SPOKANE, Wash. — With winter fast approaching, Spokane will soon become more dependent than ever on nonprofits sheltering the homeless.
But with limited funds and increasing demand, operating those shelters isn't cheap, so the city council is exploring ways to lighten that load.
Council member Kate Burke realized the same nonprofits getting money from the city were often giving portions of that right back in the form of utility bills, so she's floating a proposal to effectively eliminate those bills.
Homeless shelters would get full credits for city garbage and sewer services, meaning those services would effectively be free.
They'd get water at the lowest possible rate: just the cost to the city to provide the water. Water can't be completely free because of a state law.
It's an alluring proposal for nonprofits. Catholic Charities of Spokane estimates it would have saved them $68,000 last year, allowing that money to go directly toward services.
In the briefing paper for the draft ordinance, city staff estimated the cost to the city would be around $230,000 per year.
Burke says the ordinance would not result in any new taxes or rate hikes on utilities.That means the utility departments would likely have to cut spending in other areas to make up the loss in revenue.
Council member Breean Beggs says subsidizing shelters' utility costs from the general fund, rather than providing a direct rate credit, is another option being considered.
Besides the cost, there are other concerns, too. Giving special treatment to shelters may be viewed as arbitrary or even unfair, given how many low-income individuals and families also struggle to pay utilities.
In fact, utility credits like this are more commonly given to individuals rather than organizations. We couldn't find any examples of other cities having tried something like this before.
Though the effective opposite has happened; the City of Atlanta threatened to cut off a shelter's water after they fell behind on bills.
If the ordinance were enacted, shelters would need to be enrolled in the city's Homeless Management Information System to qualify.
This creates another potential benefit of encouraging more organizations to join the system and provide much-needed data, Burke said.
Burke says the credit could be available to shelters that aren't typically eligible for many normal grants because they have pre-requisites for entry, like Union Gospel Mission.
The proposal is still in the early stages; right now the ordinance is just a draft.
But, Burke hopes it will be included in this year's budget talks and hopefully take effect early next year.
It would also basically be a pilot program; the current language says the policy would expire at the end of 2022.