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No one can look around our region and not be concerned about the amount of panhandling occurring and the number of homeless on South Florida streets. Fort Lauderdale is no exception. For years, the city has worked to deal with homelessness compassionately by identifying housing options and enhancing opportunities to help individuals overcome the underlying reasons for their situation.
It was the right thing to do. Many have turned a positive corner as a result of this approach. But today, we also know that we need to take a get-tough approach with those who put others at risk and, by their actions, weaken the fabric of our community.
The rest of the City Commission and I understand the frustration of the public. That is why we are demanding aggressive action, while continuing to help those who want help. We will not allow Fort Lauderdale to follow in the footsteps of San Francisco and other metro areas and become overwhelmed by this national crisis.
No city in our entire country has landed on the right answer on this most basic challenge to community safety, security and decency. Still, Fort Lauderdale is going to find a way to get it done.
I’ve made it clear to our city manager and police chief that this community demands more police officers patrolling key corridors like State Road A1A and Las Olas Boulevard, as well as other homeless hot spots. If individuals don’t want help, then our officers must take action. Among the tools available to them are our court-approved, anti-panhandling ordinance and the soon-to-go-into-effect state law prohibiting public camping.
No one has a right to make others feel unsafe in Fort Lauderdale. And no one has a right to use city sidewalks, streets or our beaches in ways that fundamentally abuse our common community values.
This must stop. It will stop.
To be clear, the city is already ahead of other communities in moving to toughen up its strategies as and expanding proactive, positive actions to get people off the streets. We are leading the way among Broward cities. And we are moving ahead faster.
The city manager recently appointed an assistant city manager who will take charge of a universal homeless strategy. This is a critical change in our approach, putting one senior manager in charge of a multi-departmental effort to ensure effective coordination and efficient targeting.
At the same time, the city has increased the number of police officers assigned directly to homeless initiatives. This is putting more officers on the street taking the issue head-on particularly on nights and weekends. The city also has layered the Fire Department and paramedics into the programming through its mobile healthcare action plan.
As a result of these changes, the Police Department, Fire Department, Code Compliance and Park Rangers are more effectively impacting critical hotspots. Once a hotspot is identified, their coordinated efforts include daily action and documentation of our progress. The city manager says this initiative is proving to have a significant impact in reducing homeless activity in these areas.
We have overcome a court decision that our old panhandling ordinance as unconstitutional, a ruling that brought enforcement to a lengthy halt. We enacted a new ordinance and have court approval. It prohibits individuals from standing in our streets and obstructing traffic. This adds a vital tool to put an end to unsafe and aggressive panhandling, and it will make a real difference.
This year, we doubled resources for our Housing Navigation Program, a unique collaboration with the TaskForce For Ending Homelessness to reduce the number of displaced individuals. This program achieved a 65 percent success rate last year with chronically homeless individuals, and we expect even stronger results this year.
In the proposed budget that will start Oct. 1, we plan to fund a new access effort. It would provide shelter to homeless individuals for up to 60 days while they transition to permanent solutions. This is yet another tool for police officers and aides to use to reduce the negative impact of homelessness on our community.
At the same time we continue to benefit from our cutting-edge community court program, a proven model for other communities around the nation. Through it, homeless individuals charged with minor offenses have the opportunity to enter temporary housing and engage in substance abuse treatment and job counseling to emerge from their downward spiral that impacts all of us.
Still, we must do more to address the challenges we face.
As the county seat, Fort Lauderdale is disproportionately impacted by homeless. We are home to the court system, the main jail, many of the regional social service programs as well as the hospital tasked with assisting the indigent in the north half of the county.
As a direct result of this, roughly half of Broward County’s unsheltered homeless population ends up within our city. Last year, the Police Department and Fire Rescue responded to more than 11,200 calls related to homelessness.
So in addition to what I’ve already outlined, we are insisting on more intergovernmental and agency collaboration to protect our community more effectively.
To that end, we are in discussions with the Sheriff’s Office and other cities about improving jail discharge procedures. That’s important because currently when a homeless person is arrested on a charge anywhere in the county, they are released in Fort Lauderdale from the main jail downtown. That’s not fair to our community, and it needs to change.
We also are talking to the chief judge about how the court system handles the homeless once arrested.
They currently are released immediately back to the streets. This has created a revolving door in which nothing changes for the individual or for our community as a whole.
Now, we have a plan with the collaboration of the court system. A homeless person can be detained for up to 60 days, during which time they can receive mental health and substance abuse treatment, and just as important, they are off the streets, the beaches and alleys.
We are also considering adaptive reuse of the old city jail rather than demolishing it as part of the ongoing construction of the new police station. The Police Department believes the facility can be used to expedite medical clearance of those arrested, as the current process can keep an officer off the street for an entire shift managing the arrest.
We should not have had to wait for the state to push us. Now, hopefully, with our Police Department, we can finally see results.
We need to act fast because the new state law on public camping will soon go into effect. With this law, the city could be sued if individuals are found to be regularly sleeping overnight on public property, including streets, sidewalks, parks or the beach.
The law permits the county to designate areas for public camping and sleeping if certain conditions are met, including implementing a safety plan and certifying that there is no available space at existing shelters. I have been pushing to get our region aligned on this change of policy, and I’m pleased that the county has finally begun to engage with Fort Lauderdale and other cities to make sure our response to this law has the most positive impact for our city.
For too long, local government was very restricted in its options of addressing homelessness and the negative impacts on the rest of the public. But a recent ruling by the Supreme Court has removed those barriers and allowed us greater freedom to answer the overwhelming call of the public to do more to ensure our streets and parks are safe.
The challenge of homelessness will not be solved overnight, but failure is not an option.
That is why I am fighting for real solutions that fit our local situation, and rejecting those that just do not make sense.
For example, while some have advocated setting aside a public parking lot for the homeless, this is a short-sighted California solution that takes us in the wrong direction. Frankly, it is a cold-hearted idea to suggest living in a car is an option we would encourage. We are so much better than that.
The bottom line is while we should always navigate this issue in a way that helps those who want help, I simply will not stand by while the residents and businesses of Fort Lauderdale are negatively impacted by those who refuse to be part of this community in the most basic way.
Sincerely,
Dean
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