Here’s the council discussion after some very moving testimony about Occupy Madison and what it means for homeless individuals living there, about what it is like to be homeless and about how the homeless services in this town may not work for everyone who is homeless. The testimony is here if you did not read it.
So, the Mayor was really cranky leading the meeting, more so than usual – another medical condition so maybe it is excusable – but most people didn’t know that might be why he was cranky and his past behavior talking about homelessness has been extremely cranky as well. So, its hard to tell, but he was in a very cranky mood!
Alder Marsha Rummel starts out the discussion thanks everyone for coming, says there was quite a ground swell and she appreciates their time and opportunity to hear their stories. She has asked the mayor if he will meet with people and they will let him speak but I hope he will agree and that you can talk about some of the issues. She says she knows the mayor handed out a sheet with some of the services we do provide, but she hopes that we can talk about some ways we can work together as a community and deal with the crisis.
Bridget Maniaci says she has a lot of mixed opinions about the language before them, especially when it says that the city reaffirms its commitment that Housing is a Human Right and will increase its efforts to implement that resolution. She is curious to know how, how are we going to implement that? She is curious to know, is this really a successful model of self organizaiton? And it may be the model of how our city can respond to poverty and homelessness. Like really? Tents? That is going to solve it? If anything, the folks at Occupy have really done a job of throwing a lot of light on where we messing up. And in front of us there is this fabulous sheet that shows hundreds of thousands of dollars that the city spends money on when it comes to homeless services and yet as the alder who district this sits in, this is not anywhere near being an issue with a resolution. She is quite mixed also because there are no real neighborhood representatives here this evening, frankly my neighborhood has been quite indifferent to the activities going on on this lot. Neither really in favor, neither really against. So long as nothing really messed up their block, their neighborhood and it is quite frustrating, cuz sitting on the Housing Committee we haven’t really met consistently for a year, so how, even within our system can we try to bring this forward when the Housing Committee hasn’t been able to meet quorum. I sort of just want to abstain from this cuz the fact that we can’t figure this out, that “all for the cost of a 15 amp electrical system and an unused parking lot”, you know, I think we have to ask ourselves, and I think we have to ask our service providers that we are providing 10s and 100s of thousands of dollars to, what is it that they are doing, why aren’t these folks being served and how can we serve these folks and I’m sorry that I don’t think a parking lot with tents and a 15-amp electrical service is how we can best serve these folks. With that says, I also have real reservations about sure, continue on this site, because we’ll have up on our agenda the development approval for across the street, and pushing these folks off the site is not going to solve the fact that they don’t have anywhere to go. So, I hope that all of us will work on this and I’d like to see some of the service providers and when I have consistently for the last four or five months gotten press calls on this item I have consistently said that we need to get the service providing community together, we need to get the county at the table, we need to figure out why this isn’t working.
Lauren Cnare thanks everyone for coming and sharing, I think most of us sitting on this side of the room are, probably, that 1% and I’m glad that you could come and share your experience with us and I think that this is the first step of many and I think that I wanted to be clear that this resolution that Alder Rummel has brought to our attention is probably that first step, but it also doesn’t make any promises about what is next, because I don’t think we know as a city what is next. It tells us there is a next, and she hopes that the conversations do continue and she also hopes that when Occupy Madison leaves its current site, it if disperses or goes somewhere else, or if people find places to continue their good work in the community, that is not going to be a reflection about Madison not caring, because you really have brought something important to our attention and we are moving into our budget season and I think we will do a better job next time. So tonight, I think we are probably all going to support this, but it doesn’t make any promises, I hope that we can do better.
This is where the crowd got a little restless and there were groans and hisses and a cough “bullshit”
Mayor says excuse me, we had no disruptive outbursts while the speakers presented and as I indicated at the time, the same applies when the council members speak. So hold your tongue.
