This is an archived article that was published on sltrib.com in 2017, and information in the article may be outdated. It is provided only for personal research purposes and may not be reprinted.
While mayors of Salt Lake City and County agree on a vision of smaller, resource-based homeless shelters that will eventually improve upon the aging shelter downtown, a split has emerged on the costs of acquiring property for the new sites and the timing of closing The Road Home on Rio Grande Street.
City administrators reiterated Tuesday that Mayor Jackie Biskupski seeks to shutter the 1,100-bed emergency shelter at 210 S. Rio Grande — known as the epicenter of the capital city's drug trade — when four planned 150-bed shelters come online.
But Salt Lake County Mayor Ben McAdams believes the larger shelter could stay open until improved services eliminated the need for it. McAdams said Tuesday that he's wary of setting an "arbitrary date" for the shelter's closure and has "serious concerns" about the $10 million the city paid to acquire two of the four sites.
The divergence in perspective was highlighted Tuesday when the city's administration presented the City Council with a list of terms it drafted for a proposed memorandum of understanding with the county.
Council Member Derek Kitchen noted this paragraph: "The City and County agree that both parties desire that the Road Home facility, located at 210 South Rio Grande, will cease operating as a homeless shelter after all four of the new Resource Centers have been constructed and are opening."
"Are you really comfortable saying that?" Kitchen asked Biskupski's deputy chief of staff, David Litvack.
Litvack said that language reflected the understanding the city had with the City Council when it selected the four sites at 653 E. Simpson Ave., 275 W. High Ave., 131 E. 700 South and 648 W. 100 South.
"To be honest with you, I'm not comfortable with that language in there," Kitchen said. "That doesn't make sense to me."
Since late summer, McAdams has responded to concerns that more than 500 people will be left out in the cold with a closure on Rio Grande by saying that The Road Home would draw down beds at a one-for-one ratio with new sites, and it would stay open thereafter as necessary.
Publicly, city administrators haven't so much argued with McAdams as they've repeated that the state and county need to do more to help serve the area's homeless population. Privately, they've done the same.
Both Biskupski and McAdams are on the board of the nonprofit Shelter the Homeless, which owns the land leased by The Road Home. In November, Biskupski called for board members to agree to eventually swap the Rio Grande land for the shelter at 648 W. 100 South, which is owned by the city's Redevelopment Agency.
After her proposal was circulated by board chairman and Zions Bancorporation CEO Harris Simmons in advance of a Nov. 22 meeting, state Department of Workforce Services Director Jon Pierpont wrote that he wasn't yet convinced the new model would reduce demand to the extent that The Road Home could immediately close upon the opening of a fourth new shelter.
"The main objective we should be focused on is to shelter those in need seeking services," Pierpont wrote. "If I am lacking further information on the city's stated goals, then I welcome further discussion on the subject. Until then, I don't believe I can fully support the proposal 'as is.'"
In response, Biskupski wrote: "The City has been very clear for over a year now that we simply cannot continue to support over 1000 people in shelters and that the State needs to assist in a statewide solution for Shelter. … It is unfortunate that at this stage the State is asking the City to continue to provide all Shelter services that are needed."
Pierpont said Tuesday that with "any issue that's important to the community and the state, there's always great debate," and that his office hopes to continue discussion about how to reduce demand.
Biskupski was not available for comment Tuesday, city officials said.
McAdams said "it does seem that Mayor Biskupski has a different view" from his own. Closing the shelter without accounting for all those in need "would cause chaos to our homeless services system and cause disastrous impact," he warned.
Litvack stopped short of characterizing it as an argument, but did allow that "Salt Lake City may feel stronger about this particular point that we can't continue to shoulder as disproportionate a burden as we have, that the City Council and administration, in deciding the four resource centers, were united that the goal was to have four resource centers, and we continue to strive for that."
Also included in the draft terms for an MOU is language that states the city will only convey title to its properties to their ultimate owner — possibly Shelter the Homeless — when it has been reimbursed, and that, "The County agrees to endorse all of the City's requests for reimbursement for all expenses related to securing the four sites."
While Salt Lake's City Council set aside almost $12 million to acquire the sites, McAdams said the county had roughly estimated about $4 million would be necessary to reimburse the city out of an expected $27 million in state funding. The total of $12 million was necessary, he said, so that the city had the funding required to secure options on additional finalists that it would then present to the public for input.
Litvack questioned the source and soundness of the county's $4 million estimate.
The city spent $7 million on 653 E. Simpson Ave. and $3 million at 275 W. High Ave. It has a three-year option to buy a Mormon Church-owned thrift store at 131 E. 700 South and expects to receive fair-market value for the RDA-owned land at 648 W. 100 South.
"We have serious concerns [that] what's been committed for land acquisition thus far is well beyond the scope of our budget," McAdams said.
The cost to build the four shelters was estimated in the city's request for proposal at $40 million — a price that does not include land acquisition.
Litvack told state lawmakers at a City Hall dinner Tuesday night that the city didn't anticipate asking for additional funding beyond the $27 million already requested, and that he expected private donors to offset the cost difference of about $10 million from a previous plan of two, 250-bed shelters to four smaller shelters. But the city does still expect to be reimbursed, he said earlier, for its property acquisitions.
Council Member Lisa Adams, whose district includes 653 E. Simpson Ave., also pointed out during the council's work session that the draft terms for an MOU capped the sites at 550 overall beds and 150 each. She still hopes to withdraw the controversial Simpson Ave. site, she said, and "I don't know that I necessarily want to tie our hands."
The city's timeline for zoning and conditional use approvals indicates it will be at least a year before it can break ground on shelters at 653 E. Simpson Ave. and 648 W. 100 South, and nine months until it can do so at 275 W. High Ave. and 131 E. 700 South.
McAdams said the county anticipated that timeline. It had hoped the sites would have been selected in August or September, and not December, but he believes they can still demonstrate the progress sought by legislators.
The city invites community input on the zoning and conditional use language at two community workshops Wednesday.
Twitter: @matthew_piper