July 10 Ward 7 Update from Council Member Lisa Goodman

Public Hearings on Revised 2020 City Budget

The City Council’s Budget Committee will hold two public hearings, July 14 and 22, on proposed revisions to the City’s 2020 budget. The City is facing approximately $156 million in projected revenue losses because of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Revised budget proposal

Mayor Jacob Frey presented the second phase of his revised budget proposal to the City Council’s Budget Committee July 9. The proposal avoids mass layoffs of City employees by relying on existing spending freezes, use of cash reserves, program cuts and furloughs. The budget also prioritizes preserving housing, economic development and racial equity work that will benefit the communities of color who have been hit hardest by COVID-19.

Frey’s Phase 1 response to the impact of COVID had included spending and hiring freezes and has saved approximately $58 million to date.

Public hearings

Engage and share your voice in this process during two online public hearings:

• Tuesday, July 14 at 6:05 p.m.

• Wednesday, July 22 at 10:00 a.m.

The City Council is scheduled to hold a budget markup July 17 and vote July 24 on a revised 2020 budget.

You can watch the online meetings and participate in the online public hearings.

For more information about the City’s budget, visit minneapolismn.gov/budget.

Public Hearings for Proposed Charter Amendment Creating New Department of Community Safety and Violence Prevention

The Minneapolis Charter Commission is seeking public comments on a proposed amendment to the City charter related to the future of public safety. People can submit their comments online or provide them directly to members of the commission at a public hearing July 15 or July 21.

The proposed amendment, submitted by the City Council, proposes removing the Police Department from the charter and adding a new Community Safety & Violence Prevention Department. Under State law, the Charter Commission is required to review and submit its recommendation(s) on the proposed amendment before a ballot question can be presented to voters.

The virtual public hearings will take place

• Wednesday, July 15 at 5:00 p.m.

• Tuesday, July 21 at 6:00 p.m.

Participation instructions will be published on the City’s website. If you’re interested in speaking at either or both of the public hearings, you can pre-register using the online registration form.

Other ways to comment:

• Using the online public comment form.
• Emailing councilcomment@minneapolismn.gov.
• Mailing comments to:The City Council voted June 26 to advance the proposal as a ballot measure to be considered by Minneapolis voters.
• Minneapolis Charter Commission City Hall – Room 304 350 S Fifth Street Minneapolis, MN 55415

Under state law, the Charter Commission has at least 60 days to complete its review and submit its recommendation to the City Council. The statutory deadline for submitting questions on the Nov. 3 general election ballot is Friday, Aug. 21. If approved by voters, the changes would become effective May 1, 2021

The Hennepin County Response to Homelessness

Hennepin County is the government entity that is the lead agency for addressing the topic of homelessness.  The remainder of this newsletter is a republishing of Commissioner Marion Greene's newsletter where she shares detailed information on what is being done by Hennepin County.

Shelter Available Today

As of today, there are 50 private rooms available for families with children at People Serving People and St Anne’s and we want to get all families out of encampments and inside as soon as possible.

At both People Serving People and St. Anne’s, families can find safe shelter from the elements, staff trained in trauma informed care and connections to quality childcare, healthcare, education and housing services. Additionally, as a right-to-shelter community for families with children, the county will work with families to make shelter arrangements even if these agencies no longer have rooms available

Responding to Families

We continue to implore all families with children to contact the Hennepin County shelter team at 612-348-9410 to arrange to get them into one of these safe places today. Outreach workers on the ground in city parks are aware of this and have helped connect some families to shelter. We want all to come inside and avoid the risks that are present at encampments. Please share this information broadly so we can help get more families out of harm’s way.

Immediate Response to COVID-19

We know that the COVID-19 pandemic is particularly threatening to our most vulnerable neighbors. As soon as the Hennepin County board issued our emergency declaration in mid-March, we expanded the entire shelter system to be CDC-guidelines-compliant, we also expanded it on a massive scale to shelter significantly more people, and we took immediate action to protect just under 600 of the most vulnerable (older people and people with comorbidities). We responded to the urgent need by asking willing Hennepin County employees to work in and run new shelters. Hennepin County shelters now operate 24-hours a day and offer breakfast, lunch, and dinner so residents have a safe place to reside full-time. 

