A special meeting has appeared on the calendar for Bloomington’s board of park commissioners. It is set for 4 p.m. this coming Wednesday (Aug. 16) in city council chambers.
As of Sunday afternoon, no agenda for the special meeting had been posted. [Added Aug. 14, 2023: The agenda and meeting packet have been posted. Here’s a link: Aug. 16, 2023 board of park commissioners special meeting packet.]
But based on the agenda for a July 27 board work session, Wednesday’s special meeting will focus on a new policy that addresses the use of tents and other enclosed structures in Bloomington’s public parks during the day.
The July 27 work session agenda was limited to one general topic. The agenda items included: use of structures on parks properties; incident reports; a draft policy; and scheduling a special meeting.
In the last few months, the city has received complaints through its uReport system, about the tents and tarps that unhoused people have set up in some city parks, like Seminary Park, Lower Cascades Park, RCA Community Park, and along The B-Line Trail.
Currently, the tents that people set up early in the day, then break down and remove before 11 p.m., are in compliance with the city’s special use policy (#13040) against camping in the parks.
What the current policy prohibits is “camping on lands of the department or inhabiting any structure or facility overnight without a permit;” The notion of “overnight” is defined in part by park hours. Bloomington city parks are open only from 5 a.m. to 11 p.m.
Complaints about people setting up tents and camping in Bloomington public parks have a years-long history.
In late 2020, the Bloomington mayor John Hamilton’s administration tried to address the complaints about people setting up tents in parks during the day—by recommending that the parks board revise its special use policy.
At that time, the administration wanted the board to prohibit (emphasis added) “camping upon or otherwise inhabiting any property, structure, or facility of the department, at any time without a permit.”
But at its Dec. 8, 2020 meeting, the board’s vote on changing the policy failed on a 1–3 tally. Casting the sole vote of support was commissioner Les Coyne, who has since retired from the board after more than four decades of service. Now serving in that seat is Jim Whitlatch.
Park commissioners who voted against the policy change in 2020 were Kathleen Mills, Ellen Rodkey, and Israel Herrera. They are still serving on the board.
In 2020, the policy focus was on the activity of camping. Based on the staff memo supporting this year’s July 27 work session, the policy focus now is the type of structures that are allowed to be set up in parks. From the memo:
Individuals have erected and occupied camping structures and makeshift enclosures at Park locations, prohibiting the use and enjoyment of these spaces by the whole community. These structures are often used in violation of the Special Use Policy (overnight 11 p.m. – 5 a.m.). Camping structures and makeshift enclosures have become a serious public health risk and safety issue due to vandalism, illegal activity, and the accumulation of abandoned property and garbage.
In 2020, a couple of days after the board of park commissioners voted down the daytime camping policy change, the Hamilton administration acted to remove a Seminary Park encampment. Camping there had persisted overnight, after the park’s closing hours.
Shortly after that, an encampment was re-established in Seminary Park. Again in January 2021, the administration removed the Seminary Park encampment.
Those events led Bloomington’s city council to consider an ordinance in early March of 2021 that would have provided protections to encampments in city parks. That ordinance failed to pass, after it was considered by the council at a meeting lasting nine hours, ending at 3:21 a.m.
Later in 2021, in mid-August, about two years ago, a new general police order was issued, which regulates the removal of encampments. The order includes some requirements for posting notice, and for some limited storage of personal property for encampment residents.
The general police order was used few days after it was issued, to remove an encampment under the B-Line bridge at Grimes Lane.
On Saturday, Aug. 12, The B Square saw a handful of tents, tarps, and hammocks that had been set up in Seminary Park. By 11 p.m. they had all been removed. By 11 a.m. on Sunday morning, a couple of tents had again been set up.
The next regular meeting of the board of park commissioners is set for Aug. 22, the week after the Aug. 16 special meeting.
I never noticed that once lovely limestone wall crumbling until this picture.
Let’s get something done this time around. Allow LEO to help monitor different levels of criminal behavior. If they do $500 in damages they are banned from the business and placed on a daily log. If they do over $1k they are given a no trespassing notice and forwarded to the prosecutors held responsible for their crimes. A crime doing $3k they must enter into a Rehab program and they are monitored on a daily basis by the authorities for their compliance. If they do $5k in damages then they go to Prison or leave town for their hardened criminal activities. When our safe and civil case will do that. We will be able to help our nonprofit to provide there services.
We really need to create a place where folks can gather in addition to Shalom. People are turned out of shelters early in the morning and need places to go with specialized support services and caseworkers. We need more day shelters.
