The emergency declaration gives the city more flexibility to create additional solutions that can be implemented at a faster pace
VANCOUVER – On Monday (Nov. 6), members of the Vancouver City Council voted to ratify an emergency declaration related to homelessness. In accordance with Vancouver Municipal Code 2.12, the city manager made the emergency declaration Friday (Nov. 3).
“We are committed to doing everything we can to address homelessness in our city,” said City Manager Eric Holmes. “While not all actions need the declaration, this mechanism will give us the agility we need to take action quickly as we continue to develop effective outreach-led, enforcement-backed solutions.”
While the city and other partners have been working to address the issue of homelessness over the last several years, the complexity and magnitude of issues related to homelessness continue to grow. The emergency declaration gives the city more flexibility to create additional solutions that can be implemented at a faster pace to save lives and to better address this public health and humanitarian crisis. It is used only in the most critical of situations.
“I know the community is anxious for solutions,” said Mayor Pro-Tem Ty Stober. “Homelessness is a complex issue, and one that requires a thoughtful and comprehensive approach. This declaration will allow the City to continue to make progress with the additional flexibility we need.”
Shortly after declaring the state of emergency, the city manager signed two initial emergency orders. The first order (Emergency Order 2023-02, Financial Authority) provides increased financial agility authorizing a streamlined process for accepting donations, accessing financial reserves for budgeting needs, and buying goods and services needed to address homelessness.
The second order (Emergency Order 2023-03, Control and Closure of Public Property and Rights-of-Way) allows the city manager to close up to 48 acres of public property to outdoor habitation as needed while ensuring public health and sanitation needs are being addressed by (1) identifying the specific parcel(s) at issue, and (2) giving notice of the closure via (a) physical posting at the site of the property closure, and (b) online at a page on the City’s website. The order also requires compliance with the City’s tent and vehicle camping expectations on a citywide basis.
The emergency declaration becomes another tool used by the city to address homelessness. Over the years, the city has made progress in addressing homelessness and related issues. Some actions taken to date include:
- Creating the Homeless Assistance and Resource Team
- Developing two Safe Stay Communities with two more opening before the end of the year
- Developing a Safe Park Zone for community members living in vehicles
- Managing the clean-up of more than 115 encampments posing public health risks
- Modifying the City Code to protect environmentally sensitive areas and fire-impact areas
- Empaneling an Affordable Housing Task Force, proposing Propositions 1 and 3 to the voters of Vancouver (which established and expanded the Affordable Housing Fund)
Find more information about Vancouver’s response to homelessness and a running list of emergency orders at www.cityofvancouver.us/homelessemergency.
Information provided by the city of Vancouver.
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A money pit !!! Take the total operating costs, divide it by the number of residents served, and see what the cost-per-head comes out to. Or how about figuring out of all the money spent, just how many have actually transitioned off the street and into permanent housing? Result: the cost of those few success stories is astronomical !!!
“If you build it, they will come”… Vancouver City hasn’t yet learned that you cannot spend your way out of homelessness. The more money and services provided, the more homeless there will be to gobble-up those monies and services.
Question: In years past, what served as the impetus for not living on the street? Answer: Fear of being hungry and cold come quickly to mind. Now, without having to worry about being hungry or cold, there is no reason to be responsible, get a job, and be a contributing member of society. It is far too easy to simply be a leech.
Instead of making it easier, Vancouver should be making it harder to participate in these high-cost programs. Start first by drug-testing every applicant; if you’re dirty then you get no assistance. When the druggies get cold enough and hungry enough, then they will either 1) figure it out and get clean, 2) get the snot beat out of them (or killed) in the commission of a crime, or 3) they will move on to someplace else where drug addicts are treated with open arms and with boat-loads of money… you know, like Vancouver is doing now. Either way, it’s a win-win for the honest tax-paying members of our community who have self-respect and a sense of responsibility.
As for me, I’m sick and tired of my tax money going to support drug addicts and the mentally ill via expensive local, grass-root level programs in which the cost-per-head and cost-per-success-story is simply unsustainable. In the meantime, emergency services and road-maintenance crews and my kid’s local school all have to figure out a way to raise money because, they say, needed tax dollars are just not there.
We all know that Jamie Spinelli, the Vancouver City czar of homelessness (and her minions) have turned homelessness into a self-sustaining industry upon which her and her staff’s livelihoods depend. She and her staff don’t want to solve the problem. Their tax-payer funded paychecks and their tax-payer funded benefits depend on there being continued homelessness.