With public camping a felony, Tennessee homeless seek refuge

COOKEVILLE, Tenn. (AP) — Miranda Atnip misplaced her dwelling throughout the coronavirus pandemic after her boyfriend moved out and she or he fell behind on payments. Dwelling in a automobile, the 34-year-old worries every single day about getting money for food, discovering somewhere to shower, and saving up sufficient cash for an condo the place her three youngsters can dwell together with her again.

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

“Truthfully, it’s going to be exhausting,” Atnip mentioned of the law, which takes effect 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 growth, Sen. Paul Bailey noted that nobody has been convicted underneath that legislation and said he doesn’t count on this one to be enforced much, either. Neither does Luke Eldridge, a man who has worked with homeless people in the metropolis of Cookeville and helps Bailey’s plan — partially as a result of he hopes it's going to spur individuals who care about the homeless to work with him on long-term options.

The law requires that violators obtain no less than 24 hours discover before an arrest. The felony cost is punishable by as much as six years in prison and the loss of voting rights.

“It’s going to be as much as prosecutors ... in the event that they want to challenge a felony,” Bailey stated. “But it’s only going to come to that if folks actually don’t need to transfer.”

After several years of steady decline, homelessness in the US started growing in 2017. A survey in January 2020 discovered for the first time that the number of unsheltered homeless people exceeded these in shelters. The problem was exacerbated by COVID-19, with shelters limiting capacity.

Public strain to do one thing in regards to the increasing number of extremely visible homeless encampments has pushed even many historically liberal cities to clear them. Though tenting has generally been regulated by local vagrancy laws, Texas passed a statewide ban last year. Municipalities that fail to enforce the ban danger losing state funding. Several different states have introduced related bills, but Tennessee is the only one to make camping a felony.

Bailey’s district consists of Cookeville, a metropolis of about 35,000 people between Nashville and Knoxville, where the local newspaper has chronicled rising concern with the rising variety of homeless folks. The Herald-Citizen reported last year that complaints about panhandlers almost doubled between 2019 and 2020, from 157 to 300. In 2021, town installed indicators encouraging residents to offer to charities instead of panhandlers. And the City Council twice thought of panhandling bans.

The Republican lawmaker acknowledges that complaints from Cookeville obtained his consideration. City council members have instructed him that Nashville ships its homeless here, Bailey stated. 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 at the thought of individuals shipped in from Nashville. She was living in nearby Monterey when she misplaced her dwelling and had to ship her children to reside together with her mother and father. She has obtained some government assist, but not sufficient to get her back on her ft, she said. At one level she received a housing voucher however couldn’t find a landlord who would accept it. She and her new husband saved enough to finance a used car and had been working as supply 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 where they will pitch it.

“It looks as if as soon as one factor goes wrong, it kind of snowballs,” Atnip said. “We have been getting cash with DoorDash. Our bills had been paid. We were saving. Then the car goes kaput and all the pieces goes dangerous.”

Eldridge, who has labored with Cookeville’s homeless for a decade, is an unexpected advocate of the tenting ban. He stated he needs to proceed serving to the homeless, however some individuals aren’t motivated to improve their situation. Some are hooked on medication, he said, and a few are hiding from law enforcement. Eldridge estimates there are about 60 individuals living outdoors roughly permanently in Cookeville, and he knows all of them.

“Most of them have been here a few years, and never once have they requested for housing help,” he stated.

Eldridge knows his position is unpopular with other advocates.

“The big drawback with this law is that it does nothing to solve homelessness. In fact, it should make the problem worse,” mentioned Bobby Watts, CEO of the National Healthcare for the Homeless Council. “Having a felony on your record makes it onerous to qualify for some sorts of housing, tougher to get a job, harder to qualify for benefits.”

Not everybody wants to be in a crowded shelter with a curfew, however folks will move off the streets given the proper opportunities, Watts mentioned. Homelessness among U.S. military veterans, for instance, has been cut practically in half over the past decade by means of a combination of housing subsidies and social companies.

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

Tina Lomax, who runs Seeds of Hope of Tennessee in close by Sparta, was as soon as homeless along with her children. Many individuals are only one paycheck or one tragedy away from being on the streets, she mentioned. Even in her neighborhood of 5,000, reasonably priced housing may be very hard to come back by.

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

Eldridge, like Sen. Bailey, stated he doesn’t anticipate many people to be prosecuted for sleeping on public property. “I can promise, they’re not going to be out here rounding up homeless people,” he stated of Cookeville law enforcement. But he doesn’t know what may happen in different parts of the state.

He hopes the brand new law will spur some of its opponents to work with him on long-term solutions for Cookeville’s homeless. If all of them labored together it would mean “lots of sources and doable funding sources to assist these in need,” he stated.

But other advocates don’t assume threatening folks with a felony is an efficient approach to assist them.

“Criminalizing homelessness just makes folks criminals,” Watts mentioned.