Maybe they could consider moving the Shalom center and Community Kitchen somewhere close to each other, and away from the center of town. Does the city (or county) own enough property that they could donate some land to put those two places on? Have those who need the services help with building new places for them to go. Not the people that have serious drug problems, that would be too much of a liability. I bet there are enough of those who use the services provided by the Shalom Center and Community Kitchen who aren’t strung out that could help. It’s a sad situation all the way around, maybe giving them a purpose would help them WANT to get their life in order. It won’t help them all, but it would move them from the center of town. Winter will be here before we know it. It would be nice to have a shelter of some sort for them before that hits and brings on yet another issue.
Banishment beyond the border; it is the lack of affordability in the core that has pushed thousands of regular folks out into the County, pricing out people who were born here, an old colonial strategy to displace natives, appease high class snooty boots who put more resources into removal than uplift. Predatory extraction economics sees us all as units to bleed rather than family to feed. Glad to see you acknowledge that not everyone unhoused in an incorrigible criminal, mentally unstable or lazy druggie. Eco Media Center recently interviewed Mark Lakeman of Portland Oregon’s City Repair Project, an eco architect and village builder who helped establish Dignity Village and other refuges for those left and pushed out of the economy. Holistic Affordable Housing will be bringing him to town to give presentations during our Living Homes Conference and stakeholder charettes on how to build eco condos, tiny homes and reverse rent apt.s that provide income to residents by doubling as green collar cottage industry, urban farms and worker owned cooperatives. H!A!H was established after years of trying to get existing agencies to center eco ethics, switch from charity to solidarity. If you would like to help, feel free to contact us:
holistichousing.bbee@gmail.com
Being without a place to live of one’s own — “homeless” or “unhoused” or whatever term you want to use — and erecting tents in public spaces are not so much the problem as they are the outcomes of a range of individual, personal life situations that have led to these outcomes. These personal situations are varied and may or may not be related. They may include, for example, loss of employment and income, drug addiction, family abandonment, physical abuse, criminal history and mental illness, and even a combination of such causes. For this reason, it is important to understand that any solution developed by the city must focus on such individual situations and develop objectives that address them on an individual basis. There needs to be a strategy for those who are drug addicted, another for those with mental illnesses, and yet another for individuals who simply can’t afford a place to live. Solutions must also take into account cases with complex causes, cases where personal relationships are involved, cases where criminality is a factor. In short, it’s pointless to simply pass an edict prohibiting tents, etc. in public spaces, as it is pointless to simply move everyone into tiny houses and other types of shelters. We are dealing with a social problem that cannot be collectively managed. It must be addressed case by case, with the cooperation and involvement of many community resources: faith-based, law enforcement, non-profit social services, healthcare, rehabilitation and, where appropriate, housing opportunities. To do otherwise will only grow the problem, not reduce it.
Addressing the causes of homelessness is certainly the goal, Mr. Popolizio, but the ongoing problem in terms of community impact also concerns the behavior of those who are homeless at any given time. It would be wonderful if the city and various types of dedicated nonprofits could mobilize for every homeless person social services on the individual level such as you envision. But the available manpower, costs, and ultimate rate of effectiveness of that sort of effort are hard to predict. Bloomington already has a relatively robust effort underway and many successful outcomes, but new cases emerge constantly. The city should certainly continue to fund and strengthen these efforts.
In the meantime, there are ongoing issues of behavior that the community may reasonably hope to address. While setting and enforcing rules concerning tents won’t resolve the personal problems homeless individuals are facing or widespread homelessness as a problem, that is not what those rules are intended to accomplish: they are only intended to modify behavior in ways that recognize the interest of the community in maintaining a reasonably safe and orderly environment.
i agree and i think those who work in support see the problem that way too. that’s why we have a lot of different programs…subsidized housing for people who are simply broke (like Crestmont), income-restricted housing (i think B-line Heights?), transitional housing for families (New Hope), shelters for sleeping (Wheeler), day shelters (Beacon/Shalom, and seasonal cooling stations at the fire houses), housing for addicts (Kinser Flats), and it goes on. i could even throw run-down ‘slum rental’ into this picture because no matter what else is wrong with it, the few remaining “relatively low-rent” apartment buildings do serve an important role.
they’re trying! but it’s hard to keep up when societal trends are pushing more people into each of these categories.
(I tried to leave this as a reply to a comment but it didn’t show up. This is what it said.) Maybe they could consider moving the Shalom center and Community Kitchen somewhere close to each other, and away from the center of town. Does the city (or county) own enough property that they could donate some land to put those two places on? Have those who need the services help with building new places for them to go. Not the people that have serious drug problems, that would be too much of a liability. I bet there are enough of those who use the services provided by the Shalom Center and Community Kitchen who aren’t strung out that could help. It’s a sad situation all the way around, maybe giving them a purpose would help them WANT to get their life in order. It won’t help them all, but it would move them from the center of town. Winter will be here before we know it. It would be nice to have a shelter of some sort for them before that hits and brings on yet another issue.
