12 Feb 27th-March 5th, 2025 phoenixnewtimes.com PHOENIX NEW TIMES | NEWS | FEATURE | FOOD & DRINK | ARTS & CULTURE | MUSIC | CONCERTS | CANNABIS | of interest. Woods served on TCAA’s board of directors from 2006 to 2012. Albert Avelar, a local landlord who filed the appeal against the permit issuance, said at a city hearing that his tenants were concerned about the unhoused trespassing and stashing belongings on his property. Both in a letter to the city council and in an interview with Phoenix New Times, Larios said unhoused people moved through the area like “zombies.” Larios said some positives could come from the shelter, and she says she wants the homeless to get help, but she worries it will bring more unhoused to the area. She objects to the idea, raised by TCAA board member Lou Silverman during a Jan. 9 city council meeting, that resident concerns are “fear-based.” “There’s fear because we’ve seen it. We live it in this neighborhood, you don’t,” Larios said. “It’s not a fear out of nowhere.” Much of that sounds like the stereotyp- ical resistance to any development meant to aid the unhoused. But one argument residents make has some teeth. They say such a project would never have been approved — or even considered, for that matter — in more affluent parts of the city. “They wouldn’t do this if it were the Lakes, they wouldn’t do this if it were Warner Ranch, they wouldn’t do this to certain areas of Tempe,” said Garnet Markis-Rocos, an artist and Victory Acres resident. Larios agreed. “These type of developments take advantage of areas and neighborhoods like this,” she said, “because they don’t have the power to voice, or the money to get lawyers or protest against it.” Tempe and homelessness The claim that Tempe saddles lower- income areas with affordable housing and homeless shelters while leaving tonier areas alone does hold merit, said Elizabeth Venable, the cofounder of the homeless advocacy organization Fund for Empowerment. Neighborhoods like Victory Acres do feel a “disproportionate burden,” she said. But Venable and Jeffrey don’t think that’s a reason to reject the TCAA project. Tempe has a terrible reputation for addressing homelessness, they note, adding that any forward momentum should be welcomed. Jeffrey provides input on homelessness to the Maricopa Association of Governments through the Lived Experience Collaborative. From 2018 to 2020, he was unhoused, living in the large encampment that sprung up in the Salt River Bottom and struggling with substance abuse. As a military veteran, he eventually got help through the Veteran’s Court and the Veterans Administration. Tempe “is notorious for criminalizing homelessness,” Jeffrey said. The homeless- ness crisis has myriad, entangled roots, but Jeffrey said Tempe has often made the problem worse. After the U.S. Supreme Court ruled last year that cities could enforce bans against public camping — and after Arizona voters approved Proposition 312, which allows property owners to sue for property tax refunds if cities don’t enforce public nuisance laws — Tempe announced it would more strictly enforce its own camping bans. “It is a systemic issue rooted in long- term policy failures, economic trends and legal shifts that have made homelessness more pervasive and difficult to address,” Jeffrey said. “Rather than implementing proactive solutions, the response has been a stick-without-a-carrot approach — one that punishes poverty without providing meaningful pathways out of it.” The kind of community pushback the TCAA development now faces isn’t new to advocates such as Jeffrey. He would tell concerned residents to consider the greater good. Solutions to homelessness have to come from everywhere, and for once, Tempe is doing something positive to address the situation. Residents can be a part of the problem or a part of the solution. “The citizens of Tempe have a choice,” Jeffrey said. “They can embrace real solu- tions and help end homelessness, or they can reject progress, allowing suffering to persist while their city remains complicit in the very crisis it claims to solve.” The Tempe Community Action Agency says it will break ground on its new headquarters at 2425 E. Apache Blvd. in March. (City of Tempe) Gimme Shelter? from p 10
