A few nights back I attended the local city council meeting. The topic was a local tax levy which would defund the local social safety net by 69.7%. That’s about $230,000 of the city’s annual budget of $330,000 which helps to fund food banks, winter shelters, homeless day centers, and addiction and recovery facilities, as well as shelters for people escaping abusive relationships. The city is choosing to cut the portion of the budget which represents almost 3% of the total budget. They need the money to fund additional police resources, to protect a park from the very people who they are taking aid from.
Think on that for a moment. The city is taking from the social safety net to fund law enforcement.
While listening to people testify to the need for continued funding from the city, many of those speaking were talking about the need to fund a theater. The theater is also on the chopping block. While I recognize the importance of arts in a city, funding a theater while failing your most vulnerable is a condemnation of your city’s values.
The city is asking voters to approve a new tax levy to fund certain aspects of the budget, while at the same time they are cutting so called entitlements. It’s a common situation across the country. People with money are being freed from their financial obligations, having their tax burden cut, while common middle class and poverty-stricken people are having the rug pulled from under them.
The tax levy drew dozens of people to city council. The room was physically packed, standing room only, with people sitting on the floor. Everyone speaking out for their budgetary needs, education, boys and girls clubs, swimming pool, business development, care for the less fortunate—everyone needing the city to spend money on their projects. Once the levy portion ended the room emptied out.
In the time after the levy portion, I had the opportunity to give public comment on any topic. I chose to speak about a law which was being read by the city attorney, the previous version of which violated federal law and was creating exposure to potential for class action lawsuits. The previous version of the law criminalized the act of sleeping. This city is hostile towards the homeless. Rather than addressing the inhuman nature of laws criminalizing homelessness, the city changed its wording to outlaw the act of owning bedding while in public.
This video is my testimony to the council on how their new law violates the Universal Declaration Of Human Rights.
