Latest news with #StreetstoHomeIndy
Indianapolis Star
4 days ago
- Indianapolis Star
Indy reverses course on Fountain Square homeless camp, will house residents before shutdown
After weeks of sharp criticism, Indianapolis leaders have again changed their approach to a prominent Fountain Square homeless camp and will allow residents to remain at the site until they are offered housing. The Office of Public Health and Safety announced Aug. 15 that residents who still live at or recently left the homeless camp along Leonard Street will be housed through Streets to Home Indy, a new city-backed initiative to place more than 300 people known to be living on the streets into apartments by next June. At each camp, the process is expected to take four to six weeks. 'We appreciate everyone's patience — we needed to ensure the best outcomes for our unhoused and housed neighbors, acting with compassion and diligence to find the right solution," OPHS Director Andrew Merkley said in a written statement Aug. 15. "I'm grateful that Streets to Home Indy is able to find housing for these individuals and permanently close this camp." With the decision, Merkley is in effect doing what critics urged him to do during a contentious town hall held days after his July 25 decision to close the camp by Aug. 11. Instead of pushing people from one tent encampment to another, advocates for people who are homeless say service providers should offer people stable housing and case management. But Merkley also faced intense pressure to shut down the camp from Fountain Square homeowners and business leaders, who said that taxpaying residents should not have to live steps away from the trash, human waste and drug and alcohol consumption that they say occurred at the site. Merkley ultimately chose to close the camp after someone who seemingly did not live there reportedly fired a gunshot near a camp resident's tent the morning of July 25, according to police. He also cited alleged animal abuse at the camp in June and the site's dangerous proximity to the road as part of why it had become an imminent public safety threat. A change in the city's approach became evident earlier this week, however, when Aug. 11 came and went but nine people still apparently lived at the camp the next morning. Even camp residents were confused, with some having left before the deadline and others staying after they learned that the city would not push them away. Merkley said Aug. 13 that because the suspects in the alleged shooting and animal abuse were arrested, he felt that the largest public safety threats had been mitigated. He emphasized that no new residents will be allowed to live at the camp. Homelessness: What Trump's attack on 'Housing First' means for Indy's effort to end chronic and street homelessness In defense of the July 25 order to close the camp, Merkley had said that Streets to Home Indy wasn't prepared to take on a site as large as Leonard Street, where more than two dozen tents sat as of late July. But now the program, led by service providers like the Coalitition for Homelessness Intervention and Prevention and Horizon House, has closed an initial camp at an undisclosed location and housed 10 people who were living there. Leaders say they won't often publicly share which site they're working at because they don't want homeless people to flock there in search of housing. Social workers will move to house everyone who was living at Leonard Street, based on a list of names they collected in recent weeks. "This is exactly what Streets to Home Indy is designed to do — address encampments through housing solutions, not displacement," CHIP CEO Chelsea Haring-Cozzi said in a statement. "With growing capacity, we are ready to meet the moment and connect those at Leonard Street to stable housing." While the program works to house residents, the city is paying local nonprofit Keys2Work to clean up litter at the site. The Indianapolis Metropolitan Police Department will continue to patrol the area and respond to crime reports. After everyone is housed or offered housing, the city will clean up and permanently close the camp.
