City joins Council on Homelessness

City joins Council on Homelessness



By KATI BEXLEY
kati.bexley@staugustine.com
Publication Date: 07/15/08

St. Augustine joined hundreds of other cities Monday in a national program that works to eradicate homelessness.

The City Commission adopted a resolution to become part of the United States Interagency Council on Homelessness, which says it will partner with St. Johns County to create a 10-year plan to address homelessness.

Commissioner George Gardner was skeptical that will happen any time soon.

"We all know we've had this political rift between the city and county (over who needs to step in and address problems with the homeless)," he said. "I want this resolution adopted by the county, too."

John Regan, city chief operations officer, said that would be the next step.

Regan said the resolution shows the city is committed to the problem to motivate residents to give funds for homeless programs.

The U.S. Council of Homelessness plan says the city will pursue 12 points to help the homeless, including getting the chronic homeless off the streets, especially veterans, and recognizing punitive responses are often expensive and ineffective.


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