Screenshot of Tuesday’s Eureka Council meeting.
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Weeks after the Eureka City Council’s grueling seven-and-a-half-hour discussion over a proposed ordinance to increase penalties for people living in unauthorized homeless encampments, tensions remain high.
While discussing future agenda items near the end of last night’s city council meeting, Councilmember Scott Bauer said he has experienced “many restless nights thinking about what transpired” at the Mar. 28 meeting and apologized for not doing more to stand up for staff who were subjected to “acrimonious testimony” and “tremendous disrespect” from members of the public.
Scott Bauer.
“I can’t let it go,” Bauer said. “Frankly, I thought our community was better than that. I sincerely apologize to all staff involved in [the] meeting, [who] dedicated so much time to crafting this ordinance. You simply followed a council request to develop this law and present it to us, and you should not have been treated so poorly. … What I do find completely baffling is the lack of trust expressed during public comment in our staff [who] have dedicated [their] heart and soul to working with our homeless population.”
Many of the speakers who spoke during the three-and-a-half-hour public comment period at last month’s meeting opposed the ordinance and criticized the city for “criminalizing people simply for existing.”
The draft ordinance — linked here — would increase penalties for “unlawful camping, sitting, and lying in public spaces” from an infraction to a misdemeanor, and would allow the city to redirect offenders to community-based rehabilitative services instead of jail through a municipal program called Law Enforcement Alternative Diversion (LEAD).
Bauer acknowledged concerns about the criminalization of homelessness but emphasized that the proposed ordinance would “be used as a tool, not a bludgeon” to help law enforcement get people off the street and into housing.
“I, for one, believe EPD is a wholly necessary part of the social fabric of our city and sleep better knowing our women and men in blue are out there doing their best to care for and protect our citizens,” he continued. “This council has been nothing but supportive of CSET [Community Safety Engagement Team], Uplift, CARE [Crisis Alternative Response Eureka] and a myriad of programs that have the sole mission of getting community members off the streets. … I believe Eureka and its public servants are doing more for its homeless population than most — if not all — cities in this great state.”
At the end of his five-minute statement, which you can watch in the video below, Bauer urged his fellow council members to avoid “kick[ing] the can, once again, down a long and apparently endless road,” and asked that the council revisit the ordinance next month.
“If we do not take action, we are sentencing our most vulnerable to a life in the willows, wetlands and green spaces of our community,” he said. “Do we really think this is in the best interest of our city and [our] citizens?”
Councilmember Kati Moulton defended the council’s decision to table the item, noting that it was 1:30 a.m. and “emotions were running really high” after the lengthy public comment period.
“I thought it would be more useful for us to have a delicate and nuanced conversation with a fresh head at the next meeting,” Moulton said. “But at this point, I would say that the ordinance is either useful and we should … adjust it and pass it, or we should take an entirely different path, but having this kind of hanging out there, I agree, is not helping anything.”
Mayor Kim Bergel asked if the rest of the council was in favor of the proposal, and was met with two thumbs up from Bauer and Moulton, and two thumbs down from Councilmembers Leslie Castellano and Renee Contreras-DeLoach. (Councilmember G. Mario Fernandez was absent.)
Castellano acknowledged Bauer’s frustration with the way that staff were treated, but felt it would be “disingenuous to the community” to bring the ordinance back prematurely.
“I do feel like we set upon some things that we told the community we’re going to be working on,” she said. “I do think distrust of government in general is, from my experience, at an all-time high, and I don’t think that trust is going to be built by bringing [the ordinance] back so soon.”
Tasked with breaking the tie, Mayor Bergel took a few moments to collect her thoughts before explaining her stance. She described how EPD has changed its policing tactics over the years, adopting a more compassionate approach.
Mayor Kim Bergel.
“I’ve watched staff go from slashing tents, stealing people’s property, talking smack about people, all those things. I’ve watched our [police] department change over the last 10 years, and I’ve watched our city grow in compassion over the last 10 years,” she said. “I was very disappointed about the meeting … and I had people call me on the phone, very upset that … it would be put off to some [date] far, far away.
Bergel agreed that the ordinance should be brought back to the council sooner rather than later. “I would like to see some resolution with it,” she said. “If it fails, it fails, but I think that the discussion … needs to happen.”
With three thumbs up secured, staff agreed to add the ordinance discussion to the council’s May 20 agenda.
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Other notable bits from last night’s meeting:
- The council received an update from Uplift Eureka on staff’s efforts to increase homeless outreach and services. Special Programs Manager Jeff Davis said the Uplift Eureka Community Resource Center, located in the Municipal Auditorium at 1111 E Street, has had nearly 400 people visit the resource center since it opened to the public in January. Uplift continues to house people through its Homeless, Housing, Assistance and Prevention (HHAP) programs, Davis said, adding that the city has housed over 200 people through its Rapid Rehousing Program. “Every day we’re working towards better outcomes and better goals,” he said.
- The council also received an annual report from the Humboldt Waste Management Authority (HWMA). This summer, the authority is going to launch a study to assess the feasibility of creating a local organic waste collection site. City Manager Miles Slattery noted that the city’s compostable materials are sent down to Mendocino County, which kind of defeats the purpose of collecting organic waste to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
- Staff also revealed the city’s new poet laureates: Sarai Bordeaux and Oivia Jaqueline Gibson. Both poets read a poem to the council, one of which moved Mayor Bergel to tears.
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