Indianapolis Star
6 days ago
- General
- Indianapolis Star
'A gut punch': Indy program that offered parking spots to people living in autos shuts down
An Indianapolis program that allowed people to sleep in their cars without fear of relocation has abruptly ended. Safe Park Indy, which launched Oct. 1, 2024, offered free overnight spots in private parking lots for up to 60 days at a time. It was the first initiative of its kind in the state and was intended as a year-long pilot program. People staying in Safe Park Indy spots were provided with resources including bathroom access, hygiene supplies and food. "Our small organization, unfortunately, lacks the resources to scale beyond our pilot," the organization's website said on Aug. 13. Between five and 20 spots were available nightly, but more than 400 people applied for the program before its waitlist was shut down, according to founder Elizabeth Friedland. More than 1,800 people in Indianapolis were homeless on a given night in Indianapolis as of January 2025, up from 1,700 a year earlier. "This is a gut punch," Friedland wrote in a Facebook post on Aug. 12. She said she plans to reach out to nonprofits in the area to see if they'd be able to take on the program moving forward. "I'm unwilling to let Safe Park Indy die," Friedland wrote in an email to IndyStar. Friedland stepped down as Safe Park Indy's executive director in January 2025, citing the organization's need for a leader who could "intentionally, full-time steer the organization to success for hopefully many years to come." More: Indianapolis program aims to close homeless camps, place 350 residents into housing A "document outlining our learnings" will be available at some point in the future, Safe Park Indy's website said. The organization was funded entirely by private donors and the closure was not caused by federal cuts to money allotted for nonprofits, Friedland told IndyStar. Donations given to Safe Park Indy after Feb. 15, 2025 will be refunded, the organization's website said. The program's closing comes as Indianapolis leaders plan to clear out homeless camps and relocate their approximately 350 residents to supportive housing, the first part of a multi-year plan called Streets to Home Indy. A low-barrier shelter that will provide 150 overnight beds is not expected to open until 2027.
Indianapolis Star
04-08-2025
- Politics
- Indianapolis Star
What Trump's attack on 'Housing First' means for Indy's effort to end chronic homelessness
Leaders of a new city-backed program to essentially end street homelessness say it was designed so that local taxpayer and philanthropic dollars will fund the $8.1 million Year 1 cost. But it's unclear how leaders will raise the money to pay for the three-year effort's $50 million estimated price tag, as Republicans at the state and federal level become increasingly hostile toward the "Housing First" approach that's foundational to the new effort, called Streets to Home Indy. In the nation's top office, President Donald Trump issued an executive order July 24 that aims to steer money away from "Housing First" efforts and empower city and state governments to crack down on unsheltered homelessness. Critics are especially worried by Trump's calls for more "involuntary commitment," a process by which health workers can forcibly detain and medicate people against their will. Streets to Home Indy aims to get ahead of any policy shifts. By next June, the program aims to house more than 300 people known to live unsheltered across Indianapolis in homeless camps, abandoned buildings or vehicles. Over three years, the plan is to move the quarter of Indy's homeless population that is unsheltered or experiencing chronic homelessness — meaning they have been homeless for more than a year and have at least one health issue — into permanent housing. (About 60% of people facing chronic homelessness are also unsheltered, according to a 2024 count.) Overall, the goal is to make the experience of homelessness in Indianapolis, where the homeless population exceeded 1,800 people in 2025, "rare, brief and non-recurring" by the end of 2028, leaders say. Along with Streets to Home Indy, another important part of that effort is the publicly funded low-barrier shelter that will add 150 temporary beds by 2027. "It's not that we are going to completely end homelessness. People will experience housing crises," Chelsea Haring-Cozzi, CEO of the Coalition for Homelessness Intervention and Prevention, said during a recent town hall on Streets to Home Indy. "But what we have to do is end street homelessness, because people shouldn't experience a housing crisis that leads them to the streets. There should be safe, inclusive places for people to land and get them to housing." With the nation's homeless population reaching a record-high of more than 770,000 people last year, many conservative politicians are demanding tougher approaches, such as banning street encampments and forcing homeless people into treatment centers and hospitals. The tangible effects of Trump's July 24 order remain unclear. But