By Lindy Browning | Contributor, Rocky Mountain Voice
When the Grand Junction City Council was forming their plan in 2023 to find temporary shelters for the approximately 2,300 homeless people who were living in the streets, members of the community had multiple concerns about the potential problems with the proposed housing.
One of those concerns was the illegal use of drugs inherent to many in the homeless population.
On Aug. 22, 2024, the Grand Junction City Council approved changes to city zoning and created a process to establish places for temporary housing shelters in non-residential and mixed-use areas of town.
At the time, the Council decided not to approve tents or safe parking places, although those options had been considered in earlier discussions. They were not approved because of concerns about safety.
Homeward Bound of the Grand Valley Resource Center, a homeless resource center housed at 261 Ute Ave., became a regular hub for homeless to gather and get help for their needs. Recently, people have been camping and sleeping within the fenced parking lot of the center.
On Sept. 25, 2024, a detective with the Western Colorado Drug Task Force saw people smoking illicit drugs at the resource center. Eight people were arrested on drug-related charges and other misdemeanors. According to City Councilman Cody Kennedy, the officers had probable cause to arrest eight more people, but didn’t have the manpower to process them.
Kennedy said that he initially supported the city’s investment in the Recourse Center, hoping that the center could provide services to the homeless that would lessen the burden on local businesses and residents.
Residents of the area had grown weary of the crime, trespassing on private property, open air drug use, and using their parking lots and front yards as a restroom.
“It has become evident that the Resource Center is not working as intended,” Kennedy said.
The city approved $900,000 to the Resource Center to get the program off the ground after they voted to close Whitman Park, a place where many of the homeless gathered. The park had become unusable for the public.
After the arrests on Sept. 25, the Resource Center has asked for another $135,000 to be used to hire more staff.
“I am very much against giving them any additional money at this point. … We’re funding a crack house in the middle of Grand Junction,” Kennedy told fellow Council members.
“As a former police officer, I know that calling this ‘some drug use arrests’ misrepresents the severity of the problem. I acknowledge the good work being done here, but this isn’t working the way we intended,” Kennedy said.
People are being moved from camps to shelters, receiving medical care, and are able to access sanitation and nutrition services. However, the “ultra-low barrier” for services has unintentionally turned the center into a safe space for drug use, according to Kennedy.
During the work session the City Council held to discuss the situation at the center after the arrests were made, Mayor Abe Herman told the council members that 30,000 services had been rendered and on a daily basis, hundreds of people are being served.
When asked to describe what constitutes a service, Kennedy clarified, “Thirty thousand people have not been helped. A service is defined as each action, not each person. If someone comes in and gets a haircut, gets a cup of coffee, talks to someone who provides mental health services, gets a meal, that is counted as four services.”
Approximately 200 people are being serviced by the $900,000 appropriated to the program, he said.
The criminal activity has not gone unnoticed by the surrounding neighbors of the mixed-use neighborhood. There have been multiple complaints, calls and letters submitted to the city in the months since the center opened. One particularly eye-catching letter came from the Elk’s Lodge across the street from the center. The letter described ongoing safety concerns for patrons and employees at the lodge.
“Since my last address (to Council) we have faced escalating vandalism, vagrancy, drug use and trespassing, despite the best efforts and professionalism of the Grand Junction Police Department. These problems persist and worsen. Staff members fear to leave the building at night, and many elderly members are afraid to visit (the activities at the facility). We fully reject the message from Councilman (Scott) Bielfuss when he came to visit us, that ‘The Elks will have to continue living with this for the next 15 to 18 months,’ ” reads the letter from Jeremy Scheetz.
The letter came just before a tragic event at the Elks lodge. On Sept. 28, the Elks hosted a family movie night for its members. After the movie, a family, consisting of a mom and dad, and four children under the age of eight, were assaulted by a homeless man, Keegan Batts, 32. Batts approached the family and knocked the mother to the ground and pulled a knife on the father in front of his four small girls. Batts was charged with menacing, assault, attempt to commit motor vehicle theft and other charges related to the incident.
“While I have great compassion for people who are homeless, addicted and mentally ill, I also know that what we are currently doing is not helping them. We are keeping them sick, and enabling addiction. We need charity that is balanced with accountability,” Kennedy said. He is ‘very aware’ that these people deserve compassion, that they are someone’s family member, Kennedy said.
“I am aware of some new exciting programs that are developing in Grand Junction that are designed to help the homeless with mental illness needs. I have a lot of hope for the programs being developed at A Special Place, a nonprofit run by Carrie Shahbahrami who is a licensed Psychiatric Nurse Practitioner who has served the needs of the mentally ill in the Grand Valley for years.”