STL Bicycle Lobby

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@NickDesideri There were 7 streets department trucks clearing an encampment today yes? The same department that got tens of millions of dollars from BB120 to repave streets? Who paid for the gas in their trucks while they cleared the encampment!?

@NickDesideri Glad to see you caring about the well-being of our homeless neighbors Nick!!

This is misinformation and cannot be taken seriously. A complete disregard for how city budgets work or the US Treasury rules governing ARPA funds ⬇️

@westbywest @ladybacon86 There’s a high probability that #BB120 funds passed last month are being used by the streets department to clear this encampment.

@STLBicycleLobby @ladybacon86 It'll be notably perverse if any of today's activities causing persons to no longer have adequate shelter later get billed to one of the ARPA accounts

💯 0% of our budget is going to support our unhoused neighbors. What are we even doing here?!

Eight hours later, the bulldozing has started

@brianmmunoz Have any official statements been provided from the mayors office or Director Scoggin?

Most residents have vacated with a lot of their belongings left behind. Seems to be a holding pattern on clearing the remaining materials with city officials on standby, including St. Louis DHS Director Yusef Scoggin.

At least six dump trucks are lined up near the Leonor K. Sullivan encampment of unhoused people along the #StLouis riverfront. The City has gone back and forth with advocates for months in attempts to clear this site. Stay tuned to @stlpublicradio for more.

@MonicaObradovic Thanks again for your reporting Monica. Follow up 🙋‍♂️: It appears the belongings are being tossed in unmarked black garbage bags. How does the streets department track whose belongings are whose if the bags are unlabeled? Does dept of human services assist?? @nickdunne_stl

@STLBicycleLobby I haven’t called but one the trucks is being used to take residents’ belongings to some storage location. I’m told by the unhoused advocates down here that it’s normal for the streets department to show up to haul what’s left of encampments away.

The brigade to clear an encampment of unhoused people near Laclede’s Landing this morning.

@ChrisWillcoxSTL The best way to address homelessness is to…build more housing. Seattle recently passed a social housing bill to build more affordable housing: axios.com/local/seattle/… Kansas City passed similar housing bonds: gkcceh.org/kcmo_affordabl…

@ChrisWillcoxSTL You’re preaching to the choir here. Looks like a big part of this problem is ARPA funds are being contracted out to third parties. City has no internal capacity for this, so they have to pay a 2-3x premium to a contractor to provide services. And yet…cops just got a 16% raise

Weird that the streets department has time to forcefully evict homeless people from public space, but not repaving roads & filling potholes. Would love to hear what plan, if any, the city has to rehouse these folks or direct them to support services? @NickDesideri @MeganEllyia

@BStingSTL @chryssi Were any of those amendments reintroduced after Boyd and Reed left office? If not, have other alders had any discussions around reintroducing elements of that amendment under a new bill next session?

@BStingSTL Appreciate the input, Alderman. Any idea why more ARPA funds haven’t been spent after the board allocated money? Seems like the board allocated a good deal of funding, but little of it has been spent.

@LifelineAidGrp If it’s private property why are public employees working on clearing the site?

Folks are using a dump truck to transport unhoused residents belongings to “storage.” Im unclear where that is.

Is clearing encampments is in line with the recommendations from @CoriBush newly formed “caucus to end homelessness” ? riverfronttimes.com/news/cori-bush…

What if instead of doing some civil asset forfeiture, the city sent representatives from the department of public health to assist in Medicaid enrollment and the housing authority to provide expedited section 8 approval? How does throwing away peoples belongings help them??

@MonicaObradovic Are there any public officials down at the scene or just workers from the streets department??

A fence is being built around the camp.

@westbywest @NickDesideri @MeganEllyia @chryssi are these figures correct? Have we really only spent $80k on rapid rehousing measures??

@STLBicycleLobby @NickDesideri @MeganEllyia $8 Million allocated from ARPA for emergency shelter yet only $5 Million spent. More distressingly, $3 Million for rapid re-housing yet only $80k spent. $1.5 Million for bridge housing yet only $159k spent. Etc.

Maybe @BStingSTL knows something? Were any plans of this discussed with the BOA?

@westbywest @NickDesideri @MeganEllyia I wonder if funds from BB120 are paying the streets department to do this.