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Mr. Minichiello whips up fear with the argument that all disabled persons who are homeless are potential murderers or are otherwise dangerously violent people. That's a vicious, unconscionable and false argument, and it is extremely unfortunate that it has gained any traction. If it were true, then the faith-based community would hardly be equipped to "provide for" such a population.
Furthermore, Mr. Minichiello's examples are all of people who were untreated and unhoused. Had they been working with case managers and on their meds, the incidents described would almost certainly not have occurred.
The question is not "Do you want these people to move into your neighborhood?" They're already there, whether you live in South Knox, North Knox, Corryton or Farragut. The question really is, "Do you want these people untreated, unmanaged, and unhoused continuing to wander through your neighborhood?"
We would all agree that homelessness is a problem that belongs to our whole community, not just a few agencies or a few neighborhoods. We would surely all agree that we should be working to solve the problem. We will solve it by doing everything we reasonably can do to end it.
The strategy adopted by the Ten-Year Plan, permanent supportive housing, is proven to be effective at ending chronic homelessness. It isn't perfect, but it works. It ends the homelessness of the majority of the disabled people who enter it.
We need to develop more affordable housing for the disabled homeless people who are already living outdoors in our communities. We need to distribute that housing throughout the community instead of simply putting it in a few neighborhoods. And that is what we're committed to doing.
We're not talking about some experimental idea here. It's been done, studied, and proven in communities of all sizes across the nation. If you would like to learn more about permanent supportive housing and how it serves as the foundation for our Ten-Year Plan, please visit http://tenyearplan.org.
Sincerely,Robert FinleyMayors' Office of the Ten Year Plan to End Chronic Homelessness400 Main StreetKnoxville TN 37902rfinley@cityofknoxville.orghttp://tenyearplan.org865-215-3071
It's been a good year for the Ten-Year Plan. I say that for these reasons:
The agencies who provide services to people who are homeless, chronic and otherwise, are working together in a whole new way; KARM's Crossroads Day Services is the most visible manifestation of that, because it brings all of our service providers together in one place to get people on the road to appropriate housing. There are others: http://www.knoxmag.com/issues/current....
City Council and County Commission have come together to begin addressing, on the front end, siting considerations for future permanent supportive housing: http://knoxtenyearplan.org/2008/12/19...
Minvilla's financial picture looks quite good and this long-anticipated project should overcome its challenges to get underway in the spring: http://minvilla.org
The Ten-Year Plan is also becoming more transparent and inclusive. We credit Commissioner Amy Broyles, who did the most to bring that need to our attention. In direct response to Ms. Broyles and others, we now have neighborhood representatives on the Advisory Board, whose quarterly meetings are now open to the public: http://knoxtenyearplan.org/2008/12/19...
Chronic homelessness is a tough problem, but our community is beginning to sink its teeth into it. We're pioneering some stuff here in Knoxville that stands a good chance of becoming recognized as best practices in other cities. We've got a good plan, and we've got great people working to carry it out.
Sincerely,Robert FinleyMayors' Office of the Ten-Year Plan to End Chronci Homelessnesstenyearplan.org
Matt,
Minvilla, like any historic rehab project, is an expensive project. It is not, however, out of line costwise with other projects like it. That's pretty easy to document.
You imply that the cost of Minvilla is ever-rising. Others have used more hyperbolic language to characterize this supposed ongoing project cost increase.
To our knowledge, there's only been one significant cost increase in this project, and it was an increase over a preliminary estimate made in the absence of an actual contractor's estimate.
How'd that come about? When the former developer's earliest cost estimates for Minvilla went public,they were artificially low (total project cost of $4,500,000; hard costs $3,000,000). The former developer's estimate was a ballpark made without construction drawings and a contractor's estimate. The figure of $3,800,000 was first published, I believe, in the News-Sentinel, and lodged in the public consciousness.
We now have much better information (completed construction documents and a firm estimate from the contractor. Project cost is much higher than the preliminary (approximately $6,200,000 with developer contribution; $7,000,000 if the developer retains developer's fee) one to which people indexed their expectations, but it is also realistic.
I think there are people in the community who mistakenly believe that there was a recent "cost increase" from $6.2M to $7M. That's inaccurate. The former figure is the total project cost with the developer's fee being donated to the project; the latter fee is total project cost with the developer retaining his fee.
Thanks for the opportunity to clarify.
Very nice. Thanks to MP and Rose Kennedy.
The Ten-Year Plan has posted on its own website some more info about its proposed project at Flenniken. You can read about it at http://knoxtenyearplan.org/2008/05/20....
I need to make a couple of important corrections.
First, the headline might be a little confusing. Flenniken Housing is not in any way a "shelter," at least not in the sense that most people tend to use the term when describing housing for people who are homeless. Flenniken Housing is permanent permanent supportive housing. That means every resident will have a lease, will pay rent, and will have a relationship with a case manager. Once a person's in permanent supportive housing, she's not homeless anymore.
Emergency shelter is vital to our community's continuum of care for people who are homeless, but a shelter stay is supposed to be temporary, and a person staying at a shelter is still a person who is homeless.
Second, Leadership Knoxville is not directly involved in this project. Our friends at Knoxville Leadership Foundation are the ones helping us with Flenniken Housing. They're a non-profit with experience in developing low-income housing. You can learn more about that here: http://www.klf.org/index.php/programs...
This is good. In fact, if I were a plagiarist, I'd steal it and post it at http://tenyearplan.org.
Since I'm not, I'll just link to it. And suggest that readers follow the general advice offered here. It's not helpful to reward panhandling behavior with a direct donation to the applicant. Instead, give generously to Volunteer Ministry Center, or the Salvation Army, or Knox Area Rescue Ministries or any of the other excellent Knoxville-area nonprofits that serve people who are homeless.
"No" may be hard to say, but it's also best.
