Advocates ask governments to commit funds for homeless

Jennifer Knight

Thursday, May 8, 2003 | 10:08 a.m.

A group of homeless advocates is asking the local governments to commit to spending a specific amount of money every year to help the homeless.

Clark County and area cities would set aside 0.02 percent of their annual budgets to provide for the homeless under a plan presented by the Southern Nevada Advocates for Homeless People.

"We're not talking about anything new," Leroy Pelton, a professor of social work at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, said. "We're talking about the social services infrastructure being beefed up."

The advocacy group, which includes Pelton, Franciscan brother David Buer and homeless advocate Frank Perna, believes the fund would generate about $8 million to $10 million a year.

The money would pay for overnight shelters with no time limits and day centers for the estimated 8,000 men, women and children living on Southern Nevada streets, and would be managed by the county, according to the plan.

While advocacy members said they hoped their proposal would prompt city officials to start viewing the homeless problem holistically, the officials see it as an unrealistic demand on their budget.

"I think the proposal is difficult to grasp because if we (took a percentage out of the budget) then we would have the inflexibility to respond to other problems," Clark County Manager Thom Reilly said.

Henderson Mayor Jim Gibson said he would be happy to take a look at the proposal but worried the financial demand of 0.02 percent of a $135 million budget would drain resources from the city's existing homeless program.

"We're more than happy to look at any reasonable suggestion," Gibson said. "What we don't want to do is take a step backward from the services we are providing now."

In the case of North Las Vegas, Mayor Michael Montandon says his city is already doing enough to help with the homeless problem.

"We believe we're a big part of that picture," Montandon said. "We're shouldering a huge burden on the homeless housing issue. We (could) simply do like Boulder City does and eliminate zoning for affordable housing, but we don't."

As for Las Vegas, it is a question of too many demands on too little resources.

"There are a lot more needs than we have money for," said Sharon Segerblom, Las Vegas' director of the department of neighborhood services. "I also think they have some outright distortions in this summary."

Segerblom said that the proposal implied that the city was not using most of its federal funding for the homeless, but fails to note that the city receives only $142,000 a year from the federal government for that purpose. The rest of the federal funds must pay for child care, elderly services and a host of other programs, she said.

The proposal happens at a time when city government leaders are unable to see eye to eye on how to slice up the pie.

Las Vegas Mayor Oscar Goodman has asked Montandon and Gibson along with Boulder City to contribute funds to pay for the Crisis Intervention Center, which serves as the county's nerve center for shepherding homeless and low-income resident into programs that can help them.

Currently, Las Vegas and the county pay for the center, but no other city pitches in for funding, according to Las Vegas officials.

Henderson puts some of its money into a service called Henderson Allied Communities Advocates, which helps low-income residents gain access to government programs and doctors as well as get help for substance abuse.

Gibson said he's set to write Goodman and show him how paying for the crisis center would simply duplicate what the city is already doing.

Buer stressed the homeless issue won't go away until everyone comes to the table and talks about the bigger issue of solving what he calls a humanitarian issue.

"You can see a progression of less services over the years," Buer said. "It's a health issue. It's a human dignity issue. Even if a human being doesn't recognize his or her own dignity, it is our job to honor them anyway."