March 31, 2025 - American Public News

ITHACA, N.Y. — Nearly three years after it took on the task to address homelessness, the City of Ithaca has a new proposed plan to manage the informal and evolving homeless encampment on the city’s West End.An initial 2023 pilot policy created a temporary 28-acre “non-enforcement zone” where people are allowed to sleep outside. The zone is located on a plot of city-owned land behind the Walmart store on Ithaca’s West End, also known as Southwest Park. City officials have in the past clashed on what services, if any, should and could be offered to unhoused Ithacans living in the non-enforcement zone.The new draft plan includes recommendations to offer resources like showers and lockers nearby and a plan for how and when law enforcement is allowed to intervene. The proposal comes as the county’s state mandated cold weather emergency shelter program — Code Blue — is set to end for the season. The end of the winter program often coincides with a steep increase in the number of people sleeping outside. There were an average of 13 people sleeping outdoors each night over the last 10 days of January. Last July, the number of people sleeping outside averaged 65 each night. Those figures do not reflect the full number of people experiencing homelessness who may be sleeping in cars, on friend’s couches or in emergency shelter facilities.The recommendations are summarized in a report by an advisory committee formed in January. The report also includes input from people who have experienced homelessness. So far, the city has set aside $800,000 in capital funds for physical improvements to the area plus an additional $150,000 to cover operational expenses. However, it’s unlikely the funds will be sufficient to meet all the recommendations presented in the report.Those include a semi-permanent “navigation hub” to support people transitioning in and out of living in the non-enforcement zone. The services offered there have yet to be finalized, but Deputy City Manager Dominick Recckio said the hub could provide a place for people to store important documents or even get a bite to eat.Unhoused Ithacans surveyed as part of the project ranked trash removal and a clean environment as the most desired improvement to Southwest Park. Adding showers and toilets was a close second. Other popular proposals included solar powered lighting and outlets, lockers and a community center with basic amenities such as drinking water, wifi, computer access, mailboxes and dog kennel spaces. Individuals also reported a desire for the camp to be close to medical services and other resources.Respondents included those who stayed at the encampment and those whose campsites had been reported. Recckio also presented a proposal for an “engagement strategy,” which aims to prioritize outreach workers as the main people engaging with unhoused people to provide services, with law enforcement officials taking a backseat role.One of the main goals outlined in the policy draft is to avoid the stigmatization and criminalization of homelessness. This approach has support from both the Ithaca Police Department (IPD) and the Department of Public Works. The draft policy still allows for law enforcement to respond to reports of alleged criminal activity at the encampment.Police officers and outreach workers relocated 20 small encampments in 2024, the report states. Those who were relocated frequently cited a lack of local shelter beds as a reason why they were sleeping outside, among other reasons. While Recckio commended police officers for building relationships with unhoused people, respondents said they preferred outreach workers over police when being asked to move. According to a separate survey of non profits working with Ithaca’s homeless community, a majority of respondents agreed, saying they felt outreach workers were best suited to respond first to a reported encampment site.Alderperson David Shapiro suggested adding more surveillance to areas in the 28-acre non-enforcement zone with the goal of curtailing crime associated with drug use. Shapiro was the executive director of supportive housing non-profit Second Wind Cottages until last spring.During Shapiro’s outreach work in the non-enforcement zone, he said people sleeping there have expressed concerns about thievery and firearms.“People steal guns from each other,” Shapiro said. “People make their own guns.”Deb Wilke, homeless crisis alleviation coordinator for Second Wind Cottages, said the allegations that people might be manufacturing guns is “absurd.” Wilke also pushed back against the idea that unhoused people living at Southwest Park want more surveillance. Wilke has worked directly with the homeless community for nearly a decade.Wilke said she is concerned about the temporary status of the non-enforcement zone. The draft plan suggests that the non-enforcement zone only exists “when the community lacks the housing and shelter capacity to accommodate everyone who needs it.”In March, Wilke there were roughly 101 adults waiting for supportive housing but only one available supportive housing unit. The number of people looking for supportive housing could jump to 150 people if it included youth, Wilke said. Only 31% of the nearly 600 individuals who interacted with county homeless shelter services in 2023 ended up in permanent housing, county data shows. The data also revealed homelessness in Tompkins County disproportionately affects non-white communities.Wilke said much of the 28-acre parcel consists largely of wetland which limits its use and capacity. Wilke said she is also concerned about the suitability of the park for a sanctioned encampment because it was once used as a city dump site.The area was at some point part of a voluntary cleanup program under the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation. It’s unclear how much cleanup actually occurred, but a state database currently shows the site as “requiring no further action” at this time.More recently, the county ordered the city to clear an earlier iteration of the encampment last spring after the area was designated a public health hazard. During the most recent phase of the $146,000 clean up effort, city crews removed at least 170 tons of debris. The area has remained better maintained since then, Wilke said.The Common Council will receive a final draft of the policy in April with a vote expected in early May. The unhoused Ithacans who participated in the process said they wanted city officials to know that the encampments are their home and asked that they be treated with dignity. “We are functioning intelligent adults, but we are treated like rudimentary minions,” one respondent said. Others said they felt a sense of freedom and agency living on their own terms rather than navigating the housing situations they’ve experienced in the past.“Sometimes it feels like freedom compared to housing in Ithaca,” one person said.The post Ithaca once again weighing proposal for homeless encampment service hub appeared first on The Ithaca Voice.First published by The Ithaca Voice.

Daily Archives: March 31, 2025

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