As reported here, 6th District Councilman Dee Andrews announced last week his intention to move forward with an agenda item that will allow Long Beach’s homeless population – the release refers to “economic refugees” – to sleep in their vehicles at night in certain specific zones.
Yesterday, as reported here, Councilman Andrews withdrew his proposal and issued a press release stating he plans to reintroduce the proposal “after the 2010 (City) Budget is passed.”
This is one of those Council proposals that are very difficult to summarize accurately. I strongly urge our readers to review the actual language of the item as submitted by Mr. Andrews, here. Be sure to click on the attachment, entitled “090109-R-13sr.pdf “, because it is only in the attachment that the entire proposal is contained.
The late Supreme Court Justice, Thurgood Marshall, once said: “The measure of a country’s greatness is its ability to retain compassion in times of crisis.” I have no doubt that Mr. Andrews is well intentioned in his proposal and that he is motivated entirely by compassion for our City’s homeless population.
But compassion doesn’t require bureaucracy. Compassion can be demonstrated, even coordinated, in many ways. In fact, given the comparative waste and inefficiency with which government accomplishes almost any task, I believe those who truly desire to show compassion to our homeless population would be better served to leave government thoroughly and completely out of the equation.
Mr. Andrews has said that he intends to reintroduce this proposal after the FY10 budget is passed. Let’s consider some of the specifics of Mr. Andrews’ proposal as currently written:
In his memo to the Mayor and Council, Mr. Andrews claims that current City law “…effectively criminalizes living in one’s vehicle.”
This is not entirely accurate.
The Municipal Code section that Mr. Andrews cites, 10.18.040, and which he now seeks to amend, only prohibits using or occupying any recreational vehicle, trailer coach, camper, van or other vehicle for human habitation or camping purposes on any public street (emphasis added).
Far from being “criminalized” by this ordinance, living in one’s vehicle remains entirely lawful elsewhere in the city, including on private property and designated municipal properties where it is allowed and properly regulated (in our several campgrounds, for example).
In his memo, Mr. Andrews says that “We need to create special zones where people can sleep safely in their vehicles.” As I’ve demonstrated, we already have many places throughout the city where people can lawfully sleep in their vehicles. We need not create any “special zones” for this purpose.
In his memo, Mr. Andrews cites Eugene, Oregon and Santa Barbara County as having developed a compassionate community strategy to “allow people to safely sleep in their cars”. But there is no empirical evidence to support the contention that homeless people that sleep in their cars in designated parking zones are any safer than those who sleep in their cars elsewhere.
In considering this proposal –and, in fact, any government proposal- I think we would all be better served to evaluate facts, rather than assumptions.
Part of Mr. Andrews’ proposal asks that we “Explore funding opportunities that would allow such specially designated areas to be matched with staffing, security, and social services…”
It’s certainly possible that by “explore funding opportunities”, Mr. Andrews means that we should seek out grants, donations and other non-governmental funding sources to support this program, but if experience has taught us nothing else, it’s that whenever our Council “explores funding opportunities” it usually results in a net drain on our General Fund.
But let’s look at the examples that Mr. Andrews offers:
In FY09, Eugene, Oregon paid $87,200 from its General Fund to contract with St. Vincent DePaul to issue permits, respond to complaints, and to provide and maintain sanitary facilities related to their “Overnight Parking Program” (OPP).
As of August 2007, the City of Santa Barbara was paying $43,500 per year from its General Fund to the New Beginnings Counseling Center (NBCC) to oversee that City’s “Recreational Vehicle Safe Parking Program”.
Santa Barbara County costs weren’t readily available.
I’ll remind our readers that even as Mr. Andrews asks that we “explore funding opportunities” to support his proposal, Long Beach is currently in the midst of discussing and debating extremely painful budget cuts in its attempts to deal with a $38 million structural deficit.
The fact is that Long Beach simply does not have any funds for new programs of this sort right now, nor do we expect to for at least several more years, no matter how humanistic such programs may seem or how compassionate the motivation behind them may be.
So what should we do?
I’m glad you asked! Here’s my counter proposal:
I think the City, through its Homeless Services Division, should demonstrate leadership in this area by reaching out to and encouraging the numerous non- and not-for-profit social service agencies – like Goodwill Industries, The Salvation Army, the Long Beach Rescue Mission, etc- and religious organizations -like the hundreds of houses of worship- in our community to reserve a certain number of spaces, say 3-5, in their own parking lots between 6:00pm and 7:00am, for use by homeless persons who live in their vehicles. We should remind these organizations that there is no law prohibiting any or all of them from offering this valuable service to our homeless population.
Such existing, non- and not-for-profit facilities already have parking lots, most of which are not used between the hours mentioned, and already have restroom facilities that any car-bound guests could be provided access to for this purpose. If providing access to indoor restrooms proves logistically difficult, I’m certain it would be fairly easy to secure port-a-potties from a reputable vendor as an in-kind donation, the value of which these vendors can then deduct from their corporate taxes each year.
Community members who desire to assist in deferring any program costs incurred by any of these non- and not-for-profits are likewise free to donate their time, money, skills, services, food, clothing or anything else that may be needed to support the program directly to those organizations and, likewise, derive the appropriate tax-deductions for doing so.
No existing City Ordinance need be amended to adopt this proposal. The City needs not “explore funding opportunities”, especially in these budget deficit-ridden times. City Government needs not assume any vicarious liability for authorizing overnight access to public property for use by homeless persons nor bear any unnecessary costs for having such a program coordinated or maintained.
These social service agencies and faith-based non-profits can regulate overnight homeless parking on their own properties in whatever way they are led and which best suits them and meets the needs of their homeless guests. Perhaps one of the larger participating non- or not-for-profit organizations would prove willing to serve as a coordinator between all of the others; facilitating communication between them and answering toll free phone inquiries from the car-bound homeless so that if one parking provider’s spaces are full, a guest can be reliably referred to another provider nearby.
A parking lot painting contractor might be willing to step up and donate the personnel and equipment necessary at the beginning of the project to properly mark (paint) the spaces each provider agrees to set aside on their property and to assure that such markings are clear, consistent and easily identified from lot to lot.
Our City’s Homeless Services Division can visit the sites and provide referrals or other services but only to the degree that existing funding, staffing and resources permit.
Finally, this project would need a name; something that is easy to remember, readily adaptable to informational flyers and business cards, and that helps focus, not only the attention of the public but the efforts of all the organizations, entities and people that agree to participate and provide support.
And that’s where you come in.
How about employing some of your own creative talents and suggesting some creative, distinctive and marketable program names and other ideas? I welcome all serious and constructive suggestions.
Here’s an idea for a name, to get the ball rolling.
How about something like: “The Long Beach ‘Port in a Storm’ Project”?
I very much welcome your questions and your comments!
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