202404.09

West Phoenix shelter clears final hurdle, will open this summer, despite fierce opposition

Written by: Taylor Seely and Laura Daniella Sepulveda, Arizona Republic

A homeless shelter and services campus slated to be built in southwest Phoenix can now be built, despite desperate pleas from surrounding residents to choose a different location.

After four hours of public testimony, the Phoenix Board of Adjustment voted 5-1 to approve a use permit the city needed because of the shelter’s location, roughly a mile from Fowler Elementary School and a quarter mile from homes. The use permit was the final hurdle for the shelter.

The city plans to open the 7-acre, 300-person campus at 71st Avenue and Van Buren Street this summer. It will offer beds, workforce assistance and wraparound services designed to help end individuals’ chronic homelessness. The location is tucked between two distribution centers on a plot of city-owned land.

The board’s vote required certain protections for nearby residents, such as creating an advisory board of community members, reviewing compliance in six months and 18 months, and devising a plan for security and police coordination.

The approval marks a significant step forward in the city’s effort to combat homelessness but deepens decades-old wounds felt by the Hispanic, low-income neighbors who say the city’s track record of neglect prevents them from trusting city officials’ promises.

U.S. Census tract data show 18% of residents in the immediately adjacent area live beneath the poverty line, a rate 25% higher than the rest of Phoenix. Roughly 30% of the children are considered impoverished. Nearly half the dwellings are mobile homes.

Chevelle Ortega said she had been asking for street lights in her neighborhood for 15 years. She was ping-ponged between different departments and the utility provider, but never got resolution, she said. Others, like Saharai Trejo, pointed to the lack of city amenities in Estrella Village. The Si Se Puede Neighborhood Association advocated for speed bumps in 2021 but waited years.

Homeless shelter:Phoenix aims to fast track homeless shelter, but residents remain fiercely opposed

Roughly 100 community members attended Thursday’s Board of Adjustment meeting. Opponents said they were concerned for the safety of their children and for encampments or loitering. They criticized the city’s public outreach as inadequate and challenged city officials to put themselves in the community’s shoes. They asked why the city would burden the area, which is already ripe with challenges.

“Why are we … not important to the city?” asked Ortega, who has lived in the area since 1965 and a single mom of a 9-year-old who attends Fowler Elementary School. “When will our children, our elderly, our individuals with disabilities, and the residents of this community be a priority to the city of Phoenix?”

An attorney representing Phoenix, Wendy Riddell, contended the campus was critical to reducing homelessness and vital to protecting lives in the summer. She suggested it would improve the area by prioritizing unhoused people already nearby, and stressed how the facility would house individuals choosing a path of self-improvement.

Board members repeatedly asked Riddell and neighbors to elaborate on concerns and potential remedies.

The six members appeared torn over the impassioned commentary from neighbors, and urged the city to rectify its relationship with the community and provide more powerful, long-term protections.

Yet, the majority were convinced the city’s proposal would be beneficial and not worsen conditions. Wallace Graham, the lone no-vote on the board, said he was concerned about the lack of long-term protections for the community.

Office of Homeless Solutions Director Rachel Milne spoke in a subdued tone after the approval, saying she was “happy we’re moving forward” but stressed the commitment she had to fearful residents. “The conversation doesn’t stop here.”

Industrial character of neighborhood cited by both sides

For residents near 71st Avenue and Van Buren Street, the area’s existing industrialization worked against them at the zoning hearing.

To secure a use permit, applicants are supposed to show the project won’t adversely affect the surrounding areas by significantly increasing traffic in neighborhoods or increasing pollutions beyond “ambient conditions.” The proposed use can’t make the environment worse.

But warehouses saturate Van Buren Street west of Loop 202. The big-box buildings are home to distribution centers, cigarette manufacturing facilities and meat packaging plants. Massive semi-trucks traverse the roads.