Republicans' embrace of its intent could foreshadow challenges in paying for Indy's new three-year effort, which Haring-Cozzi estimated will cost about $50 million. That money will primarily pay for rental assistance, moving costs and social workers who direct clients toward housing, medical treatment and government benefits. State Republicans have already criticized Housing First programs and shown their willingness to ban street camping on public property. Earlier this year, the Indiana House of Representatives passed a bill that would have forced local police to clear any homeless camps and potentially arrest people who wouldn't comply. State senators let the proposal die without a vote. State Rep. Andrew Ireland, an Indianapolis Republican who supported the bill, said at the time that the goal was not to put homeless people in prison, but to leverage that threat to force them into mental health and substance abuse treatment. In a statement supporting Trump's order, Ireland rejected the idea that mandating treatment is cruel while refusing to shut down homeless camps is compassionate. "President Trump is right: Letting people set up permanent camps in our parks and on our sidewalks is not compassion, it's chaos," Ireland said in a written statement Aug. 1. "It's unsafe for families, bad for neighborhoods, and often traps people in cycles of addiction and crime." Homelessness: Critics see hypocrisy in Fountain Square camp closure as new details emerge. Why the camp closed Advocates for homeless people agree that allowing them to live and die on the streets is unacceptable; that's why the Streets to Home Indy program exists. But they insist the solution is to build and maintain more housing with voluntary social services — not to push people from one camp to the next or force them into a behavioral health system that's already short on beds and workers. Critics also say that while homeless people do have higher rates of addiction and mental health issues, Trump is exaggerating their role while understating economic issues like higher rents and stagnant wages. Even with lackluster federal investment, the Housing First philosophy — which places homeless people into housing quickly with few conditions and then offers services — is proven to help break the cycle of poverty. Of more than 380 people housed so far through the Housing to Recovery Fund, a local Housing First initiative established in 2019, more than 95% have remained stably housed for at least a year, according to the Central Indiana Community Foundation. Housing First policies are also credited with a drastic reduction in veteran homelessness nationwide and in Indianapolis since 2010. The number of veterans experiencing homelessness in Indianapolis fell to 125 people this year, whereas nearly 400 veterans were homeless 10 years ago. "Supportive services are way more effective when people are in housing," Haring-Cozzi said, "and not in survival mode." Because of recent turmoil at the Indianapolis Housing Agency and uncertainty in the federal government, Indy's service providers pushed for Streets to Home Indy to get started with local dollars. The Year 1 money comes in three equal parts from the Indianapolis City-County Council, a public-private partnership called the Housing to Recovery Fund and donations from philanthropic and religious groups. The $50 million cost for three years could drop significantly if the Department of Housing and Urban Development provides more housing vouchers by way of the IHA, Haring-Cozzi said. Other possible funding sources she cited are already strained Medicaid dollars that state legislators could direct toward homelessness programs, money from the state's opioid settlement and increased philanthropic donations. "We fully know that that is possible," Haring-Cozzi said of the $50 million price tag. "We're working every angle we can to have sustainability for the full initiative." There's reason for doubt, though. The city's five-year plan to end chronic homelessness by 2023 fell short, despite a surge in federal dollars to help local governments address the issue. From the start of the pandemic through summer 2021, Indianapolis spent about $35 million in federal money on homelessness and housing. That included $15 million to pay for hotel rooms for homeless people to reduce the spread of COVID-19 in shelters. Haring-Cozzi blames that prior effort's failure on a shift to survival mode necessitated by the pandemic. But some like Michael-Paul Hart, the Republican minority leader on the Indianapolis City-County Council, remain unconvinced. Resistance from him and other councilors could be an obstacle, as the city prepares to budget more frugally in anticipation of lower-than-expected property tax revenues due to a new state law. "The first time we had a number close to ($50 million) was COVID ... and we spent that in a year and a half and people were still unhoused," Hart said after attending the town hall. "So what keeps people housed after the 12-month timeline they're proposing here?" "My concern," he added, "is repeating the past."