These enormous efforts are the reason we have not seen widespread outbreaks in our homeless community as many other urban centers across the country have experienced. Hennepin County is spending almost $3 million per month for this response.

In addition, at the time of the civil unrest in Minneapolis, Hennepin County participated in the state-led effort to move about 130 people experiencing unsheltered homelessness from the Sabo Bridge, Stevens Square and Cedar encampments (also offered to folks on the Greenway) to two area hotels leased and managed by Avivo and Start Today.

Current, Ongoing Supports

Hennepin County in partnership with the city is deploying our Healthcare for the Homeless team to provide health supports to people at encampments across the city. Our Homeless Access and non-profit outreach teams are similarly working in encampments. They attempt to connect people to openings in housing, shelter and other services.

County and city staff and services have Are currently overextended at levels previously unheard of after standing up, staffing and maintaining hundreds and hundreds of new units of protective and isolation space since the days that followed the State of Emergency Declaration while also converting our entire homeless and housing system to be responsive to COVID-19.

On May 13 Hennepin County and the City of Minneapolis communicated to the State Emergency Operations Center (SEOC) that we could not safely stand up any additional hotel sites. This was before the murder of George Floyd and the resulting uprisings stretched our shelter system even further

Making Shelters Safer

These actions taken together have led to the largest and safest shelter system we have ever had in Hennepin County. Today, including the state’s most recent encampment evacuation to hotel sites, there are:

• Approximately 1,130 spaces in use for single adults experiencing homelessness in Hennepin County.
• Two-thirds of these spaces are individual separate rooms.
• All of these spaces are available for guests to use 24 hours a day, seven days a week.

Three months ago, there were:

• About 930 emergency shelter beds for people experiencing homelessness in Hennepin County
• All of these beds were in congregate settings with as many as 130 people in one room in the largest setting
• Only 180 spaces were available 24/7

Additionally, our family system still operates under a right-to-shelter for families with children and we have more than sufficient capacity to serve and shelter families

Testing for COVID-19

Mass testing at both our family shelter and one of our hotel sites recently found zero COVID+ test results for guests and staff. As of last week there had been a total of ~100 COVID+ cases among people experiencing homelessness in Hennepin County (as per MDH). While there is still a long road ahead of us, positive cases among people experiencing homelessness stayed flat thus far and have been declining steadily in recent weeks.

This effort has required unprecedented levels of funding. Hennepin County and partner staff have volunteered to be redeployed from their traditional work to offer support and step into roles they’ve never had before. This response has stretched our capacity and that of our nonprofit partners to a level that is unsustainable without additional support.

Helping People Keep the Homes They're In

The economic impacts of COVID-19 are further threatening to exacerbate these challenges. To prepare for the risk of thousands of people newly threatened with homelessness, Hennepin County recently announced $15 million for rental assistance for low income households who cannot afford their housing costs due to COVID-19.

Please help us share this resource widely: https://www.hennepin.us/rent-help.

Protecting People in Encampments

These unprecedented efforts still fall short of meeting the extraordinary need in our community. There are very real public health risks that are unavoidable in large, concentrated encampments that must be considered in our collective response to this situation. As described above, we will continue to deploy our Healthcare for the Homeless team to provide health supports to people at Powderhorn Park and other encampments across the city. Our Homeless Access and outreach teams will similarly continue to work tirelessly to connect people to services and the shelter and housing that is available.

The county and city’s previous experience with large encampments has taught us that the larger encampments get, the more dangerous they become. That is especially true for those staying within them. This was true before factoring in the global pandemic that requires social distancing to keep vulnerable individuals and our community safe.

