Man Offers Homeless a Line on Jobs, Low-Cost Housing

Homeless people do not have answering machines.

That obvious but ordinarily irrelevant truth began to matter to Dan Sandel when hundreds of people called his Chatsworth factory eager to take him up on his offer of a job and a virtually free place to live.

“It was very frustrating,” Sandel said. “One guy called three times from downtown, and it probably cost him a buck a call.

“We had no way to reach him, and he finally gave up.”

But Sandel did not.

Determined to see his unusual grass-roots welfare effort succeed, the 54-year-old self-made millionaire has resorted to a tool used by savvy business owners and by presidential candidates Jerry Brown and Ross Perot.

Starting next week, the homeless can dial (800) 303-8555 free of charge to hear a taped message instructing them which buses to take for an interview at Devon Industries, Sandel’s surgical supplies factory.

Interviews for minimum-wage assembly jobs will be conducted on the second and fourth Mondays of each month at 10 a.m.

Applicants must be willing to take a drug test, and only men and women without children are eligible because Sandel’s liability insurance for the program does not cover children.

Those selected will pay $100 a month to share a two-bedroom apartment for six months with three others of the same sex.

Sandel, whose 7-month-old Fresh Start program is believed to be the only one of its kind in the nation, has high hopes for attracting drug- and alcohol-free homeless people through the free number. Until now, he has relied largely on social welfare and government agencies to refer clients.

But referrals have barely trickled in despite a clear need for services for Los Angeles County’s 38,420 homeless.

Part of the problem is that the agencies are too busy to make referrals, social workers have said. Others have suggested that Sandel modify his expectations and accept recovering addicts, as he reluctantly did at first.

But Sandel, a naturalized U.S. citizen who came to this country from Israel more than 30 years ago to make his fortune, wants to help the recently dispossessed working middle class.