HomeMy WebLinkAbout10-30-19 Public Comment - A. Sherman-2 - HRDC Warming Center SiteFrom:Andy Sherman
To:Sarah Rosenberg; Agenda
Subject:HRDC Emergency Shelter
Date:Wednesday, October 30, 2019 11:53:44 PM
Mr. Matsen,
My name is Andy Sherman and I live at 3006 Westridge Drive...4 houses down from the
proposed HRDC Winter Homeless Shelter. My wife and I first discovered Bozeman in 1989and 1992 respectively as students at MSU, when the city of Bozeman virtually ended at
Durston Road. We are now living in the neighborhood that was the furthest South of the cityat that time, and moved to this address 16 years ago with our two infant daughters. This has
been a great neighborhood for raising kids. The proximity to the schools and the oftenbikeable/walkable commutes for my wife and I have been so appealing, that we have stayed
put in this neighborhood composed of outdated 1970's houses. Our backyard neighbor, PeteAstrup, built the first house in Figgins and he and his wife Nancy still live there. We consider
them to be friends of a lifetime. Fully six of my adjacent neighbors have a key to my house--quite the level of trust. Prior to our move back to Bozeman, we lived for 8 years in the city of
Billings where for a time I worked in an academic after school program predominantly servingNative Americans. Standard protocol dictated that if a student wasn't picked up from my after
school program, I was supposed to call the police. The principal where I worked, ShannaHenry, told me to call her at home if I had students who were not picked up (a fairly regular
occurrence) and she would give me permission to drive the students "home." "Home" wasusually a hotel room---and definitely not at the Billings Sheraton.
My wife and I bought our first home in Billings for cash--and not because we were rich. The
real estate agent, Jeff Bailey, warned us on our first visit to what was to be our first home, thatit was one of those places you "wipe your feet when you leave" and boy was he right. Our
home in Billings was 4 blocks from downtown, and it was a regular event to have homelessgentlemen sleeping in the alley behind our house (right on the border of Broadwater Ave.) I
first discovered these gentlemen while trying to open our gate onto the alley, only to discover Iwas trying to push a human being sleeping on the backside of the gate. After pouring our
sweat equity into a circa 1920 house, we were able to move back to our Mecca--Bozeman--where we have raised two great kids and poured more of the same type of equity into our
"Bozeman Box" (that is truly what the Figgins homes are called) with decks, an above thegarage addition, and remodeled bathrooms and kitchen.
This rather lengthy introduction is to hopefully give you a context as to who we are and where
we came from. We are not snobs. None of my neighbors are snobs. We have the utmostcompassion for those not as fortunate as we are, and we regularly donate thousands of dollars
per year to charities that try to help the unfortunate creatures on this earth. Our favoritecharity is called Heifer International, and we buy livestock, solar panels, water pumps, water
filters, and seeds for needy people in third world countries. Locally, we donate 4 figures everyyear to the Salvation Army, Eagle Mount, and several animal shelters throughout Montana.
We try to pick charities that focus on humans (think children) or animals who really have nochoice in their plight, and charities with high ratings in terms of seeing the dollars maximized
for their intended purpose.
With all of the above background, we strongly oppose the proposed HRDC Winter WarmingShelter in our neighborhood. On so many levels, you couldn't pick a worse location to house
dozens of "in crisis" people on a nightly basis. I have been disheartened at the lack of honestywith which the HRDC has rolled out this proposal, and I am stunned at the abuse of power
wielded by a non-profit under the auspices of Ordinance 1997. A few years back, ourneighborhood successfully fought off a zoning change that would have allowed a national,
cookie-cutter student housing REIT to build a 600 bed monstrosity just west of MorningstarElementary. The process leading up the rejection of that zoning change was both fair and
open. Citizens were able to speak at an open zoning board meeting and also at an opencommission meeting, where ultimately the commission sent Campus Crest, packing.
Ordinance 1997 has effectively taken away this process, and I would wager that there areliterally thousands of Bozeman residents in Figgins, Alder Creek, Allison, Sundance Springs,
and West Meadows subdivisions who are both shocked and seething at this abuse of powerright now. The Chronicle has effectively made this a whisper campaign through the published
letters by shamers of us, but all you need to do is a simple Internet search on some of theletter-writing shamers to realize they are not our "neighbors" as they claim. The neighbors I
know in these south-side subdivisions, regardless of political leanings or socioeconomicstatus, are fuming that the city can "spot zone" an R-1 neighborhood under the guise of
emergency housing.