What the City of Minneapolis is Doing

The City of Minneapolis has been a close partner of the county’s in this work. If you would like information specifically about the City’s overall homeless response system and encampment response the city’s webpage here: http://www2.minneapolismn.gov/cped/housing/WCMS1P-081097.

Underpinning: Lack of Affordable Housing

Our region’s lack of affordable housing does the most harm to people with very low incomes—those making 30% of the Area Median Income (or about $30,000 for a family of four). People of color are disproportionally represented in this group and even more disproportionately represented in who experiences homelessness. In Hennepin County:

• About 74,000 households live in this income bracket.
• We have only about 14,000 units of subsidized housing in Hennepin County that are affordable for them.
• About 95% of people experiencing homelessness have incomes at or below this level, including many who are working full-time jobs.

The math is simple, people can’t afford housing and there is not enough of it.

Immediate and Long-term Solutions – In ‘Normal’ Times

Every year, the county invests about $134 million, primarily state and federal funds, to support a range of affordable housing and shelter response strategies. This funding allows us to:

• Provide shelter for 9,000 people experiencing homelessness
• Help more than 7,500 residents who are experiencing or at risk of homelessness maintain or access permanent housing
• Support 15,000 people in supportive housing
• Create or preserve about 975 units of affordable housing

As I mentioned above, from the beginning of the year to the end of May, our community has moved more than 700 people in Hennepin County directly from homelessness into permanent housing. This work makes a difference for the people served but unfortunately it is not nearly enough.

Increasing Supportive Housing

Last year the Hennepin County board adopted a new strategy to proactively drive construction of 1,000 new units of housing affordable to those with the lowest income, including housing specifically designed for people who are chronically homeless or medically fragile.

This is an innovative 10-year strategy that the we estimate will cost the county $90 million and require continued investment from state and city funding partners. We have already awarded $6 million to fund seven new supportive housing projects which will create 212 physical units of housing for people experiencing chronic homelessness and people with severe addictions.

Partnership

If you’ve read this far, it is clear how closely Hennepin County and the City of Minneapolis are collaborating, and partnership with the State of Minnesota is woven through this work as well. Here is the list of joint initiatives the city and county are working on that the state hopes to join:

• Funding for additional outreach at encampments to connect people to shelter and housing
• A park board request: Funding for incidental expenses at encampments: bathrooms, handwashing stations, showers, medical services and security
• Capital and operating support for emergency shelter: dormitories at the State Fair Grounds (or other state-managed location), excess quarantine housing identified by the State Emergency Operations Command (SEOC), or other new shelter locations including but not limited to hotels
• Response to the City/County joint request to the SEOC for staffing support, either re-assigning state workers as the County has done, or new staff for hotels and shelters
• Purchase of hotels using federal CARES Act dollars or bonding across the state and region, a long-term investment in shelter and housing that would supplement this strategy that the City and County are jointly pursuing
• Support for longer term shelter needs for culturally appropriate shelter and medical respite shelter

Further Ways to Help

People often ask ‘what can I do to help,’ so here is an answer, to the best of my ability. These challenges require all of us working together with the urgency that the moment requires. Here are a few things you can do right now to help.

1. Keep advocating: Join forces with established efforts to increase housing stability in our community. Check out the Homes for All Campaign, MN Coalition for the Homeless, and the National Low Income Housing Coalition. Please continue to reach out to your state and federal representatives, as well as your city and county elected leaders and let them know we need immediate funding and action to address homelessness in our communities.
2. Volunteer: Many organizations lost volunteers when the pandemic started. Organizations need volunteers now more than ever — you are likely connected with your local non-profits but otherwise Handsontwincities.org is a good place to start.
3. Donate: Nonprofits who are providing shelter and essential services to people experiencing homelessness are facing dire financial constraints at a time when their services are more needed than ever. Hennepin County is doing everything we can to increase funding, but your donations are badly needed, too.
4. Educate: In order to take decisive and effective action together, having a sound understanding of the challenges we face together is crucial. The National Alliance to End Homelessness is a good resource to help educate your friends, family, and neighbors on solutions to end homelessness. You can also find great statistical information for Minnesota at Wilder Research. 

