Heads Up! More Ordinances Coming to Address the Homeless?!

I’m wondering if they will let the advocates participate? We all know that better solutions are arrived at when opposing parties work together to come up with solutions that are acceptable to both parties. But I doubt we will be invited to the table. It would be an awesome discussion if allowed.

This comes from a string of emails that was recently sent out – I took out people’s names, for confidentiality reasons, I replaced names with x’s.

Staff description of the issues on State St. and Downtown Area
Note the strategies, hosing people down, putting bars on benches and turning off electricity to deal with “the problem”. To be fair, in two cases, they also contacted a homeless outreach person.

From: Laschinger, Lisa
Sent: Tuesday, July 21, 2015 1:47 PM
To: Knepp, Eric
Cc: Romines, Charles
Subject: Mall Encampent/Abandonded property issues

Eric,

I spoke with the crew this morning after you and I talked and have more accurate info on the situation. I also talked to Charlie shortly after and shared with him the info I have included here. I’m sorry if this is more information than what you are looking for, but it’s what I have.

Library Mall:
Two Men sleep on the benches in Library Mall, one hangs out all day with his blue tarp and belongings taking up two benches. The other stashes his belongings in Fitch Court near one of our bike racks and leaves it for the day. There are a number of people that sleep on the exterior of St. Paul’s building, and leave their belongings, but that is not our property.

Concrete Park/Towers:
We had a very regular group here that was also camping out, but that seems to be hit and miss anymore. I saw a different group hanging out there yesterday. Apparently one of the maintenance guys at one of the neighboring buildings has been hosing down the area occassionally, waking people up so it is not as inviting as it once was.

200 Block of State:
There had been a woman living on a bench just down from Ian’s. She was particularly troublesome because of the mess she left, but she has not been around over the last couple of weeks because a security guard for a nearby bar actually put a bar/brace on the benches she was using so she couldn’t lay on them. I spoke with Will Breuer from Porchlight about her after we had so many issues with her, so he may have helped her find a different place.

Carroll Street (near Wisconsin):
Three individuals have been living/sleeping on the benches (1 woman and two men)

xxxxx (E. Washington and Pinckney
Everyone is aware of the concerns with xxxxx. Unfortunately, the smell and presence of her waste is very overpowering for the staff working in that area, as I’m sure it is unpleasant for pedestrians passing by. She tends to keep her possessions out of the way, and is always attending them.

xxxxxx/”Cancer Sucks Guy”
xxxxxxxx just re-appered on the 400 Block of State Street yesterday sleeping on a bench in around lunch time, and he was looking worse than he had been which is not surprising given his condition. Until yesterday we hadn’t seen him in over a month. He hasn’t been back long enough for us to know if he will pose the same concerns we were having before (mainly human waste and his ad hoc grocery store). I had been in pretty regular contact with Will Breuer from Porchlight about him early this summer, but not recently.

Noticeable Abandoned Property:
700 Fitch Court
30 on the Square

How we handle abandonded property:
Designated Areas Prohibiting Abandoned Property: Philosophers Grove, 30 on the Square, Peace Park and Concrete Park are all posted that “Abandoned property will be removed per MGO,” and we are able to remove the property once we know that it is abandoned. We have not done this a lot lately aside from the household furnishings that have appeared because people usually claim it when we’re in the area. The crew has not been picking up the stuff left at 30 on the Square, and I reminded them today that in any of these signed areas we are able to pick up abandoned property, log it and store it where the Rangers instruct us to.

Any areas that are not posted that “abandoned property will be removed” need to have 24 hours notice given before we can remove it. We did this last year when we were having issues at Starbucks on Main St. The Rangers would post the notice and the Mall staff would come in with the help of MPD and remove it. We have not done this since last summer. When we had issues with people living around bike racks over the winter, the Police would find the people and tell them their stuff had to be removed or it would be confiscated.

OVERTURE ISSUES:
We will be shutting the power off to all outlets on light poles in front of the Overature either today or tomorrow. The fountain is not currently running due to some mechanical—it is not run by electricity, it is basically just a fountain attached directly to the water line. I told Tom not to worry about turning it back on for the time being.

We may want to consider shutting off all outlets down State Street because as we shut off the outlets that people are currently using, they are going to migrate until they find power. Please let me know if you want us to do this.