The red flags around this proposed homeless shelter abound:
Why weren't more neighbors noticed in regards to the first informational meeting? Thanks to cell phones, we did manage to get a couple of dozen people to show up, but
the minimal number of residents who were actually contacted in the 100 foot radius ofthe property--rumor has it, it was actually just one household--was totally ludicrous. A
second meeting was to take place on 10/30 and was promptly cancelled. My guess isthat someone alerted the HRDC that there were going to be way more people than the
handful of residents who were noticed in the ridiculously small HRDC defined "impactzone." HRDC's methods have been shady from start to finish.
If this is temporary, then why did HRDC BUY this overpriced house? (And it wasREALLY overpriced.) Why didn't they lease something like the old Heebs building?
Heebs is much closer to the downtown services set up for the homeless. CertainlyYouth Dynamics, the previous non-profit owner of 3025 Westridge, would have loved
to rent the home to the appropriate number of residents--definitely not 36!
Where are the other churches who should be stepping up in this homeless crisis? Christ
King Lutheran gave a totally lame excuse as to why they didn't want to be the overflowshelter again--logistics of cot set-up and takedown--really? If there are really no
problems with these guests "in crisis," then why aren't other churches raising their handsto take them in?
Why does HRDC want 9 separate bedrooms with closed doors--doesn't it make moresense to have 2 volunteers monitoring up to 36 "in crisis" people in a barracks style
setting?
In the HRDC management plan, there are scheduled smoking breaks out of doors. In
this day and age...really? Someone who is homeless can afford an awful habit to thetune of $6.26 per pack and can't even make it through the night without a smoke? One
of the scheduled breaks is apparently at 1 AM...who is watching the "children" of thesesmokers behind the closed bedroom doors at 1 AM? Certainly the children aren't forced
to follow the "women" outside to watch their mothers smoke at 1 AM.
Figgins Subdivision has no streetlights. None. What happens when one of the 5,400
separate guests between now and April decides to leave the facility? They will mostcertainly walk right through our neighborhood heading downtown. Would you want an
"in crisis" person walking through your neighborhood on a dark winter night?
Weapons are turned in "on your honor" and we were told that "nail files" are an example
of a weapon that gets turned in, as homeless people generally don't want to carry seriousweapons around. I know you haven't lived here for long, but we had a homeless
gentleman shoot another homeless gentleman at East Main/I-90 back in 2013. I'll betthe fellow who was shot 3 times wishes the weapon carrying myth were true.
The pitch for this proposed shelter has continually used the "women and children" heartstrings bait. When pushed, HRDC finally admitted that there could/would be men
(couched in the term "families") sleeping at 3025 Westridge. They also admitted thatthey don't turn anyone away if there is an open bed on a cold night. If there are no open
beds, then a sleeping bag is handed to the homeless person. Why wouldn't one of the100+ volunteers HRDC boasted of having just put that poor soul up for the night in their
own home? Why am I being shamed as not compassionate because I don't want 36 "incrisis" strangers as guests 4 doors down for 5 months out of the year, but the HRDC
volunteer would turn someone away with just a sleeping bag on a winter night inMontana?
What happens when a guest decides to skip the bus ride out of our neighborhood at 7AM? None of the guests are vetted in any way, so does that mean our nearby schools
will have to go into lockdown while the potentially dangerous individual is found?
We live in a zoned community. As such, we should be able to trust that the zoning rules we
bought into are predictable. We also should be able to trust in the process which allows lightto be shined on every side of every decision at the zoning change level. (Did you know that
the traffic study for the proposed Campus Crest development was done over the Thanksgivingbreak? You would have to see the weekday traffic with Morningstar elementary to get an idea
as to how laughable the count was. I believe it was the single most important "Aha" momentof that months-long fiasco.) I wonder what the "Aha" moment is in the background of this
proposal.
When all is said and done, I sure don't envy you. The City Commission has put anunimaginable amount of pressure on you as a Czar of sorts who decides the fate of proposals
under Ordinance 1997. You are in the position to enrage either potentially thousands ofBozeman citizens, or else alienate people from the HRDC who appear to be so enmeshed in
the workings of our city government, that it is difficult to determine where the city ends andwhere HRDC begins. In any event, I wish you well in your decision and hope beyond hope
that logic is your compass.
Be good and be happy,
Andy Sherman