President Jones Now we have public comment on items not on the agenda. If you want to provide public comment on items on the agenda, please come up to the microphone. Please state your full name, first and last. Is there anyone that wants to make public comment? Great, thanks and if you could provide both names, it just helps our clerks because they have to do complete minutes. Thank you.
Unknown speaker [sound issues]
Marty Rehbein Point of order. Gwen, we can't hear the microphone here.
President Jones Point of order. First of all, we got a, Kristen and John could you guys please turn your cameras one? We can't see you on the ZOOM call. We have a text that that is, they're not able to see you but….
Marty Rehbein I can see John Contos and I can see Kirsten Jordan in the meeting here.
President Jones Okay.
Marty Rehbein But we couldn't hear the speaker at the microphone on the virtual element in the meeting.
President Jones Okay.
Marty Rehbein I think that might be that microphone button, yeah.
President Jones Okay before we go further, Amber did you have a point of order or was it just the hearing the speaker? We can't hear you amber; you're muted Amber.
Alderperson Sherrill Sorry I could, I just couldn't hear the public commenter, so I was wanting to make you aware.
President Jones Okay, thank you . Sorry, I have been out of town for a while and I'm getting back into the hang of things. Go ahead Joe, thanks.
Joe Alright. So, I'm gonna turn the attendant to someone else. As predicted, Rogers International, their employees have shaped up their public appearance, which I guess is some sort of progress. But for the month of May, I wanna pull back a little bit and I want to particularly turn the attention to some things that I've read on the County website and things that have been brought up in meetings that I've listened to. It's been brought up a couple times and I've sat in on, but as someone who's at the camps regularly and sees the conditions that the homeless in this community are subjected to, I find the kind of liberal back padding about this justice, equity, diversity, and inclusion initiative pretty hard to swallow. So, from the website on the county it talks about how after the racial reckoning, the reckoning with our racial history, we're looking towards building a program that acknowledges the abuses of the past and etc. and so forth, we want more just and equitable policies practices and decision-making processes that are inclusive of their increasingly diverse communities. And again, I just find that kind of difficult to swallow. I wish a word of it was reflected in how the City government treated the homeless in this community, which is the most reviled and abused caste in Missoula in orders of magnitude more likely to be racial minorities, survivors of abuse, and suffering from severe and chronic illnesses. I want to illustrate a point about how the policy decisions in this room end up having physical impacts on the people who have to live their lives like that. So, in the last comment I mentioned that the warming shelter was going to shut down despite there was still going to be freezing temps, so over 80 people no longer have a place to go at the end of the day and return to illegal camping, despite it not really being illegal per Supreme Court decision, but because the only thing that matters at the end of the day is that the guy with the badge and the gun gets to decide what's going to get enforced. People are still going to get arrested; it just might not be on the report that it was because of illegal camping. For of arrest, people cram into the camps because they don't want to deal with a night in jail, despite those camps already being over capacity. So, it makes navigation those camps difficult. Spring winds rip through the camps, and it collapse tents, rains on top of them, they're cold. Again, a lot of those people can't thermoregulate because of some of their health issues. So, they resolve to build sturdier structures add wood and metal siding that they've sourced from around town. Because it's still freezing, the shelter program and the shelter program coordinator in Helena can't be bothered to answer his phone or answer an email, the warming tent is just a canopy with inoperable warming elements in them. So, the residents are up to their own, to keep themselves warm, despite again freezing temperatures and rain. So, they move in their own warming elements, their own fires, but then camp structures are declared a fire hazard and the houses that the residents have spent months constructing are ordered to be torn down. None of that seems like justice. I watched a guy struggle for three weeks to build up a place that would keep him warm and that wouldn't blow over in the wind, and he's going to have to tear it down because we can't keep these people warm, and we can't keep up our part of the social bargain. I was assured that Rogers International was contracted to provide security but apparently the security that matters, the security from the elements, the security from abuse from the police, and having a safe place you can reliably come home to at the end of the night doesn't matter, but we have $700,000.00 from a pandemic relief fund that we can go to these black water buggers sulking around Missoula alleyways. At the end of the day, this isn't much of a problem with Rogers International as much as it's a problem with government. I understand that's not a pleasant thing to be told but I'm hoping for some introspection this month. I despise little more than hypocrisy and if you're going to claim these values, if you're going to have all these nice buzzwords on your websites, I want to hold your feet to the fire and I want to actually see this community live up to the values that we advertise ourselves up to. That's all I have to say tonight. I'm going to bring in some props tomorrow.
