Homeless rates in region hold steady, but the time without shelter worsens
Sep. 22—TRAVERSE CITY — As a day shelter in Traverse City for people without homes faces a surge in demand, a seasonal overnight shelter a few blocks away is preparing for what could be a busy winter.
Safe Harbor is expecting more people to come to its doors looking for a place to stay once its season starts on Oct. 15, said Josh Brandt, the nonprofit board's fundraising chairman and spokesman. That's based on numbers from past years.
But space at the shelter is limited, both by fire codes and by health and safety considerations, Brandt said. While the building is permitted to sleep up to 90, Safe Harbor staff and volunteers limit that to 74. That's to create a safer and more comfortable environment, although on nights with bad weather, volunteers set up cots for a few more.
Brandt said the shelter works with other partners, such as Goodwill Inn in neighboring Garfield Township, to avoid turning people away. While Safe Harbor tries to keep its barriers to entry low, it might have to turn people away this winter, based on the trend of the last several years.
"So I think that because we've experienced it last year, there's no reason to believe it's not going to continue that way," he said.
Safe Harbor volunteers are ramping up for the coming season while board members discuss how to move forward with a proposal to keep the typically seasonal shelter open year-round.
City commissioners at their recent meeting unanimously agreed they support the idea and noted it'll require amending the shelter's special land use permit and operating agreement.
Operating around the year will also take money, with Safe Harbor board Treasurer Wayne Sterenberg telling commissioners it'll take an estimated $980,000 per year to stay open for 12 months, nearly double its current operating budget of $515,000.
Brandt said afterward that Safe Harbor's donor base will help foot some of the increased costs, and the nonprofit will also look to the city for financial support.
At the same meeting, commissioners approved giving Jubilee House $80,000 over two years to help pay for hiring staff to support the day shelter's volunteers. The ministry of Grace Episcopal Church runs out of a home next door to the Washington Street parish, giving guests a place to shower, do laundry, access the internet, socialize or simply relax.
The Rev. Jim Perra, Grace Episcopal's rector, told commissioners the shelter saw a 431-percent spike in visitors since 2022. In that time, the number of clients went from 20 or so per day to more than 80.
Perra said after the meeting with commissioners that he figures the increase reflects a homelessness crisis impacting the U.S., from which Traverse City is not immune.
"In fact, the cost of housing, and the availability of affordable housing, has become untenable for so many," he said. "Every year, the average cost of housing goes up faster than the rate by which people make money, so that is going to create more people without homes."
Homelessness rates in Antrim, Benzie, Kalkaska, Grand Traverse and Leelanau counties have held steady since 2022, according to Northwest Michigan Coalition to End Homelessness.
The number of people either staying at places like Safe Harbor or Goodwill Inn, or sleeping in their cars or in tents in the woods, typically is about 250 for the five-county area, coalition Executive Director Ashley Halladay-Schmandt said.
The vast majority are within Grand Traverse County, and most of the homeless are from the county, according to Halladay-Schmandt. From July 2022 to July 2023, 89 percent of the people who the coalition served claimed Grand Traverse as their last county of residence; 3 percent, Kalkaska; 2 percent, Benzonia; 2 percent, Antrim; and 1 percent, Leelanau.
One possible reason that people without homes tend to concentrate in Grand Traverse County is because of its two homeless shelters, Halladay-Schmandt said.
The coalition tries to house people where they have ties, including outside the county, and tries to meet people where they are.
"So if someone is experiencing homelessness out in the woods or wherever, we can provide services right where they are," she said. "They don't have to come in to the shelter to get services."
While the overall homelessness rate has largely stayed the same, other metrics are worsening. Coalition figures show that the average time people go without shelter has grown by 150 percent since 2020, from 86 days to 129.
The coalition pointed to a lack of housing as one factor. All of its housing placement programs were completely full as of mid-September.
Halladay-Schmandt also pointed to a lack of what she called deeply affordable housing — meaning they're priced for households earning 30 percent or less than the area median income. For Grand Traverse County, that means a family of four making $29,650 or less.
But the recidivism rate for homelessness has decreased in the area, according to their data, from 29 percent at the beginning of 2020 to 20 percent now, she said.
Coalition partners also have rehoused 240 people over the past year, Halladay-Schmandt said. But others are losing their homes almost as quickly as the coalition can find homes, sometimes faster.
"That speaks to our need for more housing," she said. "In communities where there's more units that are truly affordable for people, you don't see as high of rates of people coming into homelessness as we do."
While the coalition didn't see its member service providers bracing for a surge of demand, Halladay-Schmandt said one factor upping the number of people without homes concentrating in Traverse City is Garfield Township enforcing its no-camping ordinance. Perra also pointed to this as an issue.
As of Aug. 19, 87 people were camping on city land at the corner of Eleventh and Division streets, according to city Police Chief Matthew Richmond. That doesn't include the 20 to 30 people he estimated were coming and going from day to day.
Richmond figured the number of people living there seemed slightly higher than last year.
Police respond to the camp for incidents such as aggravated assault, ordinance violations, assault, fire, disorderly conduct, larceny, and suspicious situations, according to Richmond.
Between May 1 and Aug. 15, Traverse City Police Department responded to 126 calls. That overall number is higher than the department's call volume to the same area from May 1 through Oct. 14, 2023. About a quarter of those calls were for property inspections.
While camping on city property is against the rules, city police typically won't make a camper leave unless they're suspected of breaking other laws. City officials affirmed this stance after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that local governments could ban camping on public lands.
Garfield Township Chuck Korn said the township's no-camping ordinance is nothing new — and neither is its enforcement. While township officials faced criticism for it, and city leaders took a different approach, Korn said he believes the city's policy choices are what's creating the problem.
Garfield Township, meanwhile, is dealing with homelessness in its own way, including permitting the year-round shelter at Goodwill Inn and allowing developers to build affordable housing, including a development with supportive housing.
"We are not allowing illegal acts because our residents have asked us to protect their property, protect their parks and make it so they feel safe doing what they want to do," he said.
Korn said the township dealt with its own camping issue when it cracked down on an encampment that started behind Goodwill Inn and spread to neighboring property.
An ensuing legal battle involving local ordinances, health codes and state law ended with the camp's closure in April 2021, with many of the 30 or so people who were camped there likely displaced to Traverse City instead.
The township will continue its efforts to solve the problem, Korn said.
City leaders and a group of charities and service organizations have said they want to end camping at The Pines, agreeing it's unsafe, unsanitary and undignified. Keeping Safe Harbor open year-round would give the people camped there an alternative.
In the meantime, Safe Harbor is gearing up for another winter season, including lining up volunteers from its member churches, installing furniture, repainting and repairing or replacing worn-out kitchen fixtures, Brandt said. Shelter leadership also brought back most of its staff from last year. One will be taking the role of resource manager by helping guests connect with services in the area.
Ultimately, it'll take bigger conversations at the regional level to tackle homelessness here, Brandt said. Safe Harbor only has so much space for its mission of sheltering people from the elements.
"So it's always kind of a triage situation where we're in touch with Goodwill Inn and other places to find places for people to go if we do face that situation where we're at capacity," he said.
