City of Tacoma press release.
TACOMA, Wash. – On September 13, the Tacoma City Council will receive an introduction from District 1 Council Member John Hines on a proposed ordinance prohibiting camping and the storage of personal belongings on public property around temporary shelters. The proposed ordinance was drafted in response to a sharp uptick in public health and safety concerns received from community members regarding these specific areas.
“No one is happy with the status quo,” said Council Member Hines. “This proposed ordinance is meant to serve as a starting point for broader conversations on some of our biggest challenges. I think we can all agree that everyone in our community deserves to have a healthy and safe place to live – including those currently in encampments, in temporary shelters, and in the neighborhoods that surround them.”
Ensuring public health and safety in neighborhoods where temporary shelters are currently located will be key, according to Council Member Hines, if other neighborhoods are to consider partnering with the City in future efforts to expand shelter options.
As work to set up another temporary shelter at 35th Street and Pacific Avenue progresses, and the City continues its search for more potential shelter locations and community partnerships, Council Member Hines expressed hope that the proposed ordinance, if passed, would make things easier in the months and years ahead.
Council Member Hines also expressed his ongoing commitment to the City’s longer-term work to invest in permanent supportive and affordable housing, to examine zoning to allow for more housing types, and to support strategies surrounding mental health and substance abuse treatment.
“While this longer-term work is vital, the proposed ordinance I am introducing on September 13 acknowledges the reality that we need to address encampments and the impacts they have on our community right now,” said Council Member Hines. “I invite everyone to tune in to Study Session at noon on that day to learn more.”
Study Session can be viewed in person at the Tacoma Municipal Building Council Chambers (747 Market St., 1st Floor), and virtually on TV Tacoma, Facebook LIVE or ZOOM. Access details are available at cityoftacoma.org/councilmeetings.
If I fail to pay my ever-increasing property taxes, the government will take my property from me. Then I will no longer have a safe place to live.
If I drive around in a vehicle with no insurance or registration, the government will hand me a heavy fine.
There are endless other taxes applied to every aspect of my existence.
All of this money is funneled to an ever-expanding government that pays endless lip service to us for problems that never get solved.
We will never get a handle on our societal ills until we start electing leadership that can manage money on a base level.
You know, folks that don’t see 2+2=4 as some kind of racist or unfair or biased kind of a thing.
Our money is diluted into an unproductive bureaucracy before it has a chance to even get to the problem.
Less government and more streamlined action – that is what solves problems and finances solutions.
Tacoma needs to address the mess at center and pine street. First it was a wood and other crap shelter now the person has a pop up trailer and ez up awning. It’s an eye sore at that intersection. I grew up in Tacoma and I find it disgusting
Anything is a solution when you don’t acknowledge the root cause. And while all this is going on, I need a permit to install a sprinkler system. Makes perfect sense.
You can get a Tacoma code violation because you have untrimmed blackberry bushes on your property but wholesale stretches of the City are covered with trash, needles, filth, tents, broken down vehicles, not to mention criminal activity and get but a “wink and a nod” from the City Council. You know they personally drive past this disaster (for occupants and neighborhoods) so it’s not like they don’t know. We certainly do! This proposal needs to address ALL public areas throughout the City, regardless of proximity to shelters for clean up.