Austin Mayor Steve Adler spent much of last week on the West Coast meeting with leaders of some of America’s biggest cities to discuss homelessness. While meeting with the mayors of both Seattle and Los Angeles — two cities with some of the most well-documented issues related to homelessness — Adler said his goal was to find out what did not work for those cities in hopes of avoiding the same decisions in Austin.
Over the weekend, Adler returned home with a fresh vision of the future of the fight against homelessness in Austin. Although, that new vision may not be so different than the current vision, which involves the spending of more than $30-million annually on homeless shelters and services alone.
Speaking with CBS Austin, Adler says the root of the solution really is more money, and a lot of it.
“Build more homes, build more spaces for people, give people choices and alternatives to be able to get off the street. We need to do that. We need to be able to make the tough choices associated with that,” Adler says.
Adler acknowledges that both Seattle and Los Angeles have homeless problems that are almost out of control, and he attributes that to a lack of foresight on the part of the city governments. He says the City of Austin must act quickly to stay ahead of the problem to avoid suffering a similar fate.
The Austin Police Association said recently officers were struggling due to a perceived subjectivity to ordinance changes allowing the homeless to camp in public. Adler has directed City Manager Spencer Cronk to present the city council with a list of specific locations in August in which the homeless will not be permitted to camp. Currently, City Hall is among those locations.
The Austin City Council is currently on a summer break.
