Quick Take
In a room barely larger than a cubicle, 1,710 lives intersect through benefits, letters from family, bulletin boards and daily routines. The Housing Matters’ mail room reveals how something as simple as a physical address can underpin survival and dignity for the region’s unhoused. The mail room is slated to close in March, along with other day services at the Coral Street campus. Local officials are racing to find a replacement.
It’s just barely bigger than an office cubicle and filled with standard metal cabinets, but the mail room at homelessness nonprofit Housing Matters makes a much bigger difference in the lives of unhoused residents than its modest appearance might suggest.
The free post office is one of the only places in Santa Cruz County to get registered mail and, most importantly, government documents and benefits notices that cannot be delivered to P.O. boxes. For unhoused residents, or people who lack stable housing, it is a vital service that allows them to access government assistance and other resources they need to work their way out of homelessness.
It’s also a place where they can reliably receive mail or packages if they don’t have a safe place or permanent address to deliver to otherwise. In total, 1,710 people use the mail room on Housing Matters’ Coral Street campus in Santa Cruz as their permanent address. Next spring, they will be searching for a new place to get their mail, after Housing Matters closes the mail room and other services in the area as part of a focus on permanent supportive housing.
Throughout an early Tuesday afternoon, a steady stream of people — typically a couple people every few minutes — came up to the small window at the front of the room to check on their mail, a mix of personal mail, packages and government notices sorted alphabetically within the many filing cabinets. It’s a quick process, with most people waiting for only a few seconds before departing with their stuff, unless they hang around to talk to the staff.
Tammy Lunn, who lives in the family shelter across the parking lot with her husband and child, says she and her husband check their mail every day. She was devastated to hear that the mail room is scheduled to shut down at the end of March.
Lunn said the service is a “lifeline” for a lot of community members. She not only receives food stamps and welfare notices through the mail, but also gets updates on her grandfather, who is suffering from end-stage dementia. She said she doesn’t have a working phone at the moment, so postal mail is the best way to stay in touch with people: “Where else can we go without having to buy a P.O. box or something like that?”
“I just don’t know what we’re going to do, because we can’t afford a P.O. box,” she said. P.O. boxes can cost at least $192 a year, depending on the size. “Hopefully they can find a solution, because it’s been on my mind ever since I found out. Definitely just something else to worry about while you’re homeless.”
Last month, Housing Matters made the decision to close the only public, drop-in day services facility in the county at the end of March. That means access to showers, restrooms, rest areas and other basic amenities will end next year for an estimated 50 to 80 unhoused people who use the services daily.
Housing Matters Chief Initiatives Officer Tom Stagg, who leads all of the organization’s programs and services, said the mail room’s original intent was to help people collect benefits such as Social Security, cash aid and notices about housing assistance. Given how many unhoused or recently housed people use multiple benefits programs, having a permanent place to get mail from relevant agencies is a must.
“Some agencies and organizations require a physical mailing address,” like Social Security, he said. “So as we look for alternatives, one of the things that’s a challenge is [finding] a place where Social Security will send mail to, as well as things like SNAP [federal food aid via EBT cards] and others at the state level.”
Some mail room users, like Tim, who lived in the Housing Matters family shelter about five years ago, get benefits for family members, too. He now rents a place in Capitola, but still uses the mail room to get Medi-Cal notices as well as food stamps for his 3-year-old son. He was surprised to hear the mail room was headed for closure. He plans to redirect his mail to a new address, but worries about people who might not have that same opportunity.
“I’ve been sober for almost four years now, so I can handle it,” he said. “But back then it would’ve f–ked everything up.”
Others simply use the mail room out of convenience and because it’s secure. Susan Bliss, 81, was previously a shelter resident for about 18 months, and now rents in Santa Cruz. However, she says packages left at her apartment are often delivered haphazardly or lost, so she still receives mail at the Housing Matters campus.
“Somehow, they got things mixed up and would leave packages around my lawn, so I would have to go around and find them,” she said as she tucked two Amazon packages under her arm. She also gets Medi-Cal notices and documents at the mail room, and frequently communicates with her sisters via snail mail.
Bliss worries about missing something vital if there’s a gap between the Housing Matters mailroom closing and a substitute service starting up, or if there’s a mix-up when she has to change addresses.
“I would probably end up breaking the law in some way, because I would miss doing something that I’m supposed to do,” she said.
Jenny Wei, temporary mail room coordinator, said each day, the staff sorts participants’ mail for easy pickup.
Guest Experience Program Manager Andrés Melgoza opens up a file box containing a dense stack of papers — from Medi-Cal notices to food assistance forms. There are five more filled boxes just like it on either side.
Wei said people use the mail room for its simplicity, reliability and security well after they have gotten housed. For some, it becomes a habit. “We have one client that comes every single day on the bus just to get her mail here,” she said. “She is housed, but it’s just part of her daily routine.”
“A lot of our clients live in places where their packages might not be there when they come home. There are also a lot of people that are constantly moving around,” said Melgoza. “So here they get the reassurance that we’ll store it properly and reliably.”
Even if a client has trouble getting to the mail room on a regular basis, there is no such thing as a missed delivery. Wei said the mail room holds onto deliveries for two calendar months. After that, they get returned to sender. However, staff hold onto important documents like driver’s licenses, Social Security cards or license plates for a few months longer.
Melgoza said clients have to pick up their mail at least once every four months to stay registered.
Beyond mail, the windows on the sides of the mail room kiosk serve as bulletin boards for community news and notices, including announcements for free pet care, phones, job opportunities and missing persons flyers.
“It’s one of those things that there’s just not a place for that but here,” said Mer Stafford, Housing Matters’ chief impact officer. “They’ll stay up, but there won’t be as much foot traffic here” when the mail room closes.
With the mail room’s closure, many clients might be short on replacement options. County officials are working to stand up a substitute mail room for when Housing Matters’ day services end.
P.O. boxes are not a good solution for most unhoused residents because they’re expensive and require two valid forms of identification, which isn’t always possible for people who’ve been through hard times or lost their most important belongings to eviction or the chaos of the streets. Also, some agencies that provide benefits, such as Social Security, won’t deliver to P.O. boxes.
While there are no concrete plans for a substitute service thus far, Stagg said Housing Matters will share the mail room’s current policies and procedures and offer its volunteers to help with setup when the time comes. For the mail room’s clients, a substitute service can’t come soon enough.
“For people that don’t have housing, this is super nice. When I was homeless, this really helped me a lot,” said mail room client Tim. “I think all of this stuff is a lot more helpful than the community realizes. I mean, it helped me get my life on track.”
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