Our View: Now let's get back to work on homelessness

Now that the tents have been tossed, the buckets of needles and human feces removed, and the once-lush lawns reseeded, our city — all of us — can get back to the hard work. As a community, we can continue addressing those factors and challenges that lead to unsightly, unsanitary, and unsafe homeless encampments, like the highly visible one that overran our Duluth Civic Center this summer and that was cleared out Wednesday .

Cities of every size similarly struggle with the mental health woes, chemical dependency, and poverty that fuels unhoused populations. We are not alone.

But Duluth is unique in that we have a plan, one that demands community buy-in and one that has to have widespread support in order to make a difference. It’s also a plan that’s brimming with promise and that’s already enjoying successes.

“A lot has been accomplished,” Joel Kilgour of Loaves and Fishes of Duluth said in an interview Thursday with the News Tribune Opinion page.

Loaves and Fishes is one of eight charities and other organizations in Duluth that, in 2022, came up with the plan, calling it Stepping On Up. It’s an ambitious strategy with a goal of getting people off the streets and into permanent housing. Usually competitors for grants and funding for their own projects, this time, with homelessness in Duluth growing evermore grim, they banded together.

Stepping On Up is a five-year, $33 million, three-phase undertaking, including establishing safe places for tent encampments and for parking for those living out of their vehicles, all with hygiene facilities, trash receptacles, and support services; increasing shelter capacity; and establishing hundreds of new units of permanent, low-cost, community-based housing.

The work has begun, beginning with short-term, stopgap, emergency-response actions.

Like the designation of a lot at the Damiano Center in the Duluth Hillside where those living out of their cars can safely park and have access to bathroom and hygiene facilities in a trailer brought to the site. “We served 241 people our first season,” Kilgour said, “which is, frankly, more than we were expecting. The need is out there, and we made contact with a lot of households that hadn't previously been connected with homeless services.”

A site where homeless people can safely and securely store belongings also has been opened and is currently serving about 90 people. “Some folks who are living on the street, it’s a place for them to keep their valuables and not have to carry huge backpacks around all day. That's been very successful,” Kilgour said.

In addition, warming centers for frigid Duluth nights have had hours extended and staffing increased. More than 800 people were able to get out of the dangerous cold last winter at centers that stayed in operation through May. There’s also a volunteer-run free laundry program serving between 30 and 50 households per week, which is its capacity. And nearly all homeless service providers in Duluth have added staff, including new outreach workers at Union Gospel Mission and Lutheran Social Services and additional capacity at domestic-violence shelters.

“Everybody's growing to meet the current need,” Kilgour said.

Longer term, a youth shelter is under construction and is expected to open in January, serving 12 young adults ages 18 to 24. And the Chum shelter downtown is expected to double its current capacity of approximately 80 beds, including an entire floor of private rooms, which “aligns with Stepping On Up’s plans to give people … a higher level of dignity,” as Kilgour stated.

“The needs are huge. I mean, every time we do something, we learn that there's just massive gaps in the system,” he said. “We're getting people inside, but ultimately, to solve this problem, we need more housing. … (The encampment at the Civic Center) was a really hard thing for folks. But I also like to remind people that that's what our shelter staff have to deal with every single night — and with an even larger (homeless) population and with dwindling resources to support our programs. (The encampment) definitely elevated the issue in people's minds, and that's a good thing. Hopefully we can be more motivated as a community to work toward meaningful long-term solutions.”

In a world where no community is successfully solving the plight of the unhoused, no one can say Duluth hasn’t been trying. In just the past three years , the city has invested nearly $24 million to create housing affordable to those with low and moderate incomes. And just last month, the Duluth City Council approved another $500,000 for Stepping On Up, bringing the city’s investment in the initiative to $1.15 million.

Homelessness will probably never be solved or eliminated, not entirely. But Duluth, with its plan, and with wide support for its plan, has a chance to effectively and strategically address the issue, to deal with it as a community, and to hopefully begin managing it and taking control of it, so our friends and neighbors who need help receive help.

“Not just with a splash of cash,” as a News Tribune editorial opined two summers ago, “but on an ongoing basis.”

The plan may be ambitious, not to mention pricey, but it’s also the best strategy Duluth has right now. If anyone has better ideas, please step forward. This needs to be faced — the discarded needles, the feces, the very real human trauma and needs of our neighbors: all of it.