Residents believe nearby industrialization has deteriorated their community. They see it as a reason why the city should not have piled on more. But Riddell highlighted this composition and suggested the homeless shelter wouldn’t worsen conditions because it was already a “very industrial area.”

She added that the city could technically move ahead with building a soup kitchen without public input, since existing zoning allows it, but was choosing instead to build a campus — positioning the city as a gracious applicant trying to do the right thing.

The point was well received by board members who cited it as a reason for their approval.

Board members were also amenable to the campus’ prioritization of nearby unsheltered individuals and the facility’s referral-only policy, which requires prospective clients to get appointments or referrals from other Valley agencies to get in. It’s also known as a “closed campus” policy.

Nathan Smith, chief program officer for Phoenix Rescue Mission, a nonprofit dedicated to helping people through homelessness, hunger, addiction and trauma, lauded the policy.

He said it helped reduce loitering at the organization’s Transforming Lives Center at 35th Avenue and Durango Street.

One board member expressed concern that adding shelter beds could inadvertently hurt people experiencing homelessness. Tim Eigo said it gave him pause that adding beds might make it easier for Phoenix to enforce its urban camping bans, which he said experts viewed as “inhumane.”

The city has an existing ban on homeless encampments in city parks and on sidewalks and alleys. The City Council is also preparing to adopt a new urban camping ban near schools, day cares and shelters.

But the city sparingly enforces the ban because of a court order that forbids it without existing shelter beds or alternative public space.

Riddell said the new beds from the 71st Avenue site should pave the way for enforcement, but she was wary to get into detail, saying it would be a policy decision for the mayor and council.

Urban camping:U.S. Supreme Court to hear lower court ruling on urban camping bans

Residents deflated after approval

As the board sided with the city, residents covered their faces into their hands and shook their head in disappointment.

For Estrella Village residents, the approval of the new homeless campus not only raises fears about how the condition of their neighborhood could worsen, but also brings up complaints about inequity in how the city invests its resources. It was yet another disappointment to the list of issues in which residents say the city has failed to listen to their needs.

Ortega said feeling unheard by the city was nothing new for her. She said low police staffing levels, a chronic problem for City Hall, meant she got no help for a homeless encampment in front of her home.

She and multiple others begged the board members to put the children first. Many expressed concern about children being unsafe to walk to school.

A social worker who lives in the area said residents already struggled with violent crime and homelessness, and worried the shelter would increase those incidents.

Trejo, another resident, said the area was filled with gas stations but lacked grocery stores, libraries and city services.

Elizabeth Esqueda, a neighborhood resident and member of Sí Se Puede Neighborhood Association, said air quality in the area was deteriorating, there was more noise pollution and heavy traffic, and neighborhood streets were filled with potholes and trash.

She said days before pre-construction for the site began, she noticed the city had recently been covering potholes and repairing streets near the shelter.

“Now I know why they were fixed,” she said.

Brenda Montoya, another resident representing Sí Se Puede’s leadership committee, said in the nearly 30 years she has lived in the area, she has noticed a prominent decline.

“Depending on what you decide to grant, it will impact how our community, especially Latinos, will be living in the coming years,” Montoya said. “We want all of this to be equitable for both parties. Please.”

Montoya emphasized the neighborhood association has mobilized residents and presented organized efforts to ask the city for more resources in their community. She said community leaders have knocked on doors, collected signatures, and followed all the protocols and requirements the city stipulates to request more services in the neighborhood.

But even then, she says city processes are often delayed and officials have broken their promises regarding the timelines.

“It’s interesting that the leadership committee has been struggling to ask for help…and the city doesn’t support us,” Montoya said as her voice trembled and cracked in an outburst of emotion. “But there is money, and there are resources to immediately establish a shelter.”

Trejo and other residents promised to keep track of harmful effects from the shelter when it’s built.

“If this shelter gets opened, I want to hold the city of Phoenix accountable for any added burdens to our community: more pollution, more traffic, more trash, more crime,” Trejo said. “If this happens, I will work hard for my community.”