Lisa Laschinger
Parks General Supervisor
Central Parks and Mall/Concourse Maintenance
City of Madison Parks Division
(608) 266-9214
Play_MP-for-email
Like us on Facebook. Follow us on Twitter @PlayMadison.

Parks Superintendent Description of staff description

From: Knepp, Eric
Sent: Tuesday, July 21, 2015 9:51 PM
To: Soglin, Paul
Cc: Romines, Charles; Crawley, Katie; Monks, Anne; Reyes, Gloria; Ragland, Enis
Subject: FW: Mall Encampent/Abandonded property issues

Mayor –
I’m providing the report below from our Central Parks Supervisor Lisa Laschinger. It provides a good amount of information on what is going on in this area related to Mall Maintenance and the transient/homeless population. We are looking forward to participating on the staff team led by MPD and human services providers to assist in addressing this issue. As you can see below, our staff routinely are exposed to very unpleasant working conditions in relationship to cleaning up the bodily wastes of others.
Thanks,
Eric M. Knepp
Madison Parks Superintendent
608.266.4711
www.cityofmadison.com/parks
Like us on Facebook. Follow us on Twitter @PlayMadison.

And, brace yourself, the Mayor . . . .

From: Soglin, Paul
Sent: Wednesday, July 22, 2015 8:55 AM
To: Knepp, Eric
Cc: Romines, Charles; Crawley, Katie; Monks, Anne; Reyes, Gloria; Ragland, Enis; All Alders; Koval, Michael; Davis, Steven
Subject: RE: Mall Encampent/Abandonded property issues

Thanks for the update. Have staff note that xxxxxxx was seen this morning near State and the Square with his walker and no pants or underwear.

The staff group will do as the alders wish, and determine what existing ordinances can be used and what new ones, if any we need, to get compliance. It should be noted that it some instances it will take a combined effort of Police, Health, Mall Maintenance, and Haz Mat.

Paul R. Soglin
Mayor
City of Madison
210 MLK Jr. Blvd
Madison, WI 53703
Office: 608-266-4611

Casey Stengel “The secret to managing is to keep the guys who hate you away from the ones who are undecided.”

My response
I thought the initial staff report was professional and measured. I thought the supervisor escalated things a bit and of course the mayor did. Why can’t we have a group of people who know these folks sit down and brainstorm solutions, not ordinances? Why must we seek “compliance” instead of figuring out why people are behaving this way and get them some help? Why do we consider the “solutions” ordinances and not housing and programs? Is jailing and fining people going to solve the problem? Would a few trained street social workers with medical resources be more effective? (The answer to the last question is yes, it is what works everyplace else . . . )

Here was my response this morning. Of course, professionally, I have no role here at all except being a member of the Homeless Services Consortium as the Executive Director of the Tenant Resource Center, but I play no role in the leadership of that group (city staff, my contract administrator spoke against me being on the board), except being the default legislative committee chair and since they mentioned ordinance, I’ll put it on that agenda (Aug 4, 1:30, United Way 3rd floor):

from: Brenda Konkel
to: Karen Andro, Heather Dempsey, “Wallinger, Sue”, Martha Cranley, “O’Keefe, Jim”, “Becker, Casey”, Heidi Wegleitner, Steven Schooler, “Green, Lynn”, Linda Ketcham, Tami Miller
cc: Mayor , All Alders
date: Thu, Jul 23, 2015 at 6:35 AM
subject: Fwd: FW: Mall Encampent/Abandonded property issues

Sue – Could you send this out to the Homeless Services Consortium and invite those who want to discuss it to attend the Legislative Committee meeting on August 4th at the Legislative Committee.

Karen, Heather, Martha – Should this be discussed at the full consortium?

Jim, Lynn and Casey – Is there some way to have a coordinated services oriented way to address these issues?

Anyone dealing with M? Does this man have to die on the street like this?

Anyone know if the Homeless Services Consortium will be involved in these discussions? Seems like we should be at the table.

Thanks all!
Brenda

Not that anyone has to or wants to or will listen to me . . . but I thought I’d try, again. I’m stubborn that way. I grew up in a stereotypical stubborn German heritage family with values rooted in the Lutheran religion. (Ah, idyllic rural Wisconsin . . . when I was a 13 year old teenager growing up on a pig farm I never thought I’d miss it! 🙂 WHo knew this is where I’d end up.)