Let's feed the homeless indoors, not in the parks!

Now that the U.S. Court of Appeals has ruled 10-0 that the City of Orlando can sharply limit public feedings in city parks, it is possible for St. Petersburg to follow suit. We can again make Williams Park our town square and the residents of the Mirror Lake area will not have to hire someone to clean up garbage everyday around Mirror Lake park.

The city has been asking the groups that feed in city parks to move to indoor facilities with tables, chairs, garbage cans, bathrooms and most important kitchens for many years. Unfortunately, there are several groups who honestly think they are helping by these feedings. The city hired an expert in homelessness who says that public feedings work against all of our efforts to get the homeless back on their feet and into the mainstream.

I introduced a new business item on April 15th which the Council took up on the 22nd. Council which has waited for four years while the Orlando case was heard, instead decided to request a "report" from the legal department rather than move forward to pass an ordinance. The residents, visitors and businesses downtown have suffered for long enough, in my opinion.

The report will come back and obviously state just what the U.S. Court of Appeals said: we may sharply limit public feedings. According to our homeless expert, it should take about ten days for the feedings to shift to decent facilities and the parks will be used again by the general public. Although the progress was slowed needlessly, we will get this done and I will keep pushing.