Under a new set of rules approved by the Tucson City Council Tuesday night, the city’s homeless residents are not allowed to have items bigger than 4-cubic feet on the sidewalk, faith groups and others cannot distribute pre-packaged food or beverages at parks without a permit from the city and sidewalks are off limits between 7 a.m. and 10 p.m.
A homeless protester asked the council: Can you fit all of your belongings within 4-cubic feet?
“I ask you to consider that right now,” Roy Trout told the council before its vote. “Number 2, how many of you hold picnics in the park every day or on special occasions? Why can’t the homeless have picnics at the park with the church? We are coming up with all of these laws and sanctions…to make life harder on each and every member that is out there, life is already hard enough.” He said that while teenagers beat up homeless people, such as himself, on the streets, the City Council “is worried about 4-cubic feet for a homeless man’s belongings. It doesn’t make sense to me. The City Council is worried about a church going into a park and giving a homeless man a meal and having a picnic with them.”
The ordinance—which passed with a 5-2 vote, and is pretty much a set of clarifications and amendments to provisions that were already in place—concerned critics, and even some members of the council.
City Councilwoman Karin Uhlich (Ward 3) was very worried about ending up in court, and the possibility of losing federal funding from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development—the agency that keeps many homeless shelters afloat. Recently, she pointed out, the Department of Justice said certain actions, such as not allowing people to sleep on sidewalks, is a violation of the Eighth Amendment’s protections against cruel and unusual punishment, and thus unconstitutional. Simply put, it criminalizes homelessness, DOJ argued. Uhlich unsuccessfully pleaded to have DOJ review the city’s suggested new rules before voting on them. She and Councilman Steve Kozachik (Ward 6) voted against the new ordinance.
“Everybody seems to want to downplay those issues but I am not willing because there is a lot at stake,” Uhlich said at the meeting. “My preference would be not to [move on] at this point. It is arbitrary…that 4-cubic feet…we are going to end up in court. I think it will put our HUD resources at risk.” Newly re-elected Councilwoman Shirley Scott (Ward 4) wasn’t sure the DOJ would pay that much attention to an ordinance in the City of Tucson. But, they have been striking down similar ones in other cities, such as Boise, Idaho. “They must have a mechanism to what constitutes as criminalizing homelessness and what does not,” Uhlich responded.
“Whether people can give water to homeless people…I don’t think we add value to our efforts [and] really tackle how we are going to get people off the streets and [to] a job,” she said. Uhlich also questioned what the penalties would be if a person doesn’t follow the provisions. According to City Attorney Mike Rankin—who had the duty of piecing together the new ordinance—the civic fines could cost roughly $100 and these would be enforced by the Tucson Police Department.
New Restrictions
The rules require health permits, which will be free of charge, to distribute pre-packaged food and beverages (except for bottled water) at parks and areas adjacent to parks. The city can deny these if it finds the request could harm public health, and that the permits are good for 10 days, but will automatically renew for an additional 50 days, unless it is otherwise determined. Councilman Paul Cunningham (Ward 2), who was also recently re-elected, added an amendment that will not require permits on Easter, Thanksgiving or Christmas.
When it comes to bikes, backpacks, sleeping bags and other belongings, there is now a size restriction of 4-cubic feet for items allowed on sidewalks, and these items have to remain 5 feet back from the curb. Rankin told the council the size limitation was necessary to avoid another problem with so-called dream pods on sidewalks and parks (remember Safe Park?). Also, no one is allowed on the sidewalks with their stuff between 7 a.m. and 10 p.m., citing heavy pedestrian traffic.
People will be allowed to rest on the sidewalks starting at 10 p.m. until 7 a.m. Along with that, city parks will be open until 10 p.m. Ranking said at the afternoon study session that the idea behind this is for homeless individuals to have a place to be at all times. When the park closes, they can move to the sidewalks.
“All of this is trying to achieve a balance, protect public safety [and] the ability to use public spaces, including sidewalks. At the same time, we can’t criminalize folks and we won’t criminalize folks,” Rankin told the council. “Twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, the homeless, particularly in downtown, will have a place to be with their stuff.”
