New Kansas City housing department would only be a baby step against homelessness

The Kansas City Council should by all means vote yes on Thursday to create a new housing department focused on creating affordable housing and coordinating services for the homeless. They’ll do that by restructuring the city’s neighborhood services department.

But if that’s all they do, it won’t amount to much.

Can’t, in fact. And right now, there isn’t any money set aside to make this move anything more than a vague acknowledgment that something must be done.

There’s not even a plan on how to find the money, or on what exactly should be done if they do. Nor does anyone seem to know who has the know-how to lead such an effort. Again, the city has none of that at this point.

That doesn’t mean this can’t be a first, baby step. All forward movement needs one of those.

“We felt it is important for us to put it in municipal code as a stand-alone department,” said Councilman Eric Bunch, a co-sponsor of the ordinance. “It’s an ideological shift to make housing a priority.”

But as Bunch is aware, this is not in itself going to accomplish anything.

“It can’t just be a political talking point,” he said. “We have got to fund a plan and implement it.”

Yes, please.

More than four years ago, City Council members asked the Neighborhood Services Department for a plan to address affordable housing and homelessness, “and nothing much ever happened, except staff said we don’t have any money,” said Katheryn Shields, 4th District at-large councilwoman.

Three years ago, the council established the Housing Trust Fund to address a lack of affordable housing, but according to Councilman Dan Fowler, who chairs the housing committee, there’s nowhere near the $75 million said to be needed in that fund. In fact, city officials said that while several potential funding sources have been identified, there currently is no stream of money going into the trust fund.

Let’s not let a new housing and homeless department become another affordable housing trust fund, with no money for effective implementation.

Every year, the city divvies up about $8 million in federal funding to support an array of programs through agencies that tend to the many challenges plaguing folks who are homeless here. So there is work happening in Kansas City to address homelessness.

But that’s disparate agencies scattered in and around the city all doing their own thing to make an impact. That’s not the city orchestrating an effort to tackle the problem. Coordinating efforts to aid the homeless “would be an expanded role for the city to take on,” said John Wood, Neighborhoods and Housing Services department director. “And do we get the money to do that?”

Hundreds of homeless people move from place to place in this city, spending scorching and freezing nights under bridges, in tents in wooded areas. Some sleep exposed on city streets. The situation has definitely been exacerbated by job loss during the COVID-19 pandemic, which pushed significant numbers of residents who had been living one or two paychecks from homelessness over the edge. Some 2,000 homeless people live in the city.

We thank those who made this situation impossible for city officials to ignore by pitching dozens of tents on the south lawn at City Hall and at a major intersection in Westport. It has forced folks to pay attention to what too many, for too long, have ignored.

And yes, we think Mayor Quinton Lucas deserves some kudos for fast tracking a proposal to arrange 90 days’ worth of hotel housing for those camped at City Hall. He invited members of the Kansas City Homeless Union to discussions about what to do in the future. We’re glad, too, that city officials backed down from threats to sweep homeless encampments and force people in tents — to, what, just move somewhere else in the city? That is what tent dwellers said had been happening.

All commendable. But a bit like putting a Band-Aid on a gash. Experts on housing and homelessness tell us the root causes of why people end up without shelter are many and varied and require a variety of programs, treatment options, money and a coordinated approach.

According to local homeless advocates, who referred to a report by the United States Interagency on Homelessness, about 75% of people experiencing homelessness in this country grapple with drug or alcohol addiction. More than that struggle with mental illness or chronic health problems. “And half of them self-report experiencing some level of two or all three,” said Eric Burger, director at Shelter KC, formerly the Kansas City Rescue Mission, a Christian-centered nonprofit. Not every person living on the street wants help. It’s complicated.

But as Lucas said: “Things can not go on like this. Where’s the long-term policy to make sure that we are matching people not just with homes but with opportunity?”

The City Council’s plan now is to reassign current staff to concentrate more on housing and homeless issues. There is no plan for a national search to hire an outside housing expert to oversee the new department, something Shields said is a good idea if the city really wants to see movement toward solving the problem of homelessness.

Fowler says even that crucial move is a non-starter. “Not going to happen,” he said. “We are in the middle of a hiring freeze.”

No wonder Councilwoman Melissa Robinson said she wants a department focused on housing, but worries about “having a department that is not fully funded.”

So do we. Shields, while she will probably vote for the new department, questions the whole thing. “Is changing the name of the department going to really change anything?”

Of course the answer is, no. The council then has to figure out a way to fund it and sustain the effort.

And as a community, we need to keep the pressure on. If not, in a year’s time, people protesting homelessness and begging for housing they can afford will be camped out on the city’s doorstep all over again.