6/24/2022
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KREM
KXLY
The Center Square
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KREM
Fencing was installed on Thursday morning along the west side of Division Street at Sprague and on the north side of Sprague on the east side of Division.
SPOKANE, Wash. — The city of Spokane is taking steps to clean up the area of Division Street and East Sprague Avenue. Now, city crews have