Thank you again for your passion for this work. It requires good faith collaboration and strong partnerships across government agencies, the public and private sectors and, especially, community and people with lived experience of homelessness. And to reiterate, shelter and encampments are not acceptable solutions; only housing is.

The City’s Response to Homelessness

Minneapolis has experienced an unprecedented growth in homeless encampments since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic. There are several large encampments citywide with the largest currently at Powderhorn Park in south Minneapolis. There are roughly 100 encampments throughout the city, most of which are small in size.

Response

The City is working with Hennepin County to help connect people experiencing homelessness to housing, shelter and services while preserving dignity and respect. The response includes:

• The City has placed more than 15 hygiene stations throughout the city including portable toilets, handwashing stations, used syringe containers and trash receptables.
• The City Health Department is coordinating public health services at large encampments.
• Officers from the Minneapolis Police Department Homeless and Vulnerable Persons Initiative deliver food and water and help people access resources.
• The City works with contracted outreach providers to connect encampment residents with services, shelter and housing.
• The City and County will work with community partners to secure federal COVID-19 funding to expand outreach and rapid rehousing services and expand long-term culturally appropriate shelter capacity.

Affordable housing

Housing ends homelessness, and the City and County have significantly increased investments in affordable housing development in 2019 and 2020, with priority for housing serving people experiencing homelessness.

• Since 2006, the City has provided more than $68 million to help develop more than 900 units of supportive housing for people experiencing homelessness.
• About 290 new units for people experiencing homelessness will close on financing from City and County, State and/or Minneapolis Public Housing Authority (MPHA) funding programs and start construction in 2020.
• We are working with partners to prevent evictions during this time of crisis. The City made $3 million available for Emergency Housing Assistance for people who have lost income due to COVID.
• The County has made $15 million available for Emergency Housing Assistance through CARES Act funds. Applications for County housing assistance are currently being accepted.

Find out more on the City website.

COVID-19 Situational Update as of July 8

• There are 5,048 cases in Minneapolis and 190 deaths. The City is sharing Minneapolis-specific daily case counts and demographics through a public facing dashboard at www.minneapolismn.gov/coronavirus/dashboard.
• Young adults continue to account for more than 50% of cases. Social exposures and contacts are increasing as more facilities open. This is the second week that cases in young adults have spiked.
• Congregate living facilities in Minneapolis continue to see new cases among residents and, while accounting only for 9% of confirmed cases, account for 72% of COVID-19 deaths.
• There are 39,589 cases in Minnesota out of over 692,000 tests completed. There have been 1,485 deaths from COVID-19 in Minnesota. There are 12,703 cases and 789 deaths in Hennepin County.
• There are over 11 million confirmed cases worldwide, with more than 3 million cases confirmed and 131,857 deaths in the US alone. The US remains the country with the highest number of cases and deaths by a significant margin.
• CDC and the Minnesota Department of Health have issued testing criteria to include all contacts with a known exposure.
• As of June 10, Minnesota has entered Phase III of the Governor’s Stay Safe MN order which allows bars and restaurants to offer indoor dining at 50% capacity with tables spaced six feet apart. Pairs of people may sit at a bar if they maintain the appropriate distance from others. Pools may open at 50% capacity and gyms may open at 25% capacity.
• Mayor Frey’s Emergency Regulation requiring that masks be worn in indoor public spaces in Minneapolis is still in effect.
• The state’s Community Resiliency and Recovery Work Group has released a survey to gather information about the impacts of COVID-19 on traditionally marginalized communities. They would like to hear from Minnesota’s Black, Asian, Latinx, Indigenous, immigrant, and refugee communities to understand how COVID-19 is impacting these groups and how the state can better support them. Please consider sharing the survey link with your constituents.

Health Incident Command updates

As the MHD continues to respond to COVID-19, we are applying an equity lens to all our work in conjunction with partners across the City enterprise.

