Opinion

Converting old hotels can help reduce homelessness

BY TOM SIMPLOT

Guest Writer

Recent increases in homelessness, coupled with the challenges brought on by the global pandemic, have made it progressively more di cult to provide enough shelter to house people living on the streets.

The majority of Arizona facilities that focus on o ering food and shelter to those in need are at maximum capacity, often making it di cult to properly social distance.

Many times, people experiencing homelessness are faced with the choice of staying in a shelter (and facing a higher risk of acquiring COVID-19), or choosing a dangerous situation like sleeping in their cars or on the streets.

This is a decision no one should have to make.

Also as a direct result of the pandemic, many hotels and motels across the country have lost business, especially the older properties.

With these two factors in play, homeless and housing providers throughout the country, including here in Arizona, developed a new service model for transitional and permanent supportive housing. It’s called “hotels to housing.”

With the need to rapidly adapt service models during the pandemic to accommodate safety protocols while still continuing to serve the homeless, housing providers started to look at vacant hotels as an opportunity – an opportunity to turn unused rooms into housing for those who so desperately need it.

The “hotels to housing” concept allows homeless persons to be distanced for safety and stabilized in comfortable housing, before they move to permanent housing with the help of wraparound services.

We have already learned that this new model for housing makes following COVID-distancing requirements easier and provides more humane housing than large, congregate shelters. We have also learned that this model results in shorter stays in transitional housing, and may even o er permanent supportive housing.

Statewide, many homelessness agencies are moving to this new model and ADOH (AZ Dept. of Housing) is making major commitments to “hotels to housing.” ADOH has funded “Project Haven” in Phoenix, a former motel that will be transformed into a 130-unit transitional housing community for seniors so they can achieve the dignity they deserve, and JoJo’s Place in Flagsta , a former hotel on Route 66 that will be converted into a transitional shelter for all ages.

ADOH is funding at least two more hotel acquisitions with federal CARES Act funding and we are developing a funding pipeline with additional federal funding.

Most hotel conversions plan to o er closed facilities, where only residents cleared to stay will be allowed, and include full-time security and on-site supportive services. Residents will be provided all the necessities, within the converted hotel properties, to stabilize and move toward self-su ciency and permanent housing.

While the pandemic created even more problems for an already tenuous housing situation, it is also forcing Arizona to fi nd new, innovative solutions.

Turning hotels into housing helps save lives and provides a potential long-term solution for reducing homelessness, but it also does something more. It o ers a successful model for future regional, specialized housing that didn’t exist before.

Through “hotels to housing” projects, homeless Arizonans can be safe and secure under a roof, receive needed healthcare services, and eventually get back on their feet.

Tom Simplot is the director of the Arizona Department of Housing.

Forlorn phone calls that will never be answered

BY DAVID LEIBOWITZ

Columnist

All his life, 75 years, my father was careful with his money, so he would be appalled by the waste. He never liked to spend a dollar, not when he could save a buck. My dad passed away in March, though, which means the decision isn’t his to make anymore.

So the phone stays on, even though there’s no one left to answer it. The line rings four times before it passes over to voicemail.

The message is a perfect metaphor for my father: Short, economical, nothing needless. He must have recorded the greeting a decade ago, when he and my mother fi nally decided to get rid of the ancient answering machine they’d had since time immemorial. The phone company must have sent them a coupon.

It’s just two sentences.

“Hi, this is Harvey,” he says. “Go ahead and leave a message.”

So I do. Even though I’m well aware that no one will ever get back to me.

Sometimes I tell my dad about my day: What’s going on at work, which clients have which problems, how I’m hitting the golf ball, how I’m doing on my diet. Other times I tell him which moments sparked memories of him and my mom. Usually it’s a song on the radio. My parents loved music from the ‘60s and ‘70s: Crosby, Stills and Nash, the Beatles, John Denver.

When I called last week, it was brought on by a song: “Black Water” by the Doobie Brothers.

It was a hit in the spring 1975, about the time I turned 10. I know this because that was the spring break my parents packed my brother and I into their Volkswagen Beetle and drove us from New York to Florida to go to Disneyworld.

That was back when no one booed at the Hall of Presidents and before they cut out the sexist portions of the Pirates of the Caribbean ride. We spent days packed into the VW, 2,000 miles in each direction, a family of four cramped and too crabby to play license plate bingo. The Doobies played on an endless loop as the FM stations faded in and out. But it was all worth it for the E-ticket rides: 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, the Haunted Mansion, the Jungle Cruise.

My father was 30 then, a paint factory worker with a wife and two kids in elementary school. Whatever childhood dreams he’d had for himself – All-Star basketball player for the Knicks, law school, airline pilot – were never going to come true.

I imagine he knew it. He owned an old Super 8 movie camera and he shot lots of footage of his sons and his wife, but not much of himself. My father was always present, though, never the focal point, always right o -screen, circling around us at the edges.

Sometimes when I call his phone number now, I wonder aloud about how that made him feel, why my father’s life so rarely seemed to be about him, at least to the people it was about. He doesn’t answer, of course. My father always was a man of few words. He spent them the way he spent his paychecks: Like there was never quite enough to go around.

My voicemails to dad’s old number always end with me telling him “I love you.” It was the way we always ended our phone calls back when he was alive. It was a sentence he said with conviction, like it mattered to him, and I never doubted it.

Maybe that’s why I still call, even now, even with no one there to answer.

To hear his voice. Always there, always nearby. Even from heaven.

New organization taking on school boards group

For the past few weeks, we have heard the cries throughout the country of the National School Boards Association (NSBA) rallying the Executive and Judicial branches of Government to characterize parents “speaking out” about their children’s education as “domestic terrorists.”

While NSBA was quick to apologize, the damage was done and the intent clear on the message this sent throughout the nation.

For too long, school board members in Arizona have not had a choice.

While each board is all but required to join a school board association, they have been forced to rely on the monopoly of one organization Arizona School Boards Association (ASBA) for policy guidance and training.

They do so with hefty memberships, upwards of $10,000 per year, paid by the school districts with your tax dollars! That association then trains your school board members on topics like Critical Race Theory.

It is time for that to change.

The Arizona Coalition of School Board Members is a non-profi t, non-partisan organization dedicated to helping school board members put students fi rst.

Other associations have forgotten who is important: our kids. In education, students should always be at the forefront of training and policy considerations, not unions and special interest groups. What works for one student may not work for another, which is why The Coalition will always support school choice.

The Coalition also recognizes the importance of parents in their child’s education. Kids belong to their parents, not the board, school, or state. Parental rights have been eroding – slowly at fi rst and now it seems right before our eyes.

As of this writing, 26 state school boards associations have now distanced themselves from the NSBA. Ten of those states have discontinued membership, participation and dues because of NSBA’s actions.

While one district in Arizona has cut ties with the national organization, none have yet to do so with ASBA. How is this acceptable? If you feel compelled to contact ASBA and demand answers please do!

The Coalition doesn’t just provide training and services to board members. We o er membership to parents, concerned citizens, and school employees.

Even if you haven’t had a student in the K12 system for many years, that’s OK. Join us. The Coalition welcomes all charter, public, private and homeschool advocates. The Arizona Coalition of School Board Members understands that education policy requires an unwavering, laser focus on #StudentsFirst. Support our mission and get involved today. azcoalition.org -Nancy Cottle (AZ Coalition board member)