Indianapolis Star
04-08-2025
- Politics
- Indianapolis Star
What Trump's attack on 'Housing First' means for Indy's effort to end chronic homelessness
Leaders of a new city-backed program to essentially end street homelessness say it was designed so that local taxpayer and philanthropic dollars will fund the $8.1 million Year 1 cost. But it's unclear how leaders will raise the money to pay for the three-year effort's $50 million estimated price tag, as Republicans at the state and federal level become increasingly hostile toward the "Housing First" approach that's foundational to the new effort, called Streets to Home Indy. In the nation's top office, President Donald Trump issued an executive order July 24 that aims to steer money away from "Housing First" efforts and empower city and state governments to crack down on unsheltered homelessness. Critics are especially worried by Trump's calls for more "involuntary commitment," a process by which health workers can forcibly detain and medicate people against their will. Streets to Home Indy aims to get ahead of any policy shifts. By next June, the program aims to house more than 300 people known to live unsheltered across Indianapolis in homeless camps, abandoned buildings or vehicles. Over three years, the plan is to move the quarter of Indy's homeless population that is unsheltered or experiencing chronic homelessness — meaning they have been homeless for more than a year and have at least one health issue — into permanent housing. (About 60% of people facing chronic homelessness are also unsheltered, according to a 2024 count.) Overall, the goal is to make the experience of homelessness in Indianapolis, where the homeless population exceeded 1,800 people in 2025, "rare, brief and non-recurring" by the end of 2028, leaders say. Along with Streets to Home Indy, another important part of that effort is the publicly funded low-barrier shelter that will add 150 temporary beds by 2027. "It's not that we are going to completely end homelessness. People will experience housing crises," Chelsea Haring-Cozzi, CEO of the Coalition for Homelessness Intervention and Prevention, said during a recent town hall on Streets to Home Indy. "But what we have to do is end street homelessness, because people shouldn't experience a housing crisis that leads them to the streets. There should be safe, inclusive places for people to land and get them to housing." With the nation's homeless population reaching a record-high of more than 770,000 people last year, many conservative politicians are demanding tougher approaches, such as banning street encampments and forcing homeless people into treatment centers and hospitals. The tangible effects of Trump's July 24 order remain unclear. But Republicans' embrace of its intent could foreshadow challenges in paying for Indy's new three-year effort, which Haring-Cozzi estimated will cost about $50 million. That money will primarily pay for rental assistance, moving costs and social workers who direct clients toward housing, medical treatment and government benefits. State Republicans have already criticized Housing First programs and shown their willingness to ban street camping on public property. Earlier this year, the Indiana House of Representatives passed a bill that would have forced local police to clear any homeless camps and potentially arrest people who wouldn't comply. State senators let the proposal die without a vote. State Rep. Andrew Ireland, an Indianapolis Republican who supported the bill, said at the time that the goal was not to put homeless people in prison, but to leverage that threat to force them into mental health and substance abuse treatment. In a statement supporting Trump's order, Ireland rejected the idea that mandating treatment is cruel while refusing to shut down homeless camps is compassionate. "President Trump is right: Letting people set up permanent camps in our parks and on our sidewalks is not compassion, it's chaos," Ireland said in a written statement Aug. 1. "It's unsafe for families, bad for neighborhoods, and often traps people in cycles of addiction and crime." Homelessness: Critics see hypocrisy in Fountain Square camp closure as new details emerge. Why the camp closed Advocates for homeless people agree that allowing them to live and die on the streets is unacceptable; that's why the Streets to Home Indy program exists. But they insist the solution is to build and maintain more housing with voluntary social services — not to push people from one camp to the next or force them into a behavioral health system that's already short on beds and workers. Critics also say that while homeless people do have higher rates of addiction and mental health issues, Trump is exaggerating their role while understating economic issues like higher rents and stagnant wages. Even with lackluster federal investment, the Housing First philosophy — which places homeless people into housing quickly with few conditions and then offers services — is proven to help break the cycle of poverty. Of more than 380 people housed so far through the Housing to Recovery Fund, a local Housing First initiative established in 2019, more than 95% have remained stably housed for at least a year, according to the Central Indiana Community Foundation. Housing First policies are also credited with a drastic reduction in veteran