The Oceanside Planning Commission has added a new set of conditions to the operating permit for the Brother Benno Foundation.
Those conditions include more communication and the hiring of security and cleaning services in order for the foundation to continue operating out of the business park on Production Avenue.
"You have to work in partnership, and you have to be good neighbors, and I think we've demonstrated that by the hiring of security and other things," said Paul McNamara, the organization’s new executive director.
He is also the former mayor of Escondido and served on a committee addressing homelessness along the State Route 78 corridor.
McNamara said Brother Benno’s took on the security and cleaning expenses to show its commitment to improving conditions in the business park, but it's an expense that the organization can’t float long term.
"It's expensive — we're nervous about ... whether or not we can sustain the cost of that security," he said. "I was very encouraged that the commission said perhaps the city could chip in and .... perhaps the businesses could chip in."
Andrea Contreras, an attorney representing property managers in the park, said security had helped, but businesses are still experiencing financial losses that they say are caused by Brother Benno's.
"They continue to lose tenants," she said. "They continue to lose potential tenants. They continue to lose money on property damage."
Oceanside Police say the people causing damage are individuals whom the Homeless Outreach Team has tried to help in the past.
"It's more like 15 individuals that cause most of the problems in or around the Brother Benno's area. We have housed them before ... multiple times. And multiple times they have been kicked out of housing," Oceanside Police Department Capt. Taurino Valdovinos.
He said most of those people had also been banned from receiving services from Brother Benno's as a consequence.
Oceanside’s new navigation center has not been offered to this group since the center only recently opened, Valdovinos said, "but we will continue to try, continue to offer them services, and offer them that possibility of going to the new navigation center."
A meeting between Brother Benno's, property managers, city and law enforcement officials will take place this week to discuss possible collaboration on the costs of security.
