing and remain in permanent housing for at least a year. “When you are homeless, the first thing you do is lose your dignity,” Smith said. “They come from so far down and have been so beaten up that when they make it they have in a sense come even further than me. The ones that make it are heroes to me.” Going from emergency state to transitional The wait list at the access center for an emergency bed in Santa Monica is four pages long. “They have to call every day to see if a bed is open,” said Lou Ann White, the access center’s interim director. There are only 450 beds in the city, and not even half are dedicated for emergency shelter. The OPCC provides beds specifically for mentally ill women, as well as transitional housing. “It’s a place where they can feel connected to the world,” Smith said. “It’s part of the healing process.” Smith said overall, 720 people were placed in emergency shelters last fiscal year while 328 were put into transitional housing and 158 into permanent housing. OPCC’s Turning Point Transitional Housing program provides a rehabilitative program for homeless adults who are dedicated to returning to society and the workforce. Clients stay for up to nine months, must hold down a job and are required to sign a sobriety contract. They also are required to save 80 percent of their income. Daybreak Shelter, which is in the same building as the access center, offers women a place to live for up to six months while they get their lives back together. Daybreak Day Center, which is provided by OPCC, is open every day for women who are mentally ill, or are victims of domestic abuse or substance abuse. An apartment at a city-owned building near the Santa Monica Pier, provides refuge for a few hours. Women can come to get a hot breakfast and lunch, see a psychiatrist and build a relationship with staff members to help them through the transition of seeking government assistance and eventually living on their own. “They can take a nap here because they feel safe,” Smith said. The women come early in the morning and leave at 2 p.m. They are allowed to come for up to seven days straight, then it’s every other day. “Sometimes they don’t come for months, but they always reconnect,” said Gabriele Hooks, Daybreak project director. “We help them get through the system.” Hooks added that she has to turn people away, which is disappointing and heart wrenching for many staff members and volunteers. Most everyone who works or volunteers for OPCC agree more needs to be done. Over the last 18 months, Daybreak has beefed up its staff because of the increased number of homeless in Santa Monica, Hooks said. It’s not just Santa Monica’s problem either. Homelessness is a national issue that continues to be ignored, OPCC officials say. “You go to any city in the country and you will see this right now,” said OPCC’s associate director, Debby Maddis, while watching dozens of people take advantage of the access center’s services on Thursday. “Where is the political will in this country to help each other?” Smith said the misconceptions about homelessness and how ineffective services are run rampant throughout the city and country. “OPCC is not perpetuating a cycle of homelessness... It helps and if we weren’t here, they would be on your front door,” she said, adding that she hopes one day society recognizes that homelessness is everyone’s problem. “It’s not our intent to have them depend on us,” she said. “Believe me, we would love to put ourselves out of business.” See related story on the Ocean Park Comminuty Center’s Adult Outreach Team on page 6. ![](https://storage.ghost.io/c/55/9f/559f9abc-8372-4a2e-8c2d-27386da4e363/content/images/2026/10/090202-02_01.jpg) Dozens of people line up outside of Ocean Park Community Center Thursday morning to take advantage of the homeless shelter’s many services. (Photo: Carolyn Sackariason/Daily Press) *Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on September 2, 2002.* [Read the original PDF.](https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/smdp%5Fbackissues/090202.pdf?ref=smdp.com)