President Cowgill and commissioners,

Park staff continue to provide support and services for three formerly permitted encampments at parks. There are currently 13 tents at Minnehaha Regional Park, 13 tents at Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr Park, and 11 tents at The Mall, for a total of 37 tents at these sites.

We also continue to share information about weather and fire-related hazards with residents at these encampments.

As temperatures have dropped, there has been an increase in use of fire and heat from propane tanks. Last week, a fire erupted at The Mall which was caused by a propane heater. One individual from the encampment was transported to the hospital with injuries and their tent and belongings were destroyed. While small fires are allowed for culinary purposes, under Park Board Ordinance 2-20 no other fires are allowed in parks. For many weeks, park outreach staff have been regularly informing encampment residents that fires and propane are not allowed and pose a significant risk to people in the parks.

Outreach staff have also been informing those at The Mall that they need to move their tents and personal items 8 feet from the roads, so they are not within the snowplow wake zone. A plow wake zone is the area where snow from the street is deposited during regular plowing operations, which is eight feet back from the curb. This is a major safety concern and the current configuration of the tents at The Mall is dangerous.

On Sunday there was an attempt by encampment advocates to build structures and establish a new winter encampment at Brackett Park.  MPRB staff arrived and informed those on site that platforms and other encampment structures could not be built in the park, and park staff assisted those on site in relocating the lumber to private property.

The Park Board has consistently stated that parks do not provide appropriate shelter for people experiencing homelessness. New winter encampments cannot be established in parks and we continue to work with county, city, and social service organizations to find shelter for residents currently living in temporary park encampments.

Since early October, our outreach staff have been encouraging unsheltered people in parks to move inside as cold weather settled in. Many people have, as reflected in the number of tents in parks dropping from 256 tents on October 7 to 37 today. Our outreach staff continue to make calls several times a week to dozens of agencies to learn of available openings. Although emergency shelters sometimes reach capacity at night, according to Hennepin County new beds become available every day and family shelter is always available. Unfortunately, many of the residents who remain in park encampments have declined past and current offers of available shelter.

County, city and state partners continue their work investing millions to open new spaces before the end of the year and to ensure COVID-19 safety guidelines continue to be met at existing and new shelter spaces, as they have since the beginning of the pandemic.

Just today, the Salvation Army expanded their capacity by 20 beds. There are also four new emergency shelter projects underway that total 200 beds, including a 20-bed women’s shelter that opened this fall and a Salvation Army 30-bed shelter for women opening soon. The 50-bed Homeward Bound shelter for Native American adults plans to open December 1 and the AVIVO Village of 100 separate indoor tiny homes plans to open the end of December.

In addition, there are 12 projects with 670 units of new housing designated for people experiencing homelessness that have opened, will open soon, or will have begun construction by the end of this year. This includes three projects with 43 units opening by the end of December.

 

Superintendent Al Bangoura