Phoenix to offer overnight heat respite this summer, but some worry of homeless 'nuisance'
Phoenix is expanding its heat response plans after record-breaking heat deaths last year, but some elected officials are concerned the plans to assist those experiencing homelessness and struggling with substance abuse disorders will burden other residents.
The city plans to open two overnight heat respite centers, expand hours at three libraries for people to cool off later in the day and explore heat safety regulations for contractors that do business with Phoenix.
Behind the scenes, the city will deploy an "incident management team" to help coordinate the city's heat response across all departments. Such teams have previously been used for events like the Super Bowl, and this year they will be in effect May through September, which the city is deeming "heat season."
The changes come after a record-breaking 625 heat-related deaths in Maricopa County in 2023, 395 of which were in Phoenix. Last year was the culmination of nearly a decade of growing heat deaths in the county. Phoenix's heat deaths grew the last three years in a row. Most of the harm was felt by unsheltered people and those with substance abuse disorder.
Phoenix Heat Director Dave Hondula presented the city's preliminary plan to the City Council at a public meeting on Feb. 27.
Mayor Kate Gallego kicked off the discussion by stressing the dangers of heat and how important it was for city departments "to learn the lessons of last summer" given the "tragic and sometimes preventable losses."
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Councilmembers asked some clarification questions about planned services and heat-safety regulations in the works, but spent most of the time discussing how the overnight respite centers and extended library hours could disrupt others.
"We need to ensure we take steps so it does not become — I don't want to use the word, but I'm going to use the word — a nuisance to the community in which it falls," Councilmember Kesha Hodge Washington said.
Hodge Washington criticized the city's plan to use a recently reopened senior center in her district as an overnight respite center, saying it was unfair to restrict the facility's availability for programs. She reiterated previous frustrations that services for unsheltered people are unfairly saturated in her district in downtown and south Phoenix.
Councilmember Laura Pastor said extending hours at a library in her district would exacerbate an already "troublesome" area where encampments are cropping up and where theft is rampant.
Councilmember Ann O'Brien asked about data collection, efficacy of services and enforcement of heat-related city ordinances, but she also expressed concerns about security and people with substance abuse issues using respite centers.
Councilmember Jim Waring said the concerns reflected his long-running frustration that homelessness is ruining city facilities and services for housed residents who pay taxes. Waring frequently critiques the city's homeless programs and recently suggested nixing the Heat Office to weather financial headwinds projected in future budgets.
After roughly an hour of councilmembers airing concerns and grievances, the mayor and Councilmember Yassamin Ansari refocused the conversation on reducing heat deaths.
Gallego said the city's plan would mean people won't "pass away on our city streets, on our canals, on our bus stop benches. ... The numbers we lost over the last couple of years (to heat) are not acceptable."
The mayor has repeatedly advocated for more federal resources to combat heat and called on the Federal Emergency Management Agency to declare heat a major disaster.
Ansari called Phoenix's heat a "silent killer" and challenged her colleagues to think about it like a tornado or hurricane.
"It's a different type of mental exercise, but if we look at places that are impacted by those sorts of natural disasters, they are using everything in their toolbox. Every city building, every site that they have to protect people, and we're really just doing the same thing," Ansari said.
The diverging focuses among elected officials on Tuesday reflect the simultaneous and intertwining crises of homelessness and heat in Phoenix, a city whose population is booming while a housing shortage reigns and the effects of climate change become more directly and severely felt.
Of Phoenix's 395 heat deaths in 2023, 54% were of people experiencing homelessness. Nearly 75% were of people with substance abuse issues.
It also reflects a tension between the City Council and staff, in which councilmembers grow frustrated about staff actions either because the council was not involved in the process or because staff did not seek adequate public input, from the council's point of view.
That separation of duties stems from Phoenix's council-manager form of government, meaning City Manager Jeff Barton controls the city's daily operations, like a CEO of a business, and the council operates as a board providing policy guidance to Barton.
This summer will be the third go around for the city's Office of Heat Response and Mitigation, and expectations are high, even after an unprecedented 2023 heat season led to record deaths and national media attention.
The City Council will meet more on heat policy in the months ahead, the mayor said, but the dates have not yet been publicized.
The changes in detail
In a packet given to the City Council, Hondula presented a 39-point plan to combat homelessness and shared a dozen ways the 2024 plan was improved from last summer's.
The primary improvements, including overnight respite and expanding library hours, addressed some of the most prominent criticism the city received last summer about lacking resources when city facilities closed.
The overnight heat relief is planned for Burton Barr Public Library, on Central Avenue south of McDowell Road, and Senior Opportunities West Center, at Seventh Avenue and Buckeye Road.
The centers would allow individuals in need to cool off, grab water, sleep, then get navigation assistance for homelessness, substance abuse issues, landlord-tenant problems or whatever led them to seek overnight respite. Hondula said each center would likely hold up to 50 people a night.
Office of Homeless Solutions Director Rachel Milne said while the centers would allow for uninterrupted rest, they would not be considered shelters because they would not provide beds or cots, nor would the library or senior center be altered.
Respite and navigation are expected to be offered 24/7 at the library in an underused section, Milne said, but only overnight at the senior center.
To help more people cool off, the city also plans to extend hours at three libraries to 10 p.m. daily and be open from noon to 10 p.m. on Sundays, May through the end of September:
Cholla Library, at Interstate 17 and Peoria Avenue, near the former Metrocenter mall.
Yucca Library, at 15th and Montebello avenues, near Solano Park and Christown Mall.
