Austin Council Wants Even More Homeless Hotels

[Elderberry]

Texas Scorecard By Jacob Asmussen December 4, 2019

“To just put all [the homeless] in a really shoddy hotel a few hundred feet from where we live … is just going to make the problem so much worse.”

AUSTIN — After several tumultuous months in Texas’ capital city, local officials have a new plan for their homelessness crisis: spend tens of millions of taxpayer dollars on homeless hotels.

Last month, the Austin City Council unanimously agreed to buy the southeast Rodeway Inn for $8 million and convert it into a hotel for homeless people, a shelter that will be “low-to-no barrier,” meaning individuals can enter without any background check, stay as long as they want, and don’t even need to be sober while they’re there.

Now, the council wants to create more places just like it.

At a Tuesday city meeting, council members discussed the possibility of purchasing another hotel as soon as next week.

“Folks will be able to stay there as long as they desire to,” said Matt Mollica, executive director of Austin’s Ending Community Homelessness Coalition (ECHO), the organization that will manage and pay for the operation of the city’s homeless hotels. “There will be some folks that identify the hotel as a long-term solution. We need to be flexible and allow that to be the case.”

More: https://texasscorecard.com/local/austin-council-wants-even-more-homeless-hotels/

[PeteS in CA]

... a hotel for homeless people, a shelter that will be “low-to-no barrier,” meaning individuals can enter without any background check, stay as long as they want, and don’t even need to be sober while they’re there.

Now, the council wants to create more places just like it.

I would not want to live, have a business, or work within a mile of these future Crime & Crap Centers! How in Hades can any pol not know this brilliant plan is going to end badly for every neighborhood around these future shit-holes?