(The Center Square) – The Spokane City Council held its second community roundtable on Tuesday over several delayed homelessness ordinances after the first meeting ended without discussing them.
Council President Betsy Wilkerson and Councilmember Zack Zappone centered the meeting on a few aspects of the measures after dozens of stakeholders left confused last time. While the intention is to gather input on the shelved legislation, the first meeting focused on existing laws.
Since mid-July, the council has stalled at least five related pieces of legislation, all but one proposed by Republicans, which Tuesday’s meeting focused on. Nicknamed the “Homeless Bill of Rights,” the ordinance would make “housing status” a protected class.
During the roundtable, stakeholders completed a survey that asked about taking up the “Homeless Bill of Rights” at the state and local levels. According to the results provided by the city, of the 24 responses, 13 noted they did not support making “housing status” a protected class for Spokane, with 12 against pushing for it at the state level.
“Some of us, like myself, are an LGBT identifying individual; that’s not something I can change,” one resident told the rest in attendance. “But homelessness is something that’s temporary, something that we want to bring people out of, and permanently identifying them as a protected class just didn’t seem to jive with us.”
If later approved, the measure could expand existing laws to prevent employers from rejecting a candidate based on their housing status or asking about it on an application. While some favored the aspects of the ordinance, many who spoke up did so against the “Homeless Bill of Rights.”
Some stakeholders voiced concerns about the unintended implications on the business community, which some of the council have already attempted to dismiss. Others noted the morality of the issues as Spokanites and those coming to town lie cold in the streets.
“There are bad actors out there, and you’re going to let them be able to avoid things if they don’t have to report things,” a business owner told the group. “I think you’re setting yourself up to see revenue shrink if you pass this. I employ over 100 people; I don’t care if you’re homeless or not; I care if you show up and work.”
The meeting also touched on part of Councilmember Michael Cathcart’s ordinance that would modify requirements around siting new service providers. One of the central parts of the measure focuses on good neighbor agreements, which require operators to uphold specific standards.
The legally binding agreement could require providers to attend the neighborhood council meetings and take reasonable steps to mitigate the impact on existing residents, among other things. However, the majority of the council noted it could make it harder to do that kind of work.
Most noted that the agreements should include the operator, neighborhood council, surrounding businesses and the city, then setting clear expectations around managing trash, graffiti and drug paraphernalia, among other requirements like when to report and enforce violations.
Most respondents also said they would like the city to enforce the agreements within three blocks of a service provider. The least popular idea was to enforce only the immediate property boundaries.
Spokane already has a good neighbor agreement with Chief Garry Park over the Trent Shelter, the city’s largest congregate shelter; however, according to the document, it’s “not legally enforceable in court, nor is it intended to be.”
“Don’t try to sneak something into a neighborhood and hope that we don’t discover what’s going on because we will,” another resident said, speaking on Chief Garry Park. “We would take a big step forward I think if we treated the service providers the same way we treat all other businesses.”