Harmon Library, at Fifth Avenue and Buckeye Road.
Other heat plan additions include a mobile water unit that was built but not deployed last year, purchasing more signage to direct people toward heat relief, and providing shade at the city's new outdoor campground for people experiencing homelessness.
In terms of management, Phoenix will formally convene biweekly meetings for staff to review the heat programs throughout the heat season. The city also is formalizing a "tiered response framework," which clarifies responses depending on the circumstances.
Tier 1: Heat season, the start of May through the end of September.
Tier 2: Peak season, mid-June through mid-August.
Tier 3: Short-term emergency adjustments as triggered by National Weather Service excessive heat warnings.
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Before the conversation transitioned to how cooling centers could disrupt surrounding communities, councilmembers discussed the worker heat-safety ordinance underway and details about the respite centers.
Ansari asked about the number of people who could be helped, the types of services provided and if the city was ready to be "nimble" to change plans and respond to problems quickly.
She and Councilmembers Betty Guardado, a former union organizer, and Pastor pressed for details about the worker ordinance, such as who was being included in planning conversations and how to make it strong and enforceable.
Pastor also asked about closing more trails during excessive heat days and placing more trained professionals to deal with substance abuse at libraries.
The mayor asked no questions but stressed the desire to focus also on indoor heat deaths, noting the danger when air conditioning units go out or residents can't pay utility bills.
O'Brien asked how the city could enforce rules to address landlord-tenant problems. She also asked about data collection, so the city could better understand who the cooling and respite centers are helping.
Hodge Washington asked about how city heat grants were being used and whether funded organizations would open overnight respite centers, so it wasn't just Phoenix's two.
Little conversation occurred about the other major changes in the Heat Office's plan, such as the incident management team framework and how the city would improve cross-departmental collaboration, or the formalization of the tiered response system.
For O'Brien, her concerns focused on how extending hours at Cholla Library could bring back problems when property owners had only recently put a lid on some of the conflicts dealing with loitering.
Days after the meeting, O'Brien told The Arizona Republic the council focused more on disruptions to surrounding communities than potential victims of heat death or illness because the heat plan was already solely focused on that population.
The councilmembers' comments, she said, were essentially balancing out the lack of public input sought for the heat plan.
"It's important we consider the community who will be impacted five months, or 40%, of the year," O'Brien said. "To take steps back is not in our best interest."
For Pastor, it was the same but at Yucca Library. She said Solano Park struggled with encampments, and theft at Christown mall had gotten so "out of control" it drove out Costco.
"When they leave the respite, they're going to be hanging in the neighborhood," Pastor said, referencing unsheltered people, who city staffers said were the target audience for the relief centers. Pastor later added, "We need resources" to address problems that could arise.
Deputy City Manager Gina Montes responded that staff was working to "do no harm." She added that libraries were already cooling centers last year, so the only change was extending hours "to make it more safe for people who are accessing it."
"I understand that, but my problems are not going to go away," Pastor replied. "So I'm putting it on the record for my constituents to see that I'm fighting for them."
Hodge Washington grilled department directors about their choice of overnight respite locations and where to extend library hours, saying she was concerned the locations selected this year would become the permanent locations for all summers going forward.
She noted both overnight respite centers, at Burton Barr and the senior center, were roughly 2 miles apart. And how one of the extended-hour libraries, Harmon Park, was just down the street from the senior center, meaning unsheltered individuals would be shuffled back and forth in the same area.
"We have the ability to transport people throughout our city, and I do not want us to continue to consolidate these services in the poorer parts of our city. I mean, that's what it's coming down to," Hodge Washington said.
Assistant Fire Chief Tim Kreis said, "Our biggest priority was to select sites that are going to save lives."
Hodge Washington's questions stem back to one of her campaign promises to advocate for homeless shelters and services to be spread more fairly across the city, instead of downtown and south Phoenix, the area she represents.
Her constituents represent some of the poorest in the city, and the city has historically underinvested in her district.
Days after the policy session, Hodge Washington said she thought the conversation focused mostly on homelessness because of the data that shows 54% of heat-related deaths are of unsheltered people.
Hodge Washington told The Republic it wasn't just about the burden, but about fairness and ensuring services are available throughout the city. She extended those concerns beyond heat and homelessness to regular city services, like roadway maintenance.
Her constituents, she said, regularly question why the city maintains south Phoenix roads to a lesser quality than affluent areas.
"And I can't say I disagree," Hodge Washington said. "We have to get to the point where the entirety of the city is treated the same. The benefit and the downfall. The benefits and the burdens. The burden should not just be shared by one portion of the city."
Waring, who represents one of the wealthiest districts in northeast Phoenix, said his area was treated differently because there's "a different dynamic," and said his residents might "one day wake up to realize" their tax dollars are paying for services they don't use and might push homelessness into their area.
The councilman pointed to Hodge Washington, Pastor and O'Brien's concerns as evidence that "we're crowding out the people who are paying for all of this and making our facilities less inviting to do this."
The mayor in a statement to The Republic days later said responding to extreme heat is "a new mindset, and it won't always be easy. But when hundreds of people die in the Valley from extreme heat like we saw last year, we have a moral obligation to respond."
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Reporter Taylor Seely covers Phoenix for The Arizona Republic / azcentral.com. Reach her at tseely@arizonarepublic.com or by phone at 480-476-6116.
This article originally appeared on Arizona Republic: Phoenix to offer overnight heat respite in summer, but some worry
