(The Center Square) – Mayor Lisa Brown unveiled an overhaul of Spokane’s homelessness strategy Thursday, pitting the city council’s progressive majority and conservative minority against each other once again.
The proposals follow the Washington State Supreme Court striking down one of the city’s camping bans in April. The high court ruled that the citizen-led effort fell outside the scope of an initiative, so the conservatives tried to restore it with a council vote, but the majority declined.
The ordinances that Brown proposed Thursday build on some of the ideas the city officials have thrown around lately, but Councilmembers Jonathan Bingle and Michael Cathcart remain skeptical.
“The majority loves to leave out the word majority; they do this consistently,” Cathcart told The Center Square after Brown’s press conference. “They act as though something has been collaborated with all of council, and it’s simply not true. There was no conversation with myself.”
If approved over the coming weeks, the ordinances proposed Monday would revamp the city’s response to homelessness. The laws would codify specific goals, adjust when the city activates inclement weather shelters, and provide police officers with a new enforcement tool for camping.
Brown and other officials held a briefing on Wednesday with the Spokesman-Review and other local media outlets so they could ask questions ahead of the announcement. However, Bingle and Cathcart say they didn’t know about it until the next day, hours before the unveiling.
Cathcart received an invite for a Thursday meeting with Brown the night before but wasn’t told what it was about. He assumed it might be related to this, considering comments that Brown made the week before, but the administration didn’t provide him or Bingle with copies, only a quick look.
“There was absolutely a private press conference, a gaggle, whatever it is, [Wednesday], and I don’t know who all was there, but I was told it was written media,” Cathcart said Thursday.
Neither received the ordinances until after The Center Square sent what Councilmember Paul Dillon had provided to the outlet. Cathcart said the officials told him he would have copies on Thursday morning but found out after the announcement that they were still making changes.
Bingle told The Center Square that he received an invitation for the 8:30 a.m. meeting with the mayor, like the rest of the council, but claimed his invite said 9 a.m. He said Brown had to leave not long after he arrived, so there wasn’t much time for back and forth on the proposed overhaul.
Bingle said this demonstrates that the administration and council majority “aren’t interested in working with” him or Cathcart. The council has long been pitted against each other over the crisis, despite efforts last year to find a compromise through a series of community roundtables.
“If it’s a really good ordinance, which they assure me it is, if it’s actually that good, this is something that we could have partnered on, because what a powerful testament it would have been,” Bingle told The Center Square. “But that’s a missed opportunity for us.”
Cathcart supports aspects of the overhaul but raised concerns about a lack of transparency and provisions he said were necessary to avoid impacts on the community. Compromises aren’t off the table, but when the council introduces them during a committee meeting, there may be some sticking points.
The proposals would also repeal Spokane’s “Sit & Lie” and pedestrian interference laws, a sore spot for the council, as both sides have repeatedly gone back and forth over the policies. Bingle held off on giving an opinion, citing a lack of time to view the proposals due to what unfolded.
Dillon told The Center Square that certain policies require officials to act fast and that it’s normal for officials to work independently sometimes. The city spent months discussing the issue during the roundtables, and the council has already debated similar measures on the dias.
He also advocated for changes to the proposal, which all of the officials will discuss as they move through the council process. Homelessness has largely divided the city, but Dillon thinks that as they put forward a more well-rounded approach, it could ease divisions on the council.
“The court decisions are unpredictable, so you have to be nimble, but obviously, there’s going to be more time for feedback,” Dillon told The Center Square. “We can’t just sit on our hands and do nothing; that’s not acceptable, and the community deserves a response.”
“And I would argue, what has been on the table has not been working,” he continued, “It’s time to chart a new course.”
