For the past few years, whenever Alex Maitre found somebody on the street who wanted a shelter bed, he had to make a phone call. Or five.
Maitre would leave voicemails and send emails. He might not hear back for hours.
Then in May, he was given access to a new app. “This is a quantum leap,” Maitre, a case manager with the homelessness services organization Brother Benno’s, said in an interview. “I have now saved a couple hours of heartache.”
The Shelter Ready app, which officials began quietly rolling out in North County late last year, lets outreach workers reserve emergency beds in the same way that tourists book hotel rooms. You answer a few questions about what’s needed. A list of available spots pop up. Click a button and the place is yours.
Eight facilities and more than a dozen organizations have so far agreed to participate, and leaders are about to formally ask other shelters around the county to sign on. “I think it is going to set us on a track for a more transparent, more efficient, more equitable future,” said San Diego County District Attorney Summer Stephan, whose office bankrolled the effort.
The app does not, of course, fix the region’s longstanding shelter shortage. The most recent point-in-time count found more than 5,700 people countywide living in vehicles, tents or sleeping bags, and there are nowhere near enough beds for everybody asking. In the city of San Diego, only around 1 out of every 10 requests for shelter are often successful.
Yet proponents believe the technology can still help leaders boost that capacity. The district attorney noted that better data about who’s easily getting shelter, and who is not, could inform decisions about what types of beds need to be created. Maitre, with Brother Benno’s, said having the app instantly tell you that nothing’s available was nonetheless better than stringing people along for hours or days.
The program has been in the works for years.
The county Board of Supervisors first approved the initiative in early 2023, and the District Attorney’s Office then budgeted $300,000 for the effort using asset forfeiture funds, which is money taken from suspected criminals. (About $162,000 has so far been spent.) Stephan said she sees the program as a way to improve public safety: Fewer people sleeping outside, for example, means fewer people who can easily be attacked or taken advantage of by their neighbors.
The app was made by Caravan Studios, a division of the nonprofit TechSoup, and an early version launched in September.
The layout is clean and clear, according to a demonstration viewed by The San Diego Union-Tribune. The app wants to know what type of shelter is preferred (private room? safe parking?) and whether the individual in question is a sex offender or arsonist. As answers are typed in, a counter at the bottom of the screen shows how many beds might be available.
Most of the required information is general. Names aren’t included and the app is not linked to the Homeless Management Information System, the region’s main database of people living outside, although a person’s HMIS identification number may be included in the intake form.
Steve Lee, Caravan Studios’ director of product development, said the collected data is stored in a secure cloud. Some records, like an individual’s age and gender, might be retained for the foreseeable future so officials can study who’s getting a bed, although other information should be deleted once the reservation is complete.
Lee added that the data is owned by the outreach workers and shelters.
Caravan Studios has already made several changes based on from s, including letting shelters specify what times are best for move-ins. Brian Wilson, director of the Rescue Mission’s North County Lighthouse, said they’d used the program to book hundreds of reservations. The head of Interfaith Community Services, Greg Anglea, liked that you could create wait lists.
Shelters and outreach workers may use the program for free.
On June 9, the District Attorney’s Office plans to show off the app to service and law enforcement organizations from around the county, including Father Joe’s Villages and the San Diego Police Department. “It sounds awesome,” said Capt. Steve Shebloski, head of the Neighborhood Policing Division.
Officials hope to eventually expand Shelter Ready to include detox beds.
