Joplin City Council candidates express views on homeless study during public forum

Mar. 26—Homelessness and affordable housing along with a need for more public transportation and continued efforts on public safety emerged as topics with a variety of views expressed among the six candidates for Joplin City Council at a public forum Monday night.

Three of the candidates, Natasha Klue-Michael, Joshua "Josh" Bard and incumbent Keenan Cortez, are vying for two four-year general seats.

The other three, Charles "Chuck" Copple, Ryan Jackson and Doris Carlin, are unopposed and virtually assured of election in the April 2 election.

Candidates were asked by forum moderator Lisa Olliges Green if they agreed with the results of the city's homeless study recommending a new commission and lead agency to obtain funding for housing and other services. The report also recommended a daytime center for those without homes to obtain services in a centralized location and the addition of a low-barrier shelter to serve those who cannot stay in existing shelters.

The City Council has not yet voted on whether to accept or act on the report.

Keenan CortezCortez said he has received a lot of feedback from community members on the report.

"I think it is a good idea to have services centralized, where people who are suffering homeless or might be on verge of homelessness can go to a one-stop shop and get a handful of services delivered to them in a compact and short manner," he said. That may be helpful and stop the need for people to wander around town trying to find all the services in various locations, he said.

He said he is torn on the idea of a low-barrier shelter and that it may need more refining. "I'm very proud of the work the council has done the last several years to try and address this issue" rather than ignoring the problem, he said. He also said he doesn't know if the Sharity Global study has all the answers, "but I think it is a workable tool."

Joshua BardBard said an internet search pulls up information about numerous other cities that have worked on the problem of homelessness.

"They like to throw a lot of money on homelessness. We can't afford to pay our police and fire and we have trouble staffing our city and we use ARPA for building houses and things of that nature. People with credit can buy a home," he said.

Bard said he was told that the main problem with people obtaining places to live is the lack of identification such as birth certificates or photo identification. "So as far as a one-stop shop, they can walk from the health department to the Division of Motor Vehicles" in less than two hours to obtain identification papers, he said. He said he doesn't believe transportation is a barrier to obtaining needed documentation.

Natasha Klue-MichaelKlue-Michael said, "Sharity seemed to have a good approach, and I agree with some of the report. ... I know several people who pay $1,000 for rent but can't get approved for a $650-a-month mortgage. A lot of people, due to their own decisions and bad credit, could have an issue dealing with that as well." Walking to the license bureau on South Range Line is time-consuming, she said. "As far as a one-stop shop, that would be nice if we did have quite a bit of our resources in one place," she said.

Klue-Michael also said she is glad to see new housing and apartments built here, "but most of the people in the working class that I know cannot afford the new housing even with help from services such as Economic Security Corp."

Copple, a retired firefighter and insurance sales representative who represents Zone 2 and is unopposed, said most of the housing being built is rented or sold at market rates and that the city may need to find a way to provide incentives for lower cost housing that is affordable.

He said he does favor a low-barrier shelter idea but that idea needs to be further refined.

Examples disastrousJackson said he was disappointed there was only one pathway identified by the Sharity study to move forward.

"My biggest concern if we adopt this, and she presents many cities like Austin, Texas, and Los Angeles, California, to model after and says we need to adopt their policies. We see in the national news what a disaster that is. I wouldn't stand for that," he said, adding that the private sector should be allowed to navigate its own programs.

A retired firefighter, Copple said he ran for election the first time because he considered the city's public safety departments in crisis because of the number of open positions that could not be filled resulting from noncompetitve pay and benefits.

"We've made tremendous strides in that, but I don't feel we're done," Copple said of the city's efforts to bolster pay and reform pension options for police and fire and obtaining contracts with the unions for police and fire workers with new pay levels. He said he is running again because he wants to continue those efforts and continue the progress he feels has been made in city improvements.

Jackson, who is unopposed for the Zone 3 seat and has served on several city boards, said he was one of the members of first public safety sales tax committee that brought about sales tax funding with the help of voters in 2006 for additions of personnel to police and fire departments and other public safety initiatives. He said he thinks the city needs new voices to keep the momentum of public safety improvements going.

'Community problem'Carlin, the sole candidate for the two years remaining of an unexpired term vacated by Kate Spencer, said that "first and foremost, we all need to recognize that homelessness is not just a city government problem. It's not just an agency problem. It is a community problem. And we have many, many contributors to this problem."

Needs persist despite many local agencies that offer services.

"I like many of the things in this report. I think it has some great ideas," Carlin said. "I think that, as presented, there are many merits, and yet am I ready to adopt it in its entirety? No. I see that there are many weaknesses as well. I don't think there is an end-all, be-all solution. I think, as a community, when we come together with all the organizations working on it, the city government and now a plan presented as a guideline to use, then we can move forward."