An unhoused individual was found dead on the front steps of Williams Chapel Baptist Church in East Oakland at approximately 6:30 a.m. on September 28, according to the church. The death, at the church's location at 1410 10th Ave., has pushed congregation leaders to publicly demand more funding and better systems of care for people living without shelter across the Bay Area.
Williams Chapel extended condolences to the individual's family and loved ones, as reported by BlackPressUSA. Per the church, the person appears to have come to Williams Chapel seeking safety and may have needed medical support. The outlet reports that the church described the death as reflecting a broader crisis affecting unhoused individuals and families throughout the Bay Area.
The church says unhoused people frequently lack reliable shelter or timely access to medical care, mental health support, and other essential services, and that limited funding and insufficient resources leave vulnerable people without the help they need, the same account notes. That gap between crisis and capacity is not new to Williams Chapel: the church has spent years building out emergency infrastructure precisely because the need on its doorstep never fully goes away.
A Longtime Safety Net Built From a Parking Lot
Williams Chapel currently provides safe-haven overnight parking, tiny-home emergency shelter, and wraparound referral services for unhoused people, per the church's own account relayed by BlackPressUSA. That work traces back to 2018, when the Interfaith Council of Alameda County launched its Tiny Home and Safe Car Park Initiative, with West Side Missionary among its initial participants and overnight vehicle parking offered through the initiative, according to The San Francisco Foundation. City funding of $300,000 also supported supervised overnight lots.
Williams Chapel works alongside West Side Missionary Baptist Church, and both congregations belong to the Interfaith Council of Alameda County, the church told BlackPressUSA. West Side Missionary, located in West Oakland and led by Pastor Ken Chambers, operates its own safe parking lot, tiny homes, and weekly mobile shower and laundry services, according to CBS San Francisco. Chambers reportedly started that work after experiencing homelessness himself in 2008, per the same report.
Faith Leaders Say Funding Determines Capacity
Both the East and West Oakland sites can increase to full capacity with additional funding, the church says, and Williams Chapel and West Side Missionary plan to extend their services to other congregations if that funding materializes. The church is inviting government agencies, nonprofit organizations, interfaith communities, businesses, and neighbors to join efforts to develop solutions for people experiencing homelessness, per the BlackPressUSA report.
Alameda County has previously funded this kind of faith-based infrastructure directly: the county awarded a $191,202 contract to the Interfaith Council of Alameda County through its Homeless Provider Incubator Fund to maintain operations at its Oakland safe parking sites, with the grant selection conducted by a community review panel without county staff voting, according to county documentation. Williams Chapel has also built more permanent solutions beyond emergency shelter — the church partnered with Eden Housing to convert an underutilized parking lot into the Dr. Kenneth Anderson Senior Housing project, 66 affordable one-bedroom apartments for low-income seniors earning 30% to 60% of area median income, per Eden Housing.
Rev. Kenneth Anderson has served as senior pastor of Williams Chapel since 2010 and ran as a candidate in Oakland's April 2025 special election for City Council District 2, a race held to fill the seat vacated by former Councilmember Nikki Fortunato Bas, according to The Oaklandside.
The Numbers Behind the Crisis
In Alameda County, preliminary Point-in-Time data showed the overall unhoused population dropped 13%, from 9,450 in 2024 to 8,201 in 2026, KQED reported in August.
