Rock Island Ald. Linda Barnes held a 103-minute listening session at City Hall Thursday, Jan. 8 regarding how to better serve the local homeless population.
While the Third Ward council member originally sought a suspension of the city social services ordinance (approved in October by a vote of 6-1 with Ald. Barnes voting no), to be discussed at Monday’s City Council meeting Jan. 12, that item will not be on the agenda, per the request of Mayor Ashley Harris.
To place an item on an agenda, it takes either the mayor or three council members to request it. Mayor Harris declined to have a suspension of the social services ordinance put on Monday's agenda and there are not three aldermen willing to do so, either, according to city spokeswoman Sarah Hayden. Barnes was requesting it, but lacks the support since the issue has already been decided, she noted.
On Thursday night, Barnes said she’s heard from residents who are concerned about the challenges faced by the homeless population in our area.
“Many of you have reached out to ask what actions can be taken to better support those who are experiencing homelessness in our community. The immediate need at this time is for a low-barrier, temporary winter shelter,” she said. “And I believe that the quickest way to achieve that is by suspending the ordinance. However, there are other possible options that the mayor may discuss later.”
“I can relate to the struggles many homeless individuals face because I have family members who have suffered from mental health, illness and substance addiction,” Barnes said. “I have also experienced the loss of loved ones due to these hardships. Their pain and suffering became my pain and suffering and I am sure that some of you may be able to relate. The difficulties associated with mental health, illness and substance addiction sometimes result in loved ones becoming homeless.
“When I see members of the homeless community, I see someone's son or daughter. I see someone's brother or sister, somebody's loved one. This month marks four years since my husband who is sitting here and I lost our 25-year-old son,” she said, noting he experienced homelessness.
“I do not view the homeless community as criminals or as people without worth. Instead, I recognize that their humanity,” Barnes said. “I recognize their humanity and understand the circumstances that may have led them to where they are. Their stories matter and it is crucial that we support solutions that provide dignity and safety.”
Mayor Harris said the city is working to resolve this complex issue.
“In the downtown area, we have a heavy concentration of service providers, the city, a lot of residents, a lot of businesses,” he said at the Thursday session. “We invested a lot of money in the downtown area. A lot of money. And we have hopes to 100% revitalize that area. And we will do that now.
“There has been certain areas that have been eyesores and to no fault of their own,” Harris said. “Another thing is the city of Rock Island. We don't want to be the only ones that are doing things for the homeless, that puts a burden on the city.
“What that does, it attracts other vulnerable people to our area. That's not also fair for our city and the limited resources that we do have,” he said. “I'm looking throughout the city, the whole city of Rock Island, for available locations. I'm working diligently on that.”
The city can’t just take an empty building and use it for a shelter.
“We have laws and regulations that we have to follow. You know, we don't own these buildings down here,” Harris said. “Those are landlords. Those are private citizens.
“I’m looking for an ideal location in Rock Island that wouldn't necessarily be concentrated in the downtown area. When we were saying that Rock Island does not want to be the only city doing things for the homeless,” he said. “You know, what's Davenport doing? What's Moline doing? Well, now they are doing things now. The city of Moline, they are developing a plan, an emergency plan to address this issue.
“Now, as early as next week, we will be in conversation with the city of Moline. So one, we can complement each other instead of creating problems for one another,” Harris said.
There have been no applications to Rock Island to open a new shelter, he noted.
“Why are we doing anything with the ordinances if no one has put in the application? So I call, I ask if there is any organization, if there is any person with the resources or the means that wants to help our vulnerable population, please come down to the city, let us know what you got going on, fill out an application. We'll do everything we possibly can to assist you, to assist others.”
Offering work to home
Matthew D’Alessandro, who was formerly homeless for 18 months, worked with Project NOW and has a residence.
“One of the biggest things I have seen and think that would be helpful for a lot of people would be rehabbing houses and being able to work and rehab, for a house for the homeless,” he said. “You know, whether it's a foreclosed or a cheaper house, they can live in the house if it's managed properly. Rehab the house, they get a job, they get a skill. Kind of like what Project 180 does on the other side of the river, but on a smaller level right now, it'll be a great thing to get people to work, to live in a safe environment. As long as it's managed properly, maybe four or five people, they can manage it.”
“It's a very easy thing to monetarily give back to the community. It gives people a trade, gives people the self-worth. There's a lot of other programs that I've come up with from Arkansas to here. I've been in Arkansas for eight years, been here about a year and a half and some of the simple programs I've seen in Arkansas.”
Shay Dean proposed taxing owners of abandoned buildings, in the city, including the large church across from City Hall that’s been empty for years.
“I think something that would be a progressive thing to do would be to tax abandoned properties. I don't know how much,” she said. “If someone’s holding a church that happens to be across the street abandoned, they're adding no value to our place, so they should have to pay for it. And maybe that taxes goes towards making more houses, maybe that tax goes towards building emergency shelters.”
“I think what really matters is these landlords who are holding our holding Rock Island hostage realistically will be forced to sell for less, will be forced to sell at a reasonable price so that people can then actually give back to Rock Island,” Dean said. “I think that's a very good progressive movement forward for our city council would be pleased to tax these abandoned buildings, make them pay for what they're doing to us. They're taking our land. So if they want to hold it abandoned, make it their problem, not ours.”
Homelessness in the greatest country
“We're the greatest country, in America, and we have homelessness. There's no reason for that,” said Linda Dothard. “I don't have the solution. I do not. But I know that we've got people who are over our city. Mayor, aldermen. We've got people who can do this. You can figure this out. Thank you, Linda Barnes, for having this meeting. Thank you for all of you who attended tonight.
“I don't know everything about this situation. I don't. And I'm not going to stand up here and tell you that I have all the answers, because I don't. But what I do know is that I agree with the gentleman who says, don't judge a book by its cover because it could be you the next time,” she said. “We're all blessed that if we have heat in our houses and a roof over our heads, we're blessed.”
“I can't imagine what it's like to be on the streets, because, unfortunately, I'm blessed,” Dothard said. “Blessed by God, to be specific. But this issue has gone on for way, way, way too long. Way too long. We have some intelligent people running this city. Figure it out.”
Leslie Kilgannon spoke as director of the Quad Cities Housing Council, the resource development arm for a consortium called the Quad Cities Housing Cluster, which has about 60 dues-paying members.
They work collaboratively to address overall affordable housing needs in the Quad Cities. Just before the pandemic, they released “Silos to Solutions,” a 10-year vision for affordable housing in the QC, and identified a few gaping holes or gaps in affordable housing.
Need for 6,654 affordable units
Then, it was estimated the area needed 6,654 rental units that would be affordable for people at the extremely low-income levels, Kilgannon said. “A lot of people were very shocked and appalled by that. But we felt like you can't address an issue unless you're honest about the situation. It’s not shocking to anyone to say that the United States and this community has an affordable housing crisis.
“There are many reasons for that. Just briefly, wages haven't kept up with the cost of really anything, but in particular housing. So it's not just an extremely low-income person's challenge,” she said. “You're seeing more and more people struggling with affordability. We're losing units of housing. We don't have enough units of housing to begin with, and they're lost.”
“Now the tsunami of evictions and housing instability and homelessness that we thought we'd see during the pandemic, we are now seeing all across the United States,” Kilgannon said. “And the Quad Cities is no different. So this Silos to Solutions vision was about how we can address rental housing. And it was really a challenge to the community to get together and address these issues through directed funding, new construction, a variety of strategies. Right. So five years later, everybody knows what we need to do in some ways.”
Last month, the Housing Council received a $300,000 transformation grant from the Quad Cities Community Foundation to create more affordable housing.
The collaboration brings together Vera French Housing Corporation, Ecumenical Housing Development Group, Habitat for Humanity of the Quad Cities, Humility Homes and Services, and Rejuvenate Housing, and each will develop units (totaling 25) within the Davenport project area—spanning Marquette to Harrison and Locust to 4th Street—using land and properties they already own.
“That's not all we need to do. We need units that have supportive services as well, so people can be successful in renting,” Kilgannon said Thursday. “These are glaring gaps, and we need to address them because it's urgent. And we need to create capacity. We need to maximize the funds that we're using, but we also need more funds. I hate to make it all about money, but we need sustained investment from all of our municipalities into creating and maintaining affordable housing.”
“The Quad Cities is a community sometimes separated by a river, but I like to think of it as brought together by a river. We're a Quad Cities community, and this is really a regional issue that we need to address,” she said. “We need better coordination and collaboration. Certainly we can always improve about that. We need a regional strategy and regional sustained funding, and we need to build support. That's where you all come in.”
“We need to create the political will to address the housing crisis at its roots. So we need units of housing. We. We need funds, sustained funds. We need support for services that have come online, like The Third Place, for example, that filled a huge gap,” she said of the downtown Rock Island drop-in center at 2000 3rd Ave.
“Those kinds of things need to be funded and sustained on an annual level. And it just should be part of what we're doing as a community,” Kilgannon said. “Everyone deserves a safe, decent, affordable place to live. That should not be controversial. And I think, as the Quad Cities, that we can achieve that.”
Consider shared housing
Beyond renovating abandoned and blighted buildings, the community should consider shared housing, she noted.
“There's lots of strategies about helping extricate folks and support them in their journey to get out of homelessness through a shared housing strategy where multiple people are sharing a home or sharing an apartment that they rent together,” Kilgannon said. “It's not always every single person needs their own unit of housing. That's certainly ideal. But in the meantime, we have to get moving and we have to get people housed so that they are safe.
“We can support people so they stop getting evicted. Because once you're evicted, you have that scarlet A, if you will, scarlet E around your neck and you can't rent again, not anything safe, decent and affordable, because landlords won't rent to people that have evictions on their record,” she said.
“We just simply have to get the municipalities to invest in the programs. We have the agencies. We have the programs, and we just need sustained support,” Kilgannon said. “It's a matter of political will. I think if communities, municipalities understood that they're not in it alone and they're not being asked to carry the burden alone, but that there are agencies, that there are both counties, that there are multiple cities that are coming together and contributing on a sustained basis. I understand you don't want to run a shelter. I understand you don't want to build affordable housing, but fund the agencies who do, do that. Support it. I think part of being a community that is growing, thriving and vibrant is having safe, decent and affordable housing for everyone at every income and part of a municipality's responsibilities.”
“We have a real crisis on our hands and the time to start was yesterday. But we have to come together and be intentional and create the political will in the community so that all the stakeholders have a role and they believe it's their responsibility as well to make sure that everyone has a safe, decent place to live,” she said.
Brian Wingert, a disabled veteran, has been unhoused eight times in his life, and works as a volunteer to offer free food to homeless people on Sundays.
“Why not be known as the city in the Quad Cities that helps other people from other cities? That's the city that I want to live in and I want to be a part of,” he said. “That's the city that I want. I want to help everybody. I want everybody to know, hey, you know what? Your city ain't taking care of you. Come here. We'll take care of you. That's what I want to be known as.”
“This is about helping people, and I think that's more important. You mentioned how you spent so much money on downtown Rock Island and want it to be beautiful, and that's why you don't want the unhoused to be down there,” Wingert said. “That’s profit over people. I don't like profit over people, because I like people more than profit.”
Pride in the city
Marshall Glover, a longtime Rock Island resident and Rocky alum, said in high school, “they always talked about pride, and they boosted and boasted the letter R and the I in the word pride, because we should take pride in the city of Rock Island. That pride, that capital R and that capital I in the middle of that pride did not have a certain demographic,” he said. “I take pride in every single person that I get to have a conversation with at The Third Place.”
Glover, an Army veteran, said the government doesn’t do enough to help veterans.
“And I could have fallen into that unhoused category. I was super prideful and didn't want to ask for help. I'm a veteran. I shouldn't have to ask for help,” he said. “I gave my life for this country. And I see so many of my battle buddies who are also veterans who gave their life for this country and this country ain't doing a doggone thing for them. Unhoused does not mean uneducated. Unhoused does not mean unemployed.”
“I for one don't care to measure ourselves to the rest of the Quad Cities. We are a unique metropolitan area that's collaborative in nature,” said Kaylee McDaniel. “However, finger pointing every other city saying that they need to be doing something first or in tandem is insane. Yeah, so who cares if we act first? So what if we act alone?
“The worst thing that happens is that we help people. And isn't that the entire point. In a constant pulse of humanity causing each other irreparable harm? I am asking our city council to stand apart from the rest and do what is inherently right,” she said. “To do it well and to do it now.”
One formerly homeless person suggested using the old Project NOW (on 19th Street across from the downtown library) as a shelter.
One woman who’s been a three-year QC resident, used to live at 324 Main in Davenport, which collapsed in 2023 and she was unhoused for a month.
“We're a community and we take care of each other. And we have a community full of homeless people, so we should provide for them,” she said. “We've already had one freeze to death. These are our people. We are a community and we need to take care of each other.”
“These people don't have anywhere to go. You know, maybe if we did have somewhere for these people to go on the weekends, at night, the crime wouldn't be there. It's our time to take care of each other,” she added.
Mayor Harris said at the meeting conclusion:
“What we got from this, what we see from this is the want, the need, the passion, the intelligence, the articulation, the will to help. We even had different perspectives.”
“We want to set environments like this, like I said, so the community can see that we're not forgotten about that our politicians can see that we're not going anywhere,” he said. “We are passionate about what we want and what we need. So I appreciate you showing me, the council and the rest of the city that I appreciate all the professionals that came to tell about their resources.”
“The work is being done. And just as soon as we can get a deal, just as soon as we can get something worked out with Rock Island, with our council, with a landlord downtown, with the city of Davenport or Moline, immediately, within 48 hours, we're going to be voting on it,” Harris said. “You're going to be hearing about it and that's my word right there.”
The City Council will meet at 5:45 p.m. Monday, Jan. 12 in Council Chambers at City Hall, 1528 3rd Ave., Rock Island.
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