Love thy neighbor
Echoing SV Salvation Army head Major Freeman, MySanAntonio.com points out that homeless shelters can cause issues for neighboring communities re: drug use, crime, and noisiness—which should be anticipated and swiftly addressed by leadership. A case study from Haven for Hope shelter in TX.
A San Antonio Express-News analysis of police records found that calls for service from the public to 911 jumped more than 5 percent in a half-mile radius around the [Haven for Hope] center in the year after it opened in April 2010, mostly about prowlers, public intoxication, fighting, overdoses and burglary.
By this April, Haven's second anniversary of operation, overall police calls had gone up 42 percent.
“Nuisance” calls — drunkenness, prowlers, fighting — rose more than 12 percent. Calls related to vice — prostitution, gambling — jumped 580 percent, compared with the year before Haven opened.
Residents complain that, with Haven's arrival, the epicenter of the homeless population shifted from downtown — where hotels and restaurants had griped — to their modest environs.
At any given time, some 850 people live on the Haven campus as they work to transition from homelessness. An additional 700 come and go on the outdoor courtyard each day, getting free food and access to showers and toilets, but are not part of the transformation program. Of those, about 600 sleep there each night.
Some of the people hanging around the neighborhoods drift there from Haven during the daytime; others have been kicked out. And still others, gripped by substance abuse or mental illness, are unlikely to enter the campus program or even use the courtyard.
“We had some homeless people and a problem with drugs before, but nothing like it is now,” said Gloria Castro, who grew up in the neighborhood and still owns a rental home she inherited from her parents on Leal Street, across from Haven.
Police Chief William McManus said an increase in police calls for service doesn't mean crime has gone up.
“It's not unfair to draw some comparisons between the two things, but one is not necessarily a direct indicator of the other,” he said.
From the start, police have attempted to mitigate problems Haven might cause by patrolling heavily in surrounding neighborhoods, he said. In addition, special officers enforce ordinances against camping, drinking and panhandling.
The center itself has tried to be a good neighbor, said Mark Carmona, Haven's interim CEO.
He ticks off successes: Security officers call police on behalf of neighbors wanting to report a possible crime; the construction of the Haven campus supplanted a blighted area; it rehabbed the nearby Garcia Park; records show the center's medical, dental and vision clinics are used by people throughout the city.
“Recovery is a process,” he said. “Some people don't get it on the first time. Does that make it difficult for the folks who live here? Yeah. But this is an opportunity for us to do outreach and partner with the community, to continue to improve our relationship with them.”
Read the whole thing here.
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