President Jones Thank you. Anyone else for public comment on items not on the agenda? Come up and provide your name and we try and keep it to 3 minutes. Thanks.
Maggie Bornstein Awesome. My name is Maggie Bornstein. I think I've met all of you in my work capacity and I want to make it very clear that I'm a private citizen, but I want to talk about something related to food justice. And well before I worked at the food bank I was on my food pantry oversight board at my college and this has been like a passion for a long time of mine, but many of you probably heard about P-EBT, which stands for Pandemic EBT. It's something such as an allotment of about $375.00 that kids and families are awarded who are living in poverty across the country, that is for the existence of a summer, to allow them to purchase food for their families and the way that's obtained is through a federal authorization through the Department of Public Health and Human Services. Montana is one of a very few handful of states who has not applied for this, which leaves, like kids in our community super, super vulnerable to experiencing food insecurity and hunger. And it makes me so sad, and I know that often I hear the City Council say like, we're up against a wall and we don't have a lot of options, that the state is really limiting but I think that you all are such effective messengers. And like how powerful would it be to hear like from you all to the Governor's office, or for any of you to like pen an op-ed in the paper about how important and vital that is because I think you're all here because you care about our community and I think it would be a really wonderful way to show up is, is to ask for the authorization of P-EBT. If we don't take it, it just goes somewhere else and so and it's a drop in the bucket when people talk about federal deficit. The response from the Gianforte administration right now is that it's like too administratively burdened some and I'm just not buying it and I think a lot of people otherwise aren't. And so again, as a private citizen, it would make my heart beat so fast if you all would speak out about P-EBT. I know Mike Nugent has and I think maybe a handful of others, but it's really appreciated. Thanks.
President Jones Thank you. Any other comments on items not on the agenda? Come on up.
Brianna West Hi, my name is Brianna West. I'm a nurse at Partnership Health Center clinic located in the Poverello homeless shelter. And I want to make it clear I'm providing this statement as a private citizen and my views do not necessarily reflect those of my organization. So, many of us here know the conveniences of living in a house and having a shelter over our head, and I just want to talk specifically about how housing relates to healthcare and how the Johnson Street Warming Shelter being closed has created a gap in healthcare for many patients. Healthcare, sorry housing is a social determinant of health, meaning that when you do not have stable housing, it leads to poor outcomes in healthcare, and I've definitely seen that just in the short time Johnson Center has been closed these past few weeks. We've had a rush of patients from Johnson Street come into the Poverello Center and the Poverello Center has had to like accept some of those patients, which has been great and then also those, some of the patients that I've been working with have had to go to the street, and so that's created a gap in needs people's healthcare. We have a community care team that has been going out and working with patients at the Johnson Street Warming Shelter, as well as the approved campsite and so that team has really developed rapport with a lot of those patients and have helped them with their healthcare. And now that they're, they're not, no longer at Johnson Street, I've been seeing a lot of those patients, which has been great but I have had to develop my own rapport with these patients and figure out what, what's going on and get them with the new provider and as well as like the patients I'm no longer seeing because they've had to make, make space for the Johnson Street Warming patients. I've lost the touch with those patients and haven't been able to find them, to do really important things like follow up on their infections, make sure they're taking antibiotics, check on their wounds. And so, really what I'm asking is I know that we still have the Johnson Street Warming Shelter facilities and I know there's still some money in the budget. So, I don't know, I was wondering if it's possible to fund the warming shelter all year because while it's great to have these patients be warm in the winter and protected from the elements, it would be even better if they could have a stable place year-round and not have to be moved around and left to do illegal camping, as well as I'm looking for this to get added into the budget for future years so that they do have this stable place to stay. Additionally, I am curious about the Sleep Inn Motel, and the patients that were awaiting COVID tests or do have positive COVID tests, where those patients are supposed to be? Because if they're awaiting a test or positive, they're not allowed to stay at the Poverello shelter and so then when they're on the street, it's very difficult to follow up with those patients. If they get their positive tests back and they have been waiting for one, it's difficult for me to locate them and let them know that their test was positive, and then we don't know if they are properly quarantining. And if we are able to talk to them, we don't have a place for them to go. I know the Sleep Inn was an option before. but it seems a bit unclear of, of what we're using that for now. So, thank you.
