The following column is the opinion and analysis of the writer.
In the age of President Trump, it shouldn’t be a surprise when government figures or associated departments tweet out something controversial. But last Friday morning it happened again, with the offending tweet originating a little closer to home than the Oval Office.
The tweetstorm
The Twitter account for Park Safety, the fledgling department founded in 2018 and tasked “to ensure safe and welcoming parks” according to their website, posted an announcement that linked to a screenshot explaining a 2015 city ordinance that ostensibly makes it a violation to distribute “food, beverages, or any other articles” to 10 or more people in a city park.
While the ordinance, Tucson City Code 21-4, is itself controversial, that wasn’t what caused the initial backlash. The Park Safety statement continued, and, borrowing logic from wildlife conservation and applying it to human beings, really kicked off the firestorm.
“The distribution of food also generates an increase in our homeless population. These individuals will continue to stay in these parks and return due to the repeated distribution,” the statement read. So basically, “don’t feed the ducks.”
It also included a line that alluded to possible criminal penalties, up to and including jail time, for defying the ordinance. Although the ordinance does make allowances for arrest and other penalties, the statement seemed extreme. “Don’t feed the ducks, or else!,” seemed to be the message.
The statement ended with a list of services provided by nonprofits and churches, and an accompanying post of photos taken of trash collected at De Anza Park on Speedway Boulevard to drive home the point.
While whoever running the account attempted to conduct PR spin, the damage was done. Twitter users, known for their tact and argumentative prowess, pounced on the post, accusing Park Safety, perhaps credibly, of picking on the homeless and discouraging good Samaritanism.
Within a day, Tucson Police Chief Chris Magnus had entered the fray, defending the nascent department.
“The angry, ill-informed comments are a good representation of those who view these issues abstractly or in a reactionary way, but certainly not as park neighbors or park users,” he tweeted. “They also have no real understanding of the dedicated & thoughtful approach being taken by Park Safety.”
The ordinance
In an interview a week after Park Safety’s initial post, Magnus explained that the impetus behind the department’s tweet was pure, but walked back some of the more incendiary parts, like violators being sentenced to jail time or fines and the “no feeding the humans” element.
“The intention behind the message of the tweet was that there are ways to be more effective in helping homeless,” he said. “To the extent that somebody gives someone a sandwich or something, the tweet conveyed that we were going to arrest people for doing that or cite them. I really regret that, because I don’t think that was the intention of those that put that tweet up.”
Magnus also said during the interview that he didn’t believe the city ordinance was meant to pick on the homeless population, but that the city council enacted it “for safety” for all the different parties who use or are near city parks.
On Thursday, Feb. 13, Mayor Regina Romero issued a statement essentially saying that, under her administration, the ordinance wouldn’t be enforced.
“I have spoken with Chief Magnus and he has assured the mayor and council that no individual will be fined or otherwise penalized for carrying out the humanitarian act of feeding a person,” it read.
Still, for Zaira Haynes-Livier, director and co-founder of the social justice community organization People’s Defense Initiative, there’s little question: the ordinance is aimed at criminalizing the homeless.
In an interview, Haynes-Livier contended that the ordinance shouldn’t just be ignored, it should be rescinded and taken off the books. She noted that Romero, who had served on the city council for years before becoming mayor, voted to pass the 2015 resolution that expanded the ordinance.
To Haynes-Livier, the ordinance is another step in a national move toward criminalizing the presence and actions of those suffering from poverty.
“If this is a code that isn’t going to be enforced, if you believe that it’s wrong, then you need to rescind it, you need to repeal it,” she said.
A path forward
Magnus acknowledged that balancing the needs of stakeholders, which he broke into four different categories (park users, neighbors, business and church interests, and the homeless population), can be especially tough.
But he said his department had a blueprint model to go off of in Amphi Neighborhood Park, just off Fort Lowell Road.
While the park has some built-in advantages (it’s small, it’s fenced, it’s adjacent to a Catholic church that owns the land the park sits on and leases it for $1 to the city), it suffered from problems familiar to many city parks: dead grass, trash, curfew breakers, illicit drug use and a growing population of homeless individuals camping out.
TPD Lt. James Wakefield said that community members came to the department last year complaining about drug use and assaults. Then TPD held a community meeting at Sacred Heart Church, along with other nonprofits, charities and services aimed at helping indigent populations.
“We knew we were gonna take a shellacking at the meeting,” Wakefield said. “Which is OK, that’s the first step in getting some of those problems identified worked, is getting those community members in to yell at us a little.”
After the meeting and TPD physically surveying the park and concluding “arresting the problem away” wouldn’t work, according to Wakefield, a plan was put into place to help address the myriad problems facing all the parks constituencies.
Parks and Recreation trimmed back overgrown trees and bushes, allowing children to play and run around easier. Sacred Heart Church put up lighting that activated after dark to discourage curfew breaking and loitering.
Tucson’s Housing and Community Development department and a mental health support team made visits to help those who qualified get registered for city services. Police cracked down on drug dealing around the immediate neighborhood and made sure to enforce curfew.
“We had everyone in there with their different disciplines and they’re chipping away at the problem, so that it wasn’t one big, heavy lift for any one agency,” Wakefield said.
Wakefield is realistic, however. He conceded that police sometimes are forced to make arrests. While he said the metrics of crime in and around the park have improved, he can’t guarantee that all the people suffering from homelessness and addiction were helped.
“It gets a little challenging to track that,” he said. “If they go to Community Bridges for either alcohol or substance abuse disorder treatments, or go to CODAC, we bump into HIPAA regulations.”
For critics of TPD and its approach to dealing with homeless populations, that isn’t good enough.
Haynes-Livier, who says she believes that housing and substance treatments are a human right, would like to see less of an emphasis on law enforcement and a greater importance put on actually housing people struggling with homelessness.
“I can tell you I have been to talks where houseless people have been there, talks on this in particular, and police officers have also been there,” she said. “And I can tell you that houseless people do not feel that police officers are in any way helping them.”
Common ground
Gradually, the culture of Amphi Neighborhood Park began to change. By addressing the layered, and sometimes competing, interests of the parks’ different constituencies, real progress was made.
Last Halloween, the neighborhood around Amphi turned out for an event held by TPD that included donated costumes, face painting and a movie in the park.
“It was really nice, some of the people that came out and yelled at us at first in late August were there for the Halloween movie, and they said things like, ‘we’ve never seen anything like this,’” Wakefield said.
Wakefield is optimistic that the improvement seen at Amphi can be replicated at bigger, more frequented city parks.
While she disagrees with the approach being taken by law enforcement and the city, Haynes-Livier is also optimistic.
“I think people should follow up with groups like Food Not Bombs, they should get to know Casa Maria and other groups that do that work and donate to them,” she said. “Help them, cook with them and get involved.”
Ultimately, both Wakefield and Haynes-Livier agree on one stance: throwing people who are homeless or addicted to narcotics in jail isn’t the way to get people off the streets.
“Ending up in jail, that’s not really a good alternative or substitution to getting them treatment,” Wakefield said. “Tucson is just blessed with a lot of providers looking to help these folks.”
