With public tenting a felony, Tennessee homeless seek refuge

COOKEVILLE, Tenn. (AP) — Miranda Atnip lost her house throughout the coronavirus pandemic after her boyfriend moved out and he or she fell behind on bills. Dwelling in a automotive, the 34-year-old worries every single day about getting cash for food, discovering someplace to shower, and saving up sufficient cash for an house the place her three children can live together with her once more.

Now she has a new worry: Tennessee is about to become the first U.S. state to make it a felony to camp on native public property similar to parks.

“Honestly, it’s going to be exhausting,” 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 expansion, Sen. Paul Bailey noted that nobody has been convicted under that regulation and said he doesn’t expect this one to be enforced a lot, either. Neither does Luke Eldridge, a man who has labored with homeless individuals within the metropolis of Cookeville and supports Bailey’s plan — partially because he hopes it is going to spur people who care concerning the homeless to work with him on long-term options.

The legislation requires that violators receive at the very least 24 hours discover earlier than an arrest. The felony charge is punishable by up to six years in prison and the lack of voting rights.

“It’s going to be as much as prosecutors ... in the event that they wish to subject a felony,” Bailey stated. “However it’s solely going to come back to that if people actually don’t want to move.”

After a number of years of steady decline, homelessness in the US began increasing in 2017. A survey in January 2020 found for the first time that the number of unsheltered homeless individuals exceeded those in shelters. The issue was exacerbated by COVID-19, with shelters limiting capability.

Public strain to do something concerning the increasing variety of extremely visible homeless encampments has pushed even many historically liberal cities to clear them. Although camping has usually been regulated by local vagrancy legal guidelines, Texas passed a statewide ban last 12 months. Municipalities that fail to implement the ban danger shedding state funding. A number of other states have introduced similar bills, however Tennessee is the only one to make tenting a felony.

Bailey’s district consists of Cookeville, a city of about 35,000 folks between Nashville and Knoxville, the place the local newspaper has chronicled rising concern with the increasing variety of homeless people. The Herald-Citizen reported last year that complaints about panhandlers almost doubled between 2019 and 2020, from 157 to 300. In 2021, the town put in indicators encouraging residents to give to charities as an alternative of panhandlers. And the City Council twice considered panhandling bans.

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

Atnip laughed at the concept of individuals shipped in from Nashville. She was dwelling in nearby Monterey when she misplaced her dwelling and needed to ship her kids to reside along with her parents. She has obtained some government help, however not sufficient to get her again on her ft, she said. At one level she obtained a housing voucher but couldn’t find a landlord who would accept it. She and her new husband saved sufficient to finance a used automobile and had been working as delivery drivers until it broke down. Now she’s afraid they will lose the car and have to move to a tent, though she isn’t positive the place they are going to pitch it.

“It looks like as soon as one thing goes mistaken, it form of snowballs,” Atnip mentioned. “We were making money with DoorDash. Our bills have been paid. We had been saving. Then the automobile goes kaput and every little thing goes unhealthy.”

Eldridge, who has labored with Cookeville’s homeless for a decade, is an unexpected advocate of the camping ban. He said he wants to proceed helping the homeless, but some folks aren’t motivated to improve their scenario. Some are hooked on drugs, he said, and some are hiding from legislation enforcement. Eldridge estimates there are about 60 individuals dwelling outdoors more or less completely in Cookeville, and he is aware of them all.

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

Eldridge knows his place is unpopular with other advocates.

“The big problem with this legislation is that it does nothing to resolve homelessness. In fact, it's going to make the issue worse,” said Bobby Watts, CEO of the National Healthcare for the Homeless Council. “Having a felony in your record makes it arduous to qualify for some varieties of housing, more durable to get a job, tougher to qualify for benefits.”

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

“It’s not magic,” he said. “What works for that inhabitants, works for each inhabitants.”

Tina Lomax, who runs Seeds of Hope of Tennessee in nearby Sparta, was once homeless with her youngsters. Many individuals are just one paycheck or one tragedy away from being on the streets, she stated. Even in her group of 5,000, inexpensive housing could be very onerous to come back by.

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

Eldridge, like Sen. Bailey, said he doesn’t expect many people to be prosecuted for sleeping on public property. “I can promise, they’re not going to be out here rounding up homeless folks,” he mentioned of Cookeville regulation enforcement. However he doesn’t know what may occur in other elements of the state.

He hopes the new law will spur a few of its opponents to work with him on long-term solutions for Cookeville’s homeless. If they all labored collectively it could mean “loads of resources and attainable funding sources to assist those in want,” he said.

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

“Criminalizing homelessness simply makes folks criminals,” Watts said.