Holistic Affordable Housing was started after years of trying to get existing agencies to switch from a charity model to solidarity, to empower autonomy by centering an eco ethic which turn homes into green collar jobs, ecopreneurial enterprise, urban farms and worker owned cooperatives which allow members to hire and fire management, reversing the power dynamic of our exploitative economic system.
Residents can earn their keep, develop skills by helping the businesses grow, reap benefits from the success they contribute to creating. An integrative intersectional approach creates a synergy not achieved in the current disaggregate turf guarding that can’t comprehend the advantages or subconsciously perpetuates class divisions.
I found a $100,000 grant for solar panels when Shalom bought their current building. They met every criteria, only needed a contractor’s estimate. We had received a similar grant at the Eco Center from the Indian Office of Energy and Defense, a Lugar program. It was blown off, meaning that dollars donated kept paying for utility costs that could have been offset. This is but one of many examples of opportunities shirked to retain a default status quo.
H!A!H is bringing eco architect Mark Lakeman to town to give presentations on the Dignity Village he helped establish in Oregon during our Living Homes Conference community stakeholder charettes next year. Our models incorporate social services and educational programs and ecopreneurial enterprise. As more punitive policies are advanced and people are priced out of the core, pushed past a perimeter, we will be working to secure property in town and out to plant structures that will provide income and shelter, other life needs, while addressing climate catastrophe, environmental challenges.
Anyone with a mind or heart to assist in manifesting something new, please contact us:
holistichousing.bbee@gmail.com
By any metric, Portland, OR, should not be considered a model for a healthy, successful urban environment. Its downtown core is a sad example of economic decline, rising crime, and businesses fleeing. Portland ranked 6th in population lost in 2022, as people leave its rotten core.
The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in 2018, in Martin vs Boise, that people have a right to sleep outside in public space. Although the Ninth’s jurisdiction is basically the West coast, the decision is reverberating across the nation. The SCOTUS declined to take up the case.
From the decision, and, in this article:
https://www.vox.com/23748522/tent-encampments-martin-boise-homelessness-housing
“The government cannot criminalize indigent, homeless people for sleeping outdoors, on public
property, on the false premise they had a choice in the matter”.
Does the Bloomington Board of Park Commissioners really want to criminalize sheltering outdoors on park land? This will lead to cruel and unnecessary treatment of homeless people. It’s a cruel policy on its face, really.
I’d like to see City Council step up and vote again on Bloomington Ordinance 21-06 which failed by one vote in 2021. The composition of the council is changing and it is high time to protect the rights of individuals to simply exist in public space.
I hope the majority understands that creating ordinances excluding a protected population, especially the population federal funding in the Hopewell project is a valid discrimination complaint no matter the civil rights obligations and compliance requirements of the federal agency thats providing financial assistance for plan.
Seems to me after living in this town for 52 years that the only regular patrons of this park and People’s park have been the less fortunate beings. If it was first class citizens frolicking in the parks and setting up sun tents or party tents would that be different? I personally don’t like seeing all the messes and grocery carts of belongings sitting around along with the drug activity that takes place.. If it were not for the homeless this park would still be sitting empty except for the few people who would come from close businesses when they were around to eat lunch. I believe it’s a matter of the group of persons who are occupying the space not necessarily the fact they are setting up tents. The city will just keep trying to pass laws that some day will bite the so called decent citizens in the rear. How many times do you go to the park and have a sun shade or tent of some type to keep the sun off you or your food sources? Better programs and.
This is not about what class of people who are allowed to use the public parks. It’s about allowing our children and families to be harmed by their lifestyle choices. It’s being able for everyone to use and be safe. The city has banned smoking on campus and businesses.
Isn’t the Seminary Square Park a public park? As is the space under the bline bridge and just about every other federally funded public space that isnt private property? So where they supposed to go?
Oh wait, what’s the Hopewell project all about? Why not designate about an acre of that land for our shelterless citizens to set up camp until the project is complete? Does not every human being have the right to human decency?
Let me explain what the problem is by telling a personal story. My son has schizophrenia. He has been treated by several doctors and given the same diagnosis every time. Medication only helps if it is given by professionals on a regular schedule and then it doesn’t help much. He has been admitted to behavioral health centers but they will never keep him longer than two weeks. He has been admitted to rehab centers but they will only keep him 28 days. So think about this, he has a disease that has no cure but his treatment is only for a month at most. It’s like saying you have stage four cancer but after a month in the hospital they throw you out and stop treatment. We desperately need long term (Years at a time) mental health care facilities. If we don’t do that they end up on the streets. The sad part is that the money is being spent. Just the wrong way.