The council seemed interested in amending the new ordinance to tweak the areas they were not happy with (Uhlich actually wanted to move the vote to a later date), and review these rules often to keep them up to the standards of DOJ.
But, as re-elected Councilwoman Regina Romero (Ward 1) put it, the ordinance is not going to be the answer to the issue of homelessness. They merely fix the concerns downtown merchants have over too many homeless people congregating in one spot. The city should continue to move toward a humane solution.
This article appears in Dec 3-9, 2015.
Rankin told the council. “Twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, the homeless, particularly in downtown, will have a place to be with their stuff.”
After spending hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars downtown, this is what we get. Sure makes you want to jump in your cars and take our decrepit roads downtown, doesn’t it?
Tucson, 5th poorest city in the country, and damn proud of it.
Tucson City Council actions are Inhumane and Barbaric:
“…..faith groups and others cannot distribute food or beverages at parks without a permit from the Pima County Health Department, and sidewalks are off limits between 7 a.m. and 10 p.m. …..They merely fix the concerns downtown merchants have over too many homeless people congregating in one spot.” …putting Money and Profit before the requirement in a Civilized Society to render Assistance when Assistance is required!! We are mutually dependent on each other. I would remind the Members of City Council that supported this Barbarism; “There but for the Grace of God…go I”…(John Bradford (circa 1510–1555)
Councils Barbaric actions must be reviewed by the Arizona Attorney General’s Office (Civil Rights Division), and the US Department of Justice!
At least they are not buying real estate like the County. Or are they?
http://tucson.com/news/local/huckelberry-defends-k-county-purchase-of-tucson-church-s-land/article_b9e84e2c-9ea8-11e5-b2ed-4f177406ce85.html
Poor Karen Ulich. She’s crying over her baloney sandwich she’s serving to people in the park…
After all, Karen is an expert in homelessness since she used to run Primavera before she ran the city council and divorced her husband and moved out of the Jefferson Park neighborhood.
There is no simple solution to the problem. First, we must know why so many people are homeless. Are they out of work, merely transients, drug addicts, or mentally ill? Until these questions are answered, the problem will continue. The “why” should come before the how and when.
Shame on the mayor and council, and shame on all of you who lack empathy for people who are homeless. What are they supposed to do? Where are they supposed to go? They have almost nothing, and by limiting their square footage you’re impoverishing them even more.
How about if we try some programs that have been proven to work? like the Housing First program in Salt Lake City? cheaper and more effective — what a concept! http://www.latimes.com/nation/la-na-utah-h…
These are human beings, many of them veterans, who you claim to respect and honor for their service, but once they’ve returned, damaged and broken from fighting your wars, you harass them, toss them aside, abandon them, don’t provide mental health services or housing or anything else they need.
And you have gutted other mental health services and addiction services for non-veterans, you have limited the number of beds in shelters, and now you’re making it harder for those without homes to be fed by folks who are trying to help.
This is a terrible decision. We are all just one or two paychecks or one medical emergency away from being in the exact same situation. Open your hearts.
Denver is offering them 20 square feet, and a real change of seasons. What if we lose them to a higher bidder?
This is all so ridiculous. But it says a lot about the City Council and the Peter Principle.
Since the United States Supreme Court has opined that corporations giving money to politicians is protected as “free” speech under the First Amendment, we should consider that giving food to the homeless also warrants First Amendment protection as a way of exercising our rights of free speech in condemnation of the Tucson City Council’s latest attack against a segment of the population that is unrepresented but still exists. I suggest that if the City Council wants the issue of homeless people in Tucson to go away, they stop these cowardly efforts to use legal trickery and start working with community groups to provide the safety nets that they and other politicians have eliminated to appease business interests at the expense of basic human dignity. If that does not work, they can continue to set in their closed-door meetings with their fingers in their ears repeating “la, la, la, la, la” till the next election, or bond attempt to raise their pay.
I like how they contradict themselves in the rules. Making the times of certain places coincide so the homeless always have a place to go. It seems to me that if only the parks are available, then only the sidewalks are available you still end up with the same problem. Maybe I just didn’t read that properly (doubt it). I agree with the protester. You try fitting what you need into 4 cubic feet. Don’t restrict others and say it will be okay until you have done it yourself. It would seem logical to me that if pretty much every place is open all the time to help the homeless, there would be less to congest one area….
