ITHACA, N.Y. — The new cohort of Common Council members has yet to sign off on hiring a part-time homeless outreach coordinator — a position former council members approved and funded in 2023 — despite repeated requests from city leadership.
City Manager Deb Mohlenhoff has largely assumed the responsibility that a previous council intended for the part-time employee: managing the various entities working to rehouse residents at “the Jungle,” a triangular strip of city-owned land that has long been used as an encampment.
Department heads at City Hall have been working overtime with Mohlenhoff to coordinate communications between the organizations, departments and city staff while awaiting approval to hire a formal coordinator. Recently, however, newly-elected council members have been hesitant to use city resources where non-government organizations are already working.
The staffing gap became increasingly difficult to manage in April, when the Tompkins County Environmental Health Division designated the encampment as a public health hazard and ordered the city to submit a plan to clean it up.
A month later, city workers began clearing tons of debris from the area. At the request of city officials and advocates, many encampment residents willingly relocated to an outdoor space designated by council members in December 2023 under the pilot policy on unsanctioned encampments on city property to avoid interactions with police.
Advocates at local nonprofits, including Second Wind Cottages, OAR and REACH, have worked one-on-one with unhoused residents for many years, helping them navigate individual circumstances and social programs with the goal of finding secure and affordable housing.
When residents began to relocate from the encampment, advocates like Deb Wilke, the homeless crisis alleviation coordinator at Second Wind Cottages, felt pressure to speed up their rehousing efforts. The advocates worked directly with the Ithaca Police Department, city employees and other entities.
Their work paid off in June, when 40 people moved into affordable housing units at Asteri Ithaca, a development located at the former Green Street Garage site. Others opted to camp illegally at locations around the city, mostly to stay close to social services, Wilke said last month.
While city staff and advocates have made progress toward achieving some of the goals established in last year’s pilot program, Mohlenhoff told council members in April that there was “no way” city workers could successfully carry out the plan without a “formal coordinator” to facilitate communications between the people on the ground making it happen.
At the same council meeting in April, Mohlenhoff likened the situation to a game of “hot potato” where city staff “keep tossing” the responsibilities from “person to person.”
“This is incredibly intensive work,” Mohlenhoff said. “We need someone to sit in the middle of an incredibly complicated web of support services, none of which the city manages, to make sure we have clear communication.”
The position was created in 2023 to ensure the city had someone dedicated to coordinating encampment initiatives outlined in the new pilot plan, as achieving the program’s goals would require extensive organization and consistent communication from the city to manage the moving parts.
At a meeting on July 10, Mohlenhoff remained steadfast in her opinion that, despite objections from some council members, the role should be filled to ease the stress felt in City Hall.
Mohlenhoff told council members that apart from lightening the workload for department heads and herself, bringing someone into the process in a part-time capacity would significantly improve the efficiency of the city’s encampment response initiatives and coordination efforts.
Despite this, council members voted to table, or wait to vote on, legislation that would have allowed Mohlenhoff to start hiring for the part-time role. The legislation will be discussed again at the next regularly scheduled Common Council meeting on Aug. 7.
The part-time position was funded in the city’s 2023 and 2024 budgets for $37,000. But since council members have not yet accessed the reserved funds, they are able to vote to redirect the money to other encampment efforts that certain members argued would benefit the unhoused population more directly.
At the July meeting, Alderperson Patrick Kuehl spoke against maintaining the wishes of the previous council that created the position, citing conversations with staff at REACH, one of the local nonprofits active in responding to the unhoused community.
Kuehl said he and Alderperson David Shapiro spoke with staff at other organizations as well, who “largely felt” the position was “incredibly redundant” and said “the work was already being done on the ground.”
Kuehl suggested council members create a working group composed of advocates, elected and city officials, representatives from IPD, members of the unhoused population and other community organizations and leaders to take suggestions on how to spend the allotted $37,000.
“I would really love for us to spend some more time to propose maybe from some community orgs some alternative uses for these funds that could really actually benefit people,” Kuehl said.
Regardless of how members of council vote to spend the money, whether hiring a part-time homeless outreach coordinator or elsewhere, Mohlenhoff will soon be hiring a deputy city manager. The position was created through the Reimagining Public Safety Initiative to create and oversee a long-awaited team of unarmed responders.
Mohlenhoff explained to council members that city officials concluded the deputy city manager’s responsibilities should be widened to include coordinating encampment initiatives.
If council members vote to approve the legislation to expand the job description, Mohlenhoff and department heads would be able to focus mostly on their designated responsibilities, rather than encampment management.
Mohlenhoff said she would begin the hiring process immediately after members of council approve the legislation, hoping to find someone to start work in September. The salary range for the future deputy city manager ranged from $125,000 to 150,000.
Legislation that would allow Mohlenhoff to hire for both the part-time homeless coordinator and the deputy city manager position will be discussed at the next Common Council meeting on Aug. 7.
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