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Editorial: Pinellas cannot ignore homeless families

 

Ariana Turner, 22, and her daughter, Namine Cowell, 2, are living at St. Petersburg Free Clinic Family Residence after falling on hard times. Pinellas County has made progress in recent years in providing temporary shelter for the homeless, but homeless families with kids are virtually shut out. It's a crisis that requires public and private leadership to find an answer that is both compassionate and cost-effective.
Ariana Turner, 22, and her daughter, Namine Cowell, 2, are living at St. Petersburg Free Clinic Family Residence after falling on hard times. Pinellas County has made progress in recent years in providing temporary shelter for the homeless, but homeless families with kids are virtually shut out. It's a crisis that requires public and private leadership to find an answer that is both compassionate and cost-effective.
Published June 23, 2017

They are living on our streets and in our parking lots, in cheap motels and spare bedrooms if they're lucky and in old cars if they are not. Their kids attend our schools, and parents often are afraid to seek help. Pinellas County has made progress in recent years in providing temporary shelter for the homeless, but homeless families with kids are virtually shut out. It's a crisis that requires public and private leadership to find an answer that is both compassionate and cost-effective.

As the Tampa Bay Times' Waveney Ann Moore reported, there are an estimated 1,984 homeless family members in Pinellas — and that is probably a low estimate given the nature of the transient population. Most of those family members are children. Yet the county has only 185 shelter beds for families, which have waiting lists and do not come close to meeting the need. A county with so many resources and well-intended public officials and business leaders can do better.

Pinellas has done better dealing with homeless adults. Local governments and the Diocese of St. Petersburg created Pinellas Hope, a tent city near Pinellas Park established nearly a decade ago that now includes small cottages created from shipping containers and serves about 325 people a day. The Pinellas County Sheriff's Office converted an old jail annex into Safe Harbor about six years ago that can be used by any adult and has a capacity of about 470. It's not nearly enough for a homeless population estimated at nearly 12,000, but it's a start.

Homeless families have even fewer options for shelter, and there is no emergency shelter in Pinellas that can take them in immediately. The Trump administration's emphasis on housing first, which involves investing in programs aimed at quickly finding permanent homes, jobs and other services for the homeless, is understandable. But it can't be rapid enough for many families living in cars or spare rooms, and emergency shelter beds for families should be a priority for Pinellas County, St. Petersburg and Clearwater. The perception that many families could find a temporary home if they just tried harder is off base and disregards the needs of children, who have no control over where they sleep.

Both Pinellas County and St. Petersburg plan to set aside millions in Penny for Pinellas money for affordable housing if voters decide in November to extend the one-cent sales tax another decade. Perhaps a small portion of that money could be set aside for emergency shelter beds for families. But affordable housing for low-income, working families is a different challenge, and the key to opening more shelter beds after setting aside construction money will be finding more money for the operational costs and the right provider.

Ultimately, it requires the will and the resources to expand shelters and services for the homeless. Miami-Dade County collects a 1 percent tax on food and beverage sales at establishments that serve alcohol, with 85 percent going to homeless programs and the rest to domestic violence shelters. Los Angeles voters decided in March to raise the sales tax one quarter of 1 percent to pay for housing for the homeless. A new homeless program in Chicago will be paid for through a tax on short-term rental companies such as Airbnb. There also may be other possibilities for raising revenue in Pinellas. St. Petersburg City Council member Amy Foster and Pinellas Commissioner Karen Seel, the chair and vice chair of the Pinellas County Homeless Leadership Board, are aggressively looking for options. Seel plans to soon create a working group of city and county officials, and private providers, to focus on emergency shelter for homeless families.

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St. Petersburg did the right thing last fall by shutting down the derelict Mosley Motel, but city officials struggled to find suitable housing for the displaced families and many of them ended up in other cheap 34th Street motels. Other families cannot even afford that, and leaders in both the public and private sectors have to address this crisis.

Pinellas County is too rich in creative thinking, compassion and financial possibilities to ignore hundreds of families living on the streets, in their cars and wherever they can rest because 185 shelter beds are full.