By Laura Lingeman
This week, the Sparks City Council demonstrated its commitment to perpetuating homelessness instead of resolving it. The City Council passed an ordinance to, “make living in vehicles or parking RVs on public property and obstructing sidewalks and right of ways misdemeanor crimes.”
One of the primary reasons cited for approving this measure was to help equip the Sparks Police Department HOPE team with the “tools” to connect homeless people to resources. The idea that this ordinance could improve our most vulnerable community members’ access to resources is ignorant to the barriers that this community faces, is financially irresponsible and is unrealistic given our community’s affordable housing crisis.
As a first responder, I have interacted with the HOPE team on many occasions and know that they are doing incredible work. That being said, for anyone who knows anything about homeless outreach, people experiencing homelessness are hard to connect to housing resources specifically because they are transient, and therefore struggle to participate in ongoing care services.
In citing and forcing these unhoused individuals to relocate, we are drastically reducing their ability to successfully engage in outreach services. These services are crucial to obtain an ID, apply for housing, and qualify for many other benefits. So, we are now facing a reality where individuals have to constantly move because they are unhoused, and they are unhoused because they constantly move.
An individual cited for living in their vehicle under this new ordinance can be subject to six months in jail and a fine of $1000. Since this individual is likely impoverished, it is unlikely the $1,000 will be collected. Instead, taxpayers will fund the potential incarceration of this individual for existing while being homeless.
According to Christine Hess, the former executive director for Nevada Housing Coalition, three months of incarceration is equivalent to one year of supportive housing. In addition, a criminal record when this individual is ultimately released from jail further diminishes options for affordable housing.
So this new ordinance could potentially cause more homeless people to be incarcerated, cost taxpayers more money, and then decrease the homeless individual’s chances of becoming successfully housed in the future.
This ordinance was passed on the basis that it addresses homelessness by connecting individuals to resources that don’t exist in our community: affordable or emergency housing.
According to the Washoe County website, Cares Campus and Safe Camp are at near maximum occupancy, and Our Place is full. In addition, according to the National Low Income Housing Coalition, Nevada has 17 affordable housing units per 100 extremely low-income renters. Simply put, our community has a homeless problem because we have an affordable housing problem.
Our community leaders should feel ashamed for passing ordinances that place the onus of homelessness on the individual instead of on our leaders who consistently fail to secure enough affordable housing.
As a community member, I don’t want to see humans living in squalor while I am out for an evening walk. I don’t want to walk by the river and see absurd amounts of trash littered on the ground where someone had clearly been living. In addition, I don’t blame citizens without personal experience with homelessness for not understanding homelessness.
I do blame public servants for not doing their due diligence to understand this issue and perpetuating the existence of policies that are costly and ineffective.
I’ll end by stating what I always do when educating the housed community on the unhoused: If you want to know what homeless people want and need to escape poverty, just ask one. I’ll guarantee it is a far cry from what Sparks City Council has provided.
Laura is a Community Health Paramedic with over 10 years of EMS experience. She is passionate about improving the health outcomes of marginalized communities through advocacy.
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