Utah on homelessness: Balancing compassion with accountability (2024)

Gov. Spencer Cox and others delivered some tough talk Thursday at a conference exploring ways to end homelessness in Utah.

The word accountability came up numerous times during two panel discussions and the governor’s speech at the Utah Solutions’ annual gathering, this one titled, “Ending Homelessness in Utah: The Critical Next Steps.” But panelists said that doesn’t mean there’s no room for compassion when interacting with the state’s unsheltered population, many of whom are addicted to fentanyl and methamphetamine.

Cox told resource providers, community leaders and elected officials at the event that Sam Quinones, the author of “The Least of Us,” argues that the country has made a “huge mistake” in swinging the pendulum too far on the compassion side. Compassion, the governor said, is absolutely necessary but policymakers in many large cities have decided that they’re not only going to show compassion but actually help people suffer more than they’re already suffering.

“That there’s something good about letting people die on the sidewalk as they’re shooting up,” he said.

Cox said society uses the saying, “You can lead a horse to water, but you can’t make them drink,” as justification to allow people to do the worst harm to themselves.

Accountability and compassion

“We have to do more on the accountability side. We have to have both of these things. It’s not a false choice,” he said. “We can have compassion and we should. We can do more to provide space, to provide lodging, to provide help, to provide recovery services, to provide everything that person needs. But if they choose not to do those things, then we have to hold them accountable.”

Cox said there must be accountability not only for those receiving services but for the agencies, including state and local government, providing them. Some great people are going to lose funding if their organizations aren’t effective, he said.

“You have to know that this is going to happen. Either make sure what you’re doing is working or figure out something else to do really quickly,” Cox said. “We can’t keep throwing money at something and not being able to deliver any results.”

Earlier this year, the Utah Legislature allocated $45 million at the governor’s request to strengthen the state’s services for unsheltered people. It also replaced the 29-member Utah Homelessness Council with a nine-member board to oversee a statewide strategic plan to minimize homelessness, funding and accountability.

“I believe we’re just on the verge of getting this right for the first time in our state’s history,” Cox said.

The Utah Highway Patrol and the Salt Lake City police, working together, have to date put 27,000 man hours interacting with homeless people, including drug suppression, removing campsites along the Jordan River Trail, 9,000 referrals for services, 900 trespassing citations, 150 felony arrests and 300 warrant arrests.

Panelists identified drug addiction, mental illness, catastrophic loss of family and lack of affordable housing among the root causes of homelessness.

Keep using or ask for help

Dave Durocher, executive director of The Other Side Academy, a nonprofit, two-year life skills program for criminals, homeless people and substance abusers, said people with mental health issues need to be separated out from the drug addicts and drug dealers and treated accordingly. Durocher was addicted to drugs for 27 years and went to prison four times before he turned his life around through a program in San Francisco.

“I always knew I had two options: keep using, ask for help. ... If I’m offered help, and I do not choose that help, I don’t deserve to be on the street terrorizing the community. I shouldn’t be breaking into your car. I shouldn’t be breaking into your home. I should be held accountable for the decision’s I’m making,” he said.

Overcoming shelter resistance

Members of the panel who work with unsheltered people say forming relationships with them and gaining their trust is a challenge. They often aren’t willing to share their personal information and might feel unsafe living in a shelter where some people don’t follow the rules.

Christian Sarver, a University of Utah research assistant professor in College of Social Work and associate director of Utah Criminal Justice Center, said some people on the street have “shelter resistance,” which might stem from paranoia, fear of the government, fear of exposure to drugs or not feeling safe.

“It’s really stressful to live in a shelter. You’re negotiating other people, other people’s families, other people’s parenting, other people’s beliefs about what’s appropriate to say to children,” she said.

Sarver said emergency shelters are not the best way to deal with unsheltered people because it doesn’t get them out of homelessness, though it protects people from the elements and hopefully provides food. Stays in a shelter, she said, should be short because the longer someone stays, the harder it is to get out.

Carol Hollowell, executive director of Switchpoint, which operates homeless shelters and treatment facilities throughout Utah, said one of her company’s taglines is “opportunity with accountability.”

“Sometimes that’s a hard pill to swallow for social service providers, but truly there has to be expectation,” she said. “We’ve seen it happen over and over again where people step up.”

Hollowell said when Switchpoint opened in St. George a decade ago made sure it had a police substation on its campus. “If people can see unsafe behavior is not going to be tolerated, it mitigated a lot of predatory actions that were happening,” she said.

Making connections

Rep. Tyler Clancy, R-Provo, who sponsored the homelessness legislation, said criminal behavior thrives in anonymity and it helps to learn people’s stories. Being homeless increases the risk of being a victim of sexual assault or other types of violence, he said. Making them aware of their rights if they’re a victim of crime might be away to form connections with law enforcement, said Clancy, a Provo police officer.

“I believe every homeless resource center in the state of Utah should be a drug-free zone,” he said, adding drug dealers prey on people in recovery. “We need to protect those sites and make sure that when someone says, ‘OK, I want to get help. I want to do something different,’ that’s a safe place to be.”

Salt Lake City police assigned officers to focus on reducing calls to police, crime and other incidents associated with the Gail Miller Resource Center. Sgt. Nate Meinzer, who leads the squad, said it takes 11 positive interactions to overcome a single negative one in a shelter. He said officers do everything they can to break down the stigma some people associate with a shelter or resource center.

“The whole intent is to get people to realize that there is safety here,” he said.

Eva Witesman, director of the Ballard Center for Social Impact at Brigham Young University, said many homeless people carry everything they need to survive and that connects them to life they used to have on their back. And shelters require them to relinquish that for a period of time.

“That’s extremely scary and traumatic, especially when they’re stuck in those spaces,” she said. Also, she said when people have to wait in line for shelter space, they become vulnerable to crime.

Editor’s note: In an earlier version of this article, a name was misspelled. The correction has been made.