homelessness nationwide and in Indianapolis since 2010. The number of veterans experiencing homelessness in Indianapolis fell to 125 people this year, whereas nearly 400 veterans were homeless 10 years ago. "Supportive services are way more effective when people are in housing," Haring-Cozzi said, "and not in survival mode." Because of recent turmoil at the Indianapolis Housing Agency and uncertainty in the federal government, Indy's service providers pushed for Streets to Home Indy to get started with local dollars. The Year 1 money comes in three equal parts from the Indianapolis City-County Council, a public-private partnership called the Housing to Recovery Fund and donations from philanthropic and religious groups. The $50 million cost for three years could drop significantly if the Department of Housing and Urban Development provides more housing vouchers by way of the IHA, Haring-Cozzi said. Other possible funding sources she cited are already strained Medicaid dollars that state legislators could direct toward homelessness programs, money from the state's opioid settlement and increased philanthropic donations. "We fully know that that is possible," Haring-Cozzi said of the $50 million price tag. "We're working every angle we can to have sustainability for the full initiative." There's reason for doubt, though. The city's five-year plan to end chronic homelessness by 2023 fell short, despite a surge in federal dollars to help local governments address the issue. From the start of the pandemic through summer 2021, Indianapolis spent about $35 million in federal money on homelessness and housing. That included $15 million to pay for hotel rooms for homeless people to reduce the spread of COVID-19 in shelters. Haring-Cozzi blames that prior effort's failure on a shift to survival mode necessitated by the pandemic. But some like Michael-Paul Hart, the Republican minority leader on the Indianapolis City-County Council, remain unconvinced. Resistance from him and other councilors could be an obstacle, as the city prepares to budget more frugally in anticipation of lower-than-expected property tax revenues due to a new state law. "The first time we had a number close to ($50 million) was COVID ... and we spent that in a year and a half and people were still unhoused," Hart said after attending the town hall. "So what keeps people housed after the 12-month timeline they're proposing here?" "My concern," he added, "is repeating the past."
Indianapolis Star
30-07-2025
- Indianapolis Star
Critics see hypocrisy in Fountain Square camp closure as new details emerge. Why the camp closed
At a Fountain Square town hall July 28, Indianapolis leaders outlined a new program that would upend the city's status quo when shutting down homeless camps, pairing methodical closures with a year of rental assistance for all unsheltered residents. But facing more than an hour of heated public comment at a community center, leaders had to contend with a choice that made the status quo seem firmly intact. Three days before, a half-mile away along Leonard Street, the city had ordered the first official homeless camp closure that was mainly due to public safety concerns since 2021. Displaced residents won't be housed through the new program because it's still ramping up. Many neighbors and advocates denounced that decision as merely shifting the problem of unsheltered homelessness from one neighborhood to the next without addressing core needs for affordable housing and social services. With Streets to Home Indy — the new $8.1 million city-backed initiative to house and provide case management to more than 300 people sleeping outdoors by next June — starting in earnest next month, critics wondered why the closure couldn't wait until residents in about two dozen tents along Leonard Street could be housed. But other Fountain Square residents and business owners believe the city waited far too long to close the Leonard Street camp, after months of complaints about human and animal waste, public intoxication and trespassing near a prime commercial district. The tension rose to a crescendo in recent weeks as neighbors, including a local business leader who rented a private dumpster to clean up the site, shared their concerns with the media. Facing criticism Monday night, Office of Public Health and Safety Director Andrew Merkley cited an incident of apparent animal abuse at the camp in June and alleged gunfire that led to an arrest July 25 as major factors in the closure. He also feared that some tents set up right next to the road could be struck by errant drivers after a recent close call, he said. "I and our agency have to protect the public health and safety of everyone in the city — not just the unhoused and not just the housed," Merkley said. "The decision to close the camp was not because people went to the media. It was not because of the constant emails that we received. ... Emergency services have been there multiple times, and we had serious public safety challenges." Specifically, Merkley ordered the camp closure after learning that someone had shot a gun near Leonard Street the morning of July 25, he said. Around the prior weekend of July 19-20, he said, a driver had fallen asleep at the wheel and jumped the curb on Leonard Street. Police arrested a man July 25 after he reportedly admitted to firing one shot into the ground near the tent of a man living at the Leonard Street encampment, according to a probable cause affidavit obtained by IndyStar. The man pulled out a black handgun and threatened to shoot the camp resident because he was jealous that a certain woman was hanging around his tent, the camp resident and the woman both told police. Then the man allegedly fired one bullet into the ground next to the tent before walking off. Police found the man nearby carrying a gun that matched the description. They also found a spent 9mm shell casing lying near the tent. The man faces five criminal charges including unlawful possession of a firearm by a serious violent felon and criminal recklessness with a deadly weapon. Indianapolis police confirmed that a case number existed for an incident where a vehicle reportedly drove onto the curb. The case is under investigation by Indiana State Police, who did not return IndyStar's requests for more details July 29. Later the same day as the reported shooting, camp residents received notice that the strip of lawn between Leonard Street and a fence bordering Interstate 65 will be permanently closed to camping and storage of personal property by Aug. 11. The city will provide storage bins to residents and hold items for up to 60 days, while working with service providers to help people find temporary or permanent housing. Merkley said residents will be offered emergency shelter beds, as required by the city ordinance governing camp closures. But he conceded that those beds aren't good options for many people. Advocates say they force people into stressful group-living settings that often impose restrictions on substance use, couples and pets. The city couldn't afford to wait for outreach teams with Streets to Home Indy to reach the encampment, officials said. The camp was too large. Social workers have visited only one site so far, where about a dozen households are staying. "The initiative was not ready to take on the Leonard Street camp," said Aryn Schounce, a senior policy adviser to Mayor Joe Hogsett. "The staffing capacity was not there. The availability of housing was not there. But there were escalating public safety issues at the camp." 'Nowhere else to go': How months of debate led the city to shut down Fountain Square homeless camp Advocates for homeless people have pushed the city to move away from police-led crackdowns on encampments, documented in a 2015 film called "Under the Bridge" that follows a large camp in Indianapolis. The city's shift toward "Housing First" practices, which aim to house residents so they can seek health services and income from a place of stability, conflict with a new federal directive that urges governments to forcibly remove homeless people from the streets and place them in treatment facilities. Chelsea Haring-Cozzi, who leads the city's top nonprofit working to reduce homelessness, was reserved in her criticism of the camp closure after sharing the stage with city officials to present Streets to Home Indy. She told IndyStar the outcome wasn't what she had hoped, but "there's no good answer to Leonard Street right now." She vowed that social workers will find the residents at other camps in the coming months and offer them housing. Other community leaders around the city, including faith leaders who are expected to help raise a third of the money to pay for the first year of Streets to Home Indy, were less diplomatic. "Instead of investing in long-term transformation, the city continues to invest in short-term optics," the Rev. David Greene, president of the Concerned Clergy of Indianapolis, said in a written statement July 28. "We must ask: Where are people expected to go tonight? Next week? This winter? Homelessness is not a nuisance to be swept away. It is a crisis to be confronted." A short walk from the community meeting, Angela Merrell, 55, cried tears of frustration outside her tent on Leonard Street. She said she stormed out of the meeting after hearing a man speak derisively of her and others who are homeless — "Where are these people coming from?" he had asked of the roughly 1,800 people known to be homeless in Indianapolis. "'Those people' were born and raised here and are being kicked out of our own neighborhood," Merrell said, mentioning that she grew up in Fountain Square near Hoyt Avenue. Now her family is left to find housing with less than $2,000 a month in disability payments, she said. She doesn't want her brother, who is gaunt from what she says is stomach cancer, to die on the streets. Her husband is hobbled after he was hit by a truck earlier this year, he told IndyStar, gesturing to a large red scar on his leg that he said was from a surgery after the crash. Since that crash, the three of them have been homeless for nearly six months, Merrell said. Finding an apartment has felt next to impossible because of requirements to earn income that's three or more times higher than the rent, she said, a rule of thumb for landlords. She can't blame the Fountain Square neighbors who look across their street and see an "eyesore," she said. That's why for months she has anxiously awaited the apartment that social workers were promising to offer her through Streets to Home Indy. "Everybody kind of had their hopes up," she said, "just to be crushed." IndyStar Public Safety Reporter Jade Jackson contributed to this story.
