"OAKLAND — People in the industry call it “housing of last resort.”

Scattered throughout Alameda County, there are perhaps 200 to 300 such facilities — some in the form of single-family homes tucked into quiet residential neighborhoods or single-room occupancy hotels dotting downtown Oakland, Hayward, Berkeley and Alameda. Still others are nondescript apartment buildings lining main streets in East and West Oakland. The one thing most have in common is the people living there have few other options.

When a four-alarm fire ripped through a transitional living facility in West Oakland last week, killing four people and displacing more than 80 others, it exposed the difficult choices facing many city and county regulators and homeless advocates when it comes to this type of housing: Shelter people in dangerous conditions, or leave them vulnerable to another danger — the streets."