By Eleanor Boudreau
http://stream.publicbroadcasting.net/production/mp3/wkno/local-wkno-899414.mp3
Memphis, TN – They're aren't many houses where Memphis Mayor AC Wharton held the kick-off meeting for his Committee to End Homelessness. There's a golf course on one side of the road, and the Memphis Botanic Gardens on the other. The mayor spoke to his new committee in the gardens' Goldsmith Room. It's the kind of place that usually hosts flower shows, and garden club meetings.
Projected on the screen behind the podium was the text "Mayor's 10 Year Plan to End Homelessness."
Housing Director Robert Lipscomb introduced Wharton. He told the group that they were going to make a "dent" in homelessness. Wharton took issue with that language.
"We're going to end it," Wharton said. But Wharton did add his own caveat, "If we don't set our goals high we resign ourselves to a level of achievement that we dare not find acceptable."
So how much of this 10 year plan is intellectual and rhetorical? And how much of it is real?
When asked how good the plan was the Deputy Director of the U.S. Interagency Council on Homelessness, Anthony Love, said, "Well, they haven't developed it yet, so it is hard to say."
Memphis' plan might be mostly talk right now, but the Obama administration has also taken an interest in ending homelessness. In 20 days, Love will submit his Federal Plan to End Homelessness to congress.
Love says across the country cities have been going about the work of eliminating homelessness completely backwards, providing homeless people with food, clothing, substance abuse, and mental health services, before housing.
"If you do all of this other stuff and there is not home there, now what you have is a stabilized, sober person who is still homeless," Love said.
Brad Watkins says whatever plan the city comes up with will be housing first. Watkins is the Organizing Coordinator for the Mid-South Peace and Justice Center, which advocates for Memphis' homeless and is involved with the mayor's committee.
"That's been the big thing for us that has come out of this. It seems like there is a big consensus around that," Watkins said.
Wharton said eliminating homelessness is part of turning Memphis into a city of choice. Watkins says it will save money.
"The cost of incarceration here is $87-112 a day. Permanent supportive housing can cost us $35 and some change per day," Watkins said. "So it's not only the moral thing to do, it's the practical thing to do, it's the smart thing to do."
But in other cities across the country, residents have resisted permanent supportive housing for the currently homeless coming into their neighborhoods. As Memphis continues to ponder its plan it's something to think about.