Case investigations: The Health Department is conducting over 50 case investigations and contact follow-ups for individuals diagnosed with COVID-19 per day. 86% of all cases reported in Minneapolis have been interviewed, 9% are lost to follow up (insufficient contact information or non-returned calls), 2% refuse the interview, and 3% represent new cases not yet interviewed or cases in long-term care facilities which are investigated by the state health department. Currently, the MHD has 25 investigators, including six non-MHD enterprise staff. Of case investigations conducted, 37% were done in a language other than English.

Testing: The testing team is beginning to plan for a community testing event at Sagrado Corazon church in south Minneapolis. This will be planned with the church and its community partners, as well as the Minnesota Department of Health. This community testing event will focus on the Latinx community; however, it will be open to all. The MHD is in conversation with community groups and Healthcare for the Homeless about coordinating testing for individuals sheltering at or near Powderhorn Park.

Personal Protective Equipment: The Health Department continues to receive requests for masks, gloves, and hand sanitizer. Last week, we distributed 2,730 cloth masks and 191 bottles of hand sanitizer. Much of what was distributed went to supporting safe practices as people congregate at and around the George Floyd memorial site at 38th and Chicago. The remainder was distributed in response to various community requests across the city. Broadly, we continue to seek to balance the needs of clinics and health care providers with the needs of other priority populations including low-income individuals, BIPOC communities, low-income multi-family housing properties, faith communities, people experiencing homelessness, and community-based organizations.

Health inspections: Health inspectors completed a sweep of 24 bars in downtown, Uptown, and Dinkytown. Nine bars were closed. The 15 open bars all had COVID-19 plans in place. Health inspectors stressed COVID-19 safety messages. Additionally, COVID-19 plans are reviewed at all routine health inspections. The Park Board opened 20 wading pools on July 4, and the MHD is reviewing COVID-19 plans at the pools as they inspect.

Homelessness response: The MHD continues to work closely with others across the City enterprise, the State, County, and the Park Board to respond to the urgent and long-term needs of the unsheltered homeless population. Tent encampments of various sizes can be found at approximately 38 parks across the city, including more than 560 tents at Powderhorn Park. Health Department staff are coordinating different health care needs at the encampment such as wound care, harm reduction, mental health, HIV and hepatitis testing. In addition, the MHD is providing on-site services such as hand washing stations and syringe drop boxes to help maintain safe and hygienic environments.

Food security efforts: Unemployment, disrupted transportation services, and public safety concerns are significantly impacting food security for individuals and families across the city. Multiple City departments are collaborating to provide leadership and support for emergency food relief efforts.

Food retail: Health inspectors completed a final walk-through of the temporary Cub Foods community market on Lake Street. The 13,000 square foot space, which includes grocery and pharmacy services, opened on Wednesday, July 8. The temporary market on West Broadway has started construction and is scheduled to open in late July. Cub is offering shuttle service from these two locations to nearby stores for those who seek a larger selection of food and goods.

Free food distribution: Demand at food shelves and free food distribution events continues to increase. City staff are co-hosting a weekly food distribution at Powderhorn Park for 600+ Latinx households and a growing number of other community members. As needs are identified among food shelves and community groups, the MHD is making connections to available resources such as state and county funding opportunities. Staff are also convening partners to help foster collaboration and address barriers such as the need for language translation at pop-up events.

Community engagement: A pilot effort is being proposed which will provide COVID-19 education and help address social isolation among Somali elders in public housing high rises. Financial support will be provided to a community-based group working with this population. If the pilot program moves forward, both the Health Department and Neighborhood and Community Relations will be involved.

Heat emergencies The Health Department is connecting with area hospitals to maintain situational awareness on hospital use related to extreme heat. Community spaces usually available for people to cool off, such as libraries and park buildings, are not available this year. Several strategies are being vetted to cope with extreme heat events including mobile cooling shelters using busses and development of emergency cooling site plans with the Park Board.

The City specific COVID email address is: COVID19@minneapolismn.gov.