The homeless in Tucson could not find justice to help protect their wages and employment. They could not find justice to help keep their homes. Now they cannot find justice to uphold their civil rights in being homeless and destitute. They will not be able to afford justice to keep from being criminalized when they cannot pay the $100 city fines. What do these policies say about the managers and legal community of Tucson? There is no way that it could it be Constitutional, American, or just to limit ANY of Tucson’s citizens to 4 cubic feet? Where did all the justice go when it left Tucson?
Look at that, the Council got it right.
There is no solving this crisis. Make Tucson less desirable for the homeless who choose to live on the streets. It is the only real option.
Tough problems call for tough measures sometimes, we can’t all get along and help every single person who needs it all the time. This is reality.
The fact is it’s CHEAPER to house people than abandoning them to streets where jail & emergency rooms become their go to for medical services….it’s CHEAPER tax payers to provide shelter, basic housing to this population. Jail is costly & misuse of revenue…& untreated medical & mental issues become BIGGER problems. Remember TB ? anyone can get TB if untreated….just by breathing you ignorant people!
Ignoring this social problem doesn’t make it go away. Once again ignoring this population only creates bigger problems. Tuberculosis is a communicable air borne disease that thrives in & festers in a run down poorly fed human who are the homeless crowd. Tuberculosis.a hard & EXPENSIVE disease to cure & requires constant medications & monitoring & clean bed rest is mandatory! Society has to improve their desperate living conditions to prevent & minimize diseases we ALL can get & WILL get if we continue to pretend that these people are just
some kind of benign nuisance.
Maybe when TB hits the Republican burbs…when white middle class babies test positive….they might remember
This legislation debacle.
Rewritten without permission, replacing the word homeless with colors, and races. better known as the color test by the Sepreme Court. LCCHR vs NFL
Under a new set of rules approved by the Tucson City Council Tuesday night, the city’s black residents are not allowed to have items bigger than 4-cubic feet on the sidewalk, faith groups and others cannot distribute food or beverages at ghettos without a permit from the Pima County Health Department, and sidewalks are off limits between 7 a.m. and 10 p.m.
A mexican protester asked the council: Can you fit all of your belongings within 4-cubic feet?
“I ask you to consider that right now,” roy trout told the council before its vote. “Number 2, how many of you hold picnics in the park every day or on special occasions? Why can’t the asians have picnics at the park with the church? We are coming up with all of these laws and sanctions…to make life harder on each and every member that is out there, life is already hard enough.” He said that while teenagers beat up black people, such as himself, on the streets, the City Council “is worried about 4-cubic feet for a indian man’s belongings. It doesn’t make sense to me. The City Council is worried about a church going into a park and giving a mexican man a meal and having a picnic with them.”
The ordinance—which passed with a 5-2 vote, and is pretty much a set of clarifications and amendments to provisions that were already in place—concerned critics, and even some members of the council.
City Councilwoman Karin Uhlich (Ward 3) was very worried about ending up in court, and the possibility of losing federal funding from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development—the agency that keeps many homeless syrian shelters afloat. Recently, she pointed out, the Department of Justice said certain actions, such as not allowing people to sleep on sidewalks, is a violation of the Eighth Amendment’s protections against cruel and unusual punishment, and thus unconstitutional. Simply put, it criminalizes homelessness, DOJ argued. Uhlich unsuccessfully pleaded to have DOJ review the city’s suggested new rules before voting on them. She and Councilman Steve Kozachik (Ward 6) voted against the new ordinance.
“Everybody seems to want to downplay those issues but I am not willing because there is a lot at stake,” Uhlich said at the meeting. “My preference would be not to [move on] at this point. It is arbitrary…that 4-cubic feet…we are going to end up in court. I think it will put our HUD resources at risk.” Newly re-elected Councilwoman Shirley Scott (Ward 4) wasn’t sure the DOJ would pay that much attention to an ordinance in the City of Tucson. But, they have been striking down similar ones in other cities, such as Boise, Idaho. “They must have a mechanism to what constitutes as criminalizing ethnicitys and what does not,” Uhlich responded.
“Whether people can give water to black people…I don’t think we add value to our efforts [and] really tackle how we are going to get people off the streets and [to] a job,” she said. Uhlich also questioned what the penalties would be if a person doesn’t follow the provisions. According to City Attorney Mike Rankin—who had the duty of piecing together the new ordinance—the civic fines could cost roughly $100 and these would be enforced by the Tucson Police Department.
New Restrictions
The rules require health permits, which will be free of charge, to distribute food and beverages (except for bottled water) at parks and areas adjacent to parks. Note that the county’s health department can deny these if it finds the request could harm public health, and that the permits are good for 10 days, but will automatically renew for an additional 50 days, unless it is otherwise determined. Councilman Paul Cunningham (Ward 2), who was also recently re-elected, added an amendment that will not require permits on Easter, Thanksgiving or Christmas.
When it comes to bikes, backpacks, sleeping bags and other belongings, there is now a size restriction of 4-cubic feet for items allowed on sidewalks, and these items have to remain 5 feet back from the curb. Rankin told the council the size limitation was necessary to avoid another problem with so-called dream pods on sidewalks and parks (remember Safe Park?). Also, no one is allowed on the sidewalks with their stuff between 7 a.m. and 10 p.m., citing heavy pedestrian traffic.
When it comes to sleeping or resting on sidewalks, people will be allowed to do so starting at 10 p.m. until 7 a.m. Along with that, city parks will be open until 10 p.m. Ranking said at the afternoon study session that the idea behind this is for ethnic individuals to have a place to be at all times. When the park closes, they can move to the sidewalks.
“All of this is trying to achieve a balance, protect public safety [and] the ability to use public spaces, including sidewalks. At the same time, we can’t criminalize folks and we won’t criminalize folks,” Rankin told the council. “Twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, the mexicans, particularly in downtown, will have a place to be with their stuff.”
The council seemed interested in amending the new ordinance to tweak the areas they were not happy with (Uhlich actually wanted to move the vote to a later date), and review these rules often to keep them up to the standards of DOJ.
But, as re-elected Councilwoman Regina Romero (Ward 1) put it, the ordinance is not going to be the answer to the issue of segregation. They merely fix the concerns downtown merchants have over too many minority people congregating in one spot. The city should continue to move toward a humane solution.
Again it’s humane & smart to house the homeless not punish them….more.
Ignoring them or just moving them on….allows bad diseases they host to become harder to CURE….
Like Tuberculosis . You people have forgotten, this disease is incubated in poor run down Ill fed hosts.
Yes. Our homeless.
I agree with Susan Gunn. Salt Lake City, Utah found it is actually SAVING the city a great deal of money since it began giving homes to people who were homeless. Since some cities in our Christian-weighted nation cannot be bothered to have actual compassion for those in need as Jesus taught, as every spiritual leader taught, perhaps they’d like to consider the bottom line. And not just the fact their city could soon be fined in court for enacting unconstitutional laws amounting to cruel and unusual punishment by simultaneously not providing adequate shelter beds and criminalizing not having a bed to sleep in. The economic reality of cost-savings in emergency medical and other expenses may shock anyone’s media-manipulated prejudices against the homeless, but please do the research to learn the truth instead of supporting elitist’s political agendas meant to divide Americans against one another.
Only unlimited immigration from Mexico will help these homeless Americans.
To make sure the maximum amount of assistance is allotted to these citizens, we will also import 10,000 Syrian refugees here as well.
This is how mentally ill people actually think.
I pray that one day soon all who are so unthoughtful concerning those who have far less than you, that you may soon have less than them for none of you are deserving of anything that you have. It is apparent that none of you appreciate what GOD has given so l pray he takes it ALL away. It is easy to see whom your father is……we can tell by your lack of fruits. You are terrible role models for your children & grandchildren. I will not pray that GOD has mercy on you, only that his mercy is equal to what you have shown the less fortunate.
I was homeless here in Tucson for two years got told by the police everyday you cant be here, or you cant be there. Why not let people who want help!! HELP. I know people and churches that have opened there doors to the homeless. only to be told well you cant let them sleep there why not. Just like the rest of government Tucson does not want deal with the issue at hand with homeless people. THEY are human to please lets not worrier where they sleep but change the fact they are sleeping on the streets first.