With public tenting a felony, Tennessee homeless seek refuge

COOKEVILLE, Tenn. (AP) — Miranda Atnip misplaced her home during the coronavirus pandemic after her boyfriend moved out and she or he fell behind on payments. Residing in a automobile, the 34-year-old worries daily about getting money for food, discovering somewhere to shower, and saving up sufficient money for an condo the place her three children can stay together with her once more.

Now she has a brand new fear: Tennessee is about to turn into the first U.S. state to make it a felony to camp on native public property reminiscent of parks.

“Truthfully, it’s going to be onerous,” Atnip stated of the regulation, which takes impact July 1. “I don’t know where else to go.”

Tennessee already made it a felony in 2020 to camp on most state-owned property. In pushing the enlargement, Sen. Paul Bailey noted that nobody has been convicted underneath that law and mentioned he doesn’t count on this one to be enforced a lot, either. Neither does Luke Eldridge, a person who has labored with homeless folks within the metropolis of Cookeville and helps Bailey’s plan — partially because he hopes it's going to spur individuals who care in regards to the homeless to work with him on long-term solutions.

The law requires that violators receive no less than 24 hours notice earlier than an arrest. The felony charge is punishable by as much as six years in jail and the loss of voting rights.

“It’s going to be up to prosecutors ... in the event that they need to challenge a felony,” Bailey said. “Nevertheless it’s solely going to come back to that if individuals actually don’t wish to transfer.”

After a number of years of regular decline, homelessness in america started rising in 2017. A survey in January 2020 discovered for the first time that the variety of unsheltered homeless people exceeded these in shelters. The problem was exacerbated by COVID-19, with shelters limiting capability.

Public pressure to do something about the growing number of extremely visible homeless encampments has pushed even many traditionally liberal cities to clear them. Though tenting has typically been regulated by native vagrancy legal guidelines, Texas handed a statewide ban final yr. Municipalities that fail to implement the ban risk dropping state funding. Several other states have introduced similar payments, however Tennessee is the only one to make tenting a felony.

Bailey’s district includes Cookeville, a metropolis of about 35,000 folks between Nashville and Knoxville, the place the native newspaper has chronicled rising concern with the growing number of homeless people. The Herald-Citizen reported last yr that complaints about panhandlers nearly doubled between 2019 and 2020, from 157 to 300. In 2021, town installed indicators encouraging residents to present to charities instead of panhandlers. And the City Council twice thought of panhandling bans.

The Republican lawmaker acknowledges that complaints from Cookeville acquired his consideration. City council members have told him that Nashville ships its homeless right here, Bailey said. It’s a rumor many in Cookeville have heard and Bailey appears to consider. When Nashville fenced off a downtown park for renovation just lately, the homeless people who frequented it disappeared. “Where did they go?” Bailey asked.

Atnip laughed on the idea of individuals shipped in from Nashville. She was residing in close by Monterey when she misplaced her home and needed to ship her youngsters to dwell together with her dad and mom. She has received some government help, but not enough to get her back on her ft, she mentioned. At one point she got a housing voucher but couldn’t find a landlord who would settle for it. She and her new husband saved sufficient to finance a used car and have been working as supply drivers till it broke down. Now she’s afraid they are going to lose the automobile and have to maneuver to a tent, although she isn’t positive the place they may pitch it.

“It looks like as soon as one factor goes wrong, it form of snowballs,” Atnip said. “We had been making a living with DoorDash. Our bills were paid. We had been saving. Then the car goes kaput and every part goes dangerous.”

Eldridge, who has worked with Cookeville’s homeless for a decade, is an surprising advocate of the camping ban. He stated he wants to continue serving to the homeless, but some individuals aren’t motivated to enhance their scenario. Some are hooked on drugs, he mentioned, and some are hiding from regulation enforcement. Eldridge estimates there are about 60 folks residing outside more or less permanently in Cookeville, and he knows all of them.

“Most of them have been here a number of years, and not as soon as have they asked for housing help,” he stated.

Eldridge is aware of his place is unpopular with different advocates.

“The large downside with this law is that it does nothing to solve homelessness. In actual fact, it can make the problem worse,” stated Bobby Watts, CEO of the Nationwide Healthcare for the Homeless Council. “Having a felony in your report makes it onerous to qualify for some types of housing, harder to get a job, more durable to qualify for advantages.”

Not everybody desires to be in a crowded shelter with a curfew, but people will move off the streets given the fitting alternatives, Watts said. Homelessness among U.S. army veterans, for example, has been minimize practically in half over the previous decade through a combination of housing subsidies and social providers.

“It’s not magic,” he said. “What works for that population, works for every population.”

Tina Lomax, who runs Seeds of Hope of Tennessee in close by Sparta, was once homeless together with her children. Many individuals are just one paycheck or one tragedy away from being on the streets, she said. Even in her group of 5,000, reasonably priced housing is very laborious to come back by.

“In case you have a felony in your document — holy smokes!” she said.

Eldridge, like Sen. Bailey, said he doesn’t expect many individuals to be prosecuted for sleeping on public property. “I can promise, they’re not going to be out here rounding up homeless individuals,” he said of Cookeville law enforcement. However he doesn’t know what would possibly happen in other components of the state.

He hopes the brand new legislation will spur a few of its opponents to work with him on long-term options for Cookeville’s homeless. If they all worked together it could imply “lots of assets and potential funding sources to assist these in want,” he said.

However different advocates don’t assume threatening people with a felony is an effective means to assist them.

“Criminalizing homelessness just makes individuals criminals,” Watts stated.