Lisa Subeck also thanks the people who came, particularly those who shared your own stories, I think it is particularly important for all of us to hear your stories and to hear what life is like and perhaps get a little taste of an experience that isn’t our own experience. I was really impressed by some of the things I heard about Occupy and I was a little embarrassed to say I haven’t been down there at all. And I should have been. And I still would like to come down and talk with you all. I think that what I heard was that there was an incredible amount of empowerment, and as somebody who worked in the homeless shelter system and in transitional housing programs for many years, we talked a lot about empowerment, I’m not sure that we were really successful in empowering those we served and what I heard in your messages was a message of empowerment and I think that is exciting. I think there is an incredible amount that we as a community can learn from that. I don’t know that the model of Occupy is exactly the right model that is going to solve our problem of homelessness and ensure that people have a place to live. That said, I think that there is a lot to be taken from it, there is a lot to be taken from it and I think that some of us who have not walked in your shoes have a lot to learn from your experiences. I also appreciate that you have highlighted many of the failures of our system. A system that we have worked within and a system that we are legitimately always trying to improve but we are grossly under-resourced and we need to make a commitment to investing more. Alder Maniaci alluded to the hundreds of thousands of dollars that the city spends, we spend $403,640 specifically on homelessness and housing services and I don’t think that is enough. That is actually a pretty piddly amount. (For those of you confused, that is the number on the CDBG side of things that is city, not state or federal dollars. It doesn’t include the community services funding for early childcare, seniors, employment, domestic violence and rape crises services, youth programs etc. It also doesn’t include money for neighborhood centers and community gardens, etc.) Now there are other pieces to the puzzle and we need to work together with our partners the county and the United Way and others, but I also think that a missing voice at that table for too long have been folks like you who spoke today and I hope that we can do a better job of bringing you to the table and evaluating what the needs are and working together to meet those needs. Finally, I want to say, Z! spoke and mentioned SROs and Housing First and those are some models I spent years looking at, did some traveling, went and saw where there were successful housing first models and I hope that we can take that and start to look at that for Madison. When I heard one of the speakers speak about barriers and folks being able to overcome their barriers because they have a safe place to be at Occupy that really is the premise to the housing first model and I think that perhaps what you all are illustrating for those of us who are not at Occupy on a regular basis is that that is a model that works in order to break down some of the other barriers, we have to put housing first quite frankly. She thanks them again, first and foremost for your willingness to share your stories and share your experiences with us.
Mayor Paul Soglin says before Solomon speaks, he says she made reference to ths document City of Madison 2012 Homeless funding, do you also have the other Community Development document, that details the $17M in other community services. No? Ok, well get you that.
Subeck says she is on Community Services, she is aware of that.
The mayor just doesn’t want them to forget the other $17M. (For comparison, we spend $53M on the bus service and $60M on police)
Brian Solomon says a lot of what he wanted to say has already been said, but I have spoken many times from this seat about how many times as a body, often unintentionally, take actions that are more about making it harder, fighting homeless instead of homelessness. And, I want to thank Alder Rummel for bringing this before us, we still live in a community where unfortunately, large numbers of our community have very negative perceptions about our homeless community, often perceptions that they choose to be homeless and it is through a fault of their own. And that our responsibility as a city is to sweep them under the rug and make them disappear. I know that nobody on this body believe that this is what we should do, and I know that the solutions are very difficult. Before us we have a solution that, where we have several dozen members of our homeless community coming to our council meeting, and speaking before us and that does not happen very often, and if for no other reason, than to celebrate the fact that they are here, that they are speaking before us, that they are telling us our stories, telling us about how empowering and how important this experience has been for them, if for no other reasons than that, this was very worthwhile. I hope that we will find a way to continue this in some format or another. It would be nice if we could all just get together and find a way to solve homelessness in Madison, and get everybody an apartment, but that is not going to happen any time soon. And until that does, we need to look at creative and non-traditional ways to address this problem. This is definitely creative and definitely non-traditional and while I understand how it might cause people to question whether or not it is the best solution, the reality is that it is part of the solution. And so thank you Alder Rummel for bringing this forward and thank you to all the members of the homeless community that are here to tell us your stories.
The mayor asks for further discussion, pauses a very long time, no one speaks. He then says, I’m thinking. Another long pause. Then he says, “on the question, all those in favor” . . .
Motion passes. Thank you Occupy.
Now, what the hell is going to happen next? Anyone know? Anyone? Now what? WHAT!?! Who is going to take the lead and do something???????? Clearly we have a problem here, no one likes anyone else’s solutions and criticizes everyone else’s ideas and we just keep ignoring the situation. What happens next? When will our community deal with this issue? When do we get to have the conversation with elected officials, service providers, homeless and homeless advocates in the same room? Will it ever happen? Or do we all just go back to the usual and feel good that we thanked some people for doing some good work?
Where are our leaders on this? Is everyone afraid to take this on because of potential consequences? I don’t think it is lack of information, maybe lack of resources, but mostly, I think it is lack of political will. What happens next? Anyone?
Thank you, Forward! I think $400K on homelessness vs. $60M on police says it all!