The Sacramento City Council will soon decide whether to cap shelter beds at around 600 in Sacramento’s River District as early as February.
The City of Sacramento’s Law and Legislation committee voted 3 to 1 to move the ordinance forward Tuesday afternoon. Committee members Roger Dickinson, Rick Jennings and Phil Pluckebaum voted in favor of the rule, and Caity Maple was the sole dissenting vote.
Phil Pluckebaum, who is also the councilmember representing the River District, put the idea forward.
“The history of corralling folks into the River District I think is both shameful and not something we want to continue to replicate,” Pluckebaum said. “That is part of the intent of this ordinance, is to create some downward pressure on the River District that will create some upward pressure in other places in the city.”
Committee member Maple said that capping beds in certain locations could have unintended consequences.
“ This feels like it could be a slippery slope,” she said. “You have one community that has very real concerns, that are valid, and yet there are also many others.”
Pluckebaum said the intention behind the ordinance is to more evenly balance the amount of unhoused people in the area with its future development. Development in Sacramento’s Railyards is on track to include a soccer stadium for Sacramento’s Republic FC team, a new Kaiser Permanente campus and a community market that focuses on fresh food through Alchemist CDC.
The region has approximately 526 beds. The ordinance would account for sites that are already in the works– this includes a safe camping site with occupancy for 100 people at 291 Sequoia Boulevard.
During public comment, many spoke against the proposed ordinance, but River District Board Secretary Greta Lacin said the issue of homelessness disproportionately affects the region.
“The River District has really suffered,” Lacin said. “Businesses have left, many businesses have left, especially in the East end. And our streets, some of them have become no man’s land.”
The River District is home to the highest concentration of social and homelessness service providers in the city, according to city documents. District One in North Natomas and District 7 in the Pocket have no shelter beds.
Angela Hassell is executive director of Loaves and Fishes, one of Sacramento’s largest homelessness service providers that operates in the River District.
She told CapRadio that harmful policies from the 1950s and 1960s pushed people out of Downtown and Old Sacramento and into the industrial area of town for the sake of urban redevelopment.
She said the organization has chosen to operate there for the last 40 years because the need is there.
“Having a cap on the number of shelter beds and services that can potentially help people move out of those really desperate and dire circumstances just feels really incongruous with the reality of how many people there are that need the help,” Hassell said.
Others who helped unhoused people on the ground echoed Hassell’s sentiment.
Vrshaank Mahesh is a medical volunteer with Sacramento Street Medicine. He finds that the problem isn’t where people are concentrated, but the fact that there aren’t enough beds for everyone who needs it.
”When people talk about urban blight and crime, it’s not because these folks are just evil and trying to wreak havoc on the River District,” Mahesh said. “It’s really because they’ve been ejected from institutional support. Capping the amount of beds is going to completely worsen that issue.”
Mahesh believes that conversation surrounding homeless strategy should focus on ways we can expand support versus reducing support.
“ It’s better to write an ordinance that’s focused on what we’re capable of doing instead of what we shouldn’t do,” Mahesh said.
The fate of shelter beds in the River District will next go to council for a vote, which according to Pluckebaum will most likely happen in February.
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