Jewish Family Service’s Proposal for a Safe Parking Program in Encinitas
Every night, Jewish Family Service of San Diego (JFS) operates a Safe Parking Program in three locations in San Diego for unsheltered San Diegans living out of their vehicles, many of whom are experiencing homelessness for the first time. As these individuals and families work to lift themselves up out of a difficult situation, many are making a nightly choice between buying food or purchasing gas to get to work and school.
JFS has received a state grant to establish a Safe Parking Lot for 25 cars in the North County region. They have approached the City of Encinitas for permission to operate a lot at Leichtag Commons. The target clients for this would be primarily families, seniors, and working professionals who are unable to afford permanent housing and instead live out of their cars.
Safe Parking Program clients also benefit from a comprehensive suite of services from JFS, including case management, housing navigation, financial assistance, financial asset building strategies and more – all with the goal of getting individuals and families back on their feet and mitigating the downward spiral of homelessness.
Leichtag Foundation has offered to lease space to the City of Encinitas to allow JFS operate the program between the hours of 5:30pm until 7am, Monday through Sunday, 365 days a year.
Program Proposal and FAQs
Learn more from JFS’s proposal to the Encinitas City Council and their FAQs about the program.
Contact Us
We welcome your questions. If you have questions about Leichtag Commons as the site for the program, please email Charlene Seidle, Leichtag Foundation Executive Vice President or call (760) 929-1090. If you have questions regarding the program itself, please email Carole Yellen, JFS Director of Strategic Partnerships, or call (858) 637-3395.
Stacie and Jeff Cook understand commitment. They live it.
Black, Jewish and Queer. These three identities weave the fabric of who I am, but it took a long time to believe that they could exist together.
Lee and Toni Leichtag established the Leichtag Foundation in 1991 following the sale of their business. Lee and Toni were lifelong entrepreneurs with a passion for innovation and for supporting talent. They believed that only with big risk comes big reward. Both born to families in poverty, Toni to a single mother, they strongly believed in helping those most in need and most vulnerable in our community. While they supported many causes, their strongest support was for young children and the elderly, two demographics who particularly lack voice in our society.
Lifelong Baltimoreans, Rabbi George and Alison Wielechowski and their sons, 11-year-old Lennon and 9-year-old Gideon, are more than pursuing the good life in Southern California. Having moved to San Diego more than three years ago, they are fulfilling a lifelong dream.
You would think that as the executive director of San Diego LGBT Pride, Fernando Zweifach López Jr., who uses the pronoun they, has done all the coming out they possibly can. A queer, non-binary individual who has worked for many years on civil rights issues, López also speaks openly and often about their father’s family, Mexican-American migrant workers who tilled the fields of rural California.