President Jones Great, thank you. Thank you for your comments and we don't really have a back and forth with questions during this segment of the meeting, but if you want to follow up with an email on specifics, I can get those answers to you. Any other public comment. Hi.
Blaine Doherty Hi everyone, my name is Blaine Doherty, and I am a tenancy support specialist at Partnership Health Center and what that means is that I work directly with folks who are experiencing homelessness to support them in their housing goals and to be and assist in what that takes and to get them to the, their desirable state of housing. And so, I'm providing this statement as a private citizen and my views are not necessarily a reflection of my organization. So, as my co-worker Bri stated, I have my position because PHD values housing as healthcare, and what that looks like on the ground for me is that, for example, I'm supporting one person at the approved campsite right now and have been for almost two months now. And in that process, her goal is to simply secure herself in her shelter and not have to continue to be putting out various fires, so to speak. And so, initially that looked like flooding that happened and after the snow melted, flooding happened. I helped her put in pallets under her tent which not many people could do alone regardless of their age. And then when the cold and wind came, I helped her find more rope and other pieces and pallets to secure her perimeter and to break the wind and to tie things down and also to deter theft. The security force is out there, it's a big camp, there's a lot going on, and these barriers are, are very useful for deterring theft. And all this is happening in the context of a of a site that's under-resourced and under-prioritized and so folks are just you know myself included doing what we can, solving the problem with the materials at hand and the time and resources we're given. And then to circle back, in addition to this, everyone out there requires, pretty much fires for cooking. And so, initially the camp was provided with maybe two fire pits, maybe three and you can imagine you know 80 people trying to all cook dinner at one time on one of those. And so, I guess, I'm here today because after all this has happened and all these folks have come together to try and solve these, these problems of flooding. Severe cold, like we all know how bad it was in April, there was like two big windstorms, and for and then a fire happens and of course everyone wants fire safety nothing more no more than the residents and that's another, another element that we need to protect ourselves against. And the response was, you'll have 48 hours to take down everything you've all built to try and protect yourself and to try and deal with living without any other resources or support given, and the resource personnel were left just trying to pick up the pieces and figure out what we have. So, like that looks like having a conversation with like can we buy hibachi grills for people and is that okay, so they can still cook? And so, I'm not here to point any fingers or anything like that, I'm just here to ask that the residents over at ACS and the support staff on the ground are prioritized and resourced adequately, and funded. And that, I guess, we, we focus on not doing the right thing, which is to like enforce this code but or sorry not doing what's right which is like enforcing the code but just like do the right thing, which is to help residents transition to something that fits code while still providing infrastructure and providing support, not just pulling the rug out from under us and saying good luck. So, yeah thank you all for your time.
President Jones All right, thank you. Thank you so much for your comments. Anyone else, public comment? Come on up.
Alex Catlett Hey everyone, my name is Alex Catlett, excuse me, and I am a nurse in the community. I'm speaking tonight on, as myself as a private citizen and a proud one of Missoula County and these views do not reflect that of my organization And a little different than some of those we've heard tonight, I deal mostly with mental health instead of more the physical side of health. With mental health, one of the big things you get with housing is that stability. With the J Street Shelter, the warming shelter open, we, we had a place where a lot of our clientele were housed consistently where they could stay and be safe. And so, by having that very basic human need of shelter, we can then focus on more of more of what's kind of in the upper tiers of Maslow's hierarchy of needs, which we learned in mental health is you build the base first, that's housing, food, those sorts of things and then you can build on top of that a healthy lifestyle. And so, I am responsible for providing stability in patients' lives and I can't do that in a mental health capacity without having housing/ Beyond just without having housing, if I can't locate my patients then I don't have a means to provide the support that is my duty to provide. And with the J Street Shelter closing, I've had more than one instance in which I've lost touch with patients. They've gone to the street, and they may have a cell phone, but in a much less secure situation, they've had cell phones stolen and so we've had people fall off the map, we've had people relapse, and it's, it's painful to watch when we put in so much effort. We build a consistent schedule and then come April 16th, the, that stability just kind of falls off the edge. So, similar to some of my colleagues here, I'm asking for consideration in opening up the Johnson Street Warming Shelter or something in a similar capacity for permanent and added stability for a clientele and our community members. Thank you very much.
President Jones All right, thank you. Anyone else, public comment on items not on the agenda? Okay, thanks so much.