This July was the hottest month ever recorded, but rising global temperatures were hardly the only thing that had Austinites fired up. In late June, city council moved to decriminalize homelessness by revising previously existing bans on panhandling, camping, sitting, and sleeping in public. While somewhat opaque—panhandlers can’t approach people in a “confrontational manner,” and those sleeping in public can’t obstruct public passageways (read: sidewalks), camp in parks, or pose a danger to public health—these ordinance changes were a necessary step towards addressing Austin’s escalating homeless problem.
Not surprisingly, this decision sparked a heated public debate that’s shown no signs of cooling down. Many people, including Texas Gov. Greg Abbott, who has threatened to override the city’s ordinances, have been especially critical of the city lifting its camping ban, arguing it will threaten public safety and lead to the construction of “tent cities.” Austin police chief Brian Manley even appeared on one of Fox News’s flagship programs, “The Story with Martha MacCallum,” to discuss the matter.
While there are legitimate concerns about the city’s growing homeless population, alarmist reactions ignore the systemic causes of the problem. The symptoms of this issue run far deeper than a collection of tents rising under highway overpasses; rather, it begins and ends with providing adequate city resources and safe, affordable housing options for all. And the city’s new ordinances play a key role in this.
First, Austin’s rule changes will ultimately save the city money. By decriminalizing panhandling and camping, Austin Police Department (APD) officers will hand out less citations (and conduct less arrests) to the estimated 2,200 homeless adults now living on city streets. According to a 2017 city audit, officers issued 18,000 citations between 2014 and 2016 for camping, sitting, lying, or panhandling. The vast majority (90 percent) of people cited failed to appear in court; in 72 percent of those cases, a warrant for their arrest had to be issued.
APD didn’t respond to interview requests, but they’ve been outspoken on this issue. In July, assistant police chief Justin Newsom told KUT that these changes align with a discretionary approach many officers have already been taking. “Officers have reduced the frequency of enforcing these ordinances…for compassionate reasons,” he said. “You have folks that have nowhere to go. So, over time, when officers [are] issuing citations for people camping in the same places over and over and over, eventually [they] just stop enforcing those locations.”
Repeatedly charging people for minor infractions doesn’t just clog the city’s courts, it exacerbates the core issue. When someone racks up tickets and court fees, it hurts their chances of gaining employment and being approved for future housing—a massive problem since housing is the key to breaking the cycle of homelessness, says Jo Kathryn Quinn, president and CEO of Caritas of Austin. “All other needs absolutely cannot be addressed until you address the need for housing,” she says. “Measured over two years, 97 percent of the people that [Caritas] houses in our permanent supportive housing program don’t return to the streets.”
Another leading voice in this field, Matthew Mollica of the Ending Community Homelessness Coalition (ECHO), shares Quinn’s sentiments. Regardless of your stance on camping, he argues, cleaning up our city’s streets starts with a support network. “Whether you don’t want to see that person on the street because you believe they deserve a home or you just don’t want some people in public places—the answer to that is to get them housed,” he says.
Austin’s homeless problem hasn’t sprung up out of no-where. For years, the city has failed to allocate resources necessary for tackling this issue, a stance Mayor Steve Adler bemoaned over the summer, saying: “I cannot participate any longer in not setting up the structure and the system to fundamentally do something to change the status quo in this city, because the status quo is killing us.”
To that end, Austin has recently unveiled a number of promising proposals, none larger than last year’s Action Plan to End Homelessness. Developed for the city by ECHO, it directs $30 to 40 million annually towards resources like short-term shelters, emergency aid, and long-term housing services. As part of that plan, the city approved an $8.6 million, 100-bed emergency shelter in South Austin, drawing fervent protests from many area residents. APD has also established a Homeless Outreach Street Team (HOST) to proactively aid people in hopes of avoiding arrests, citations, or admissions to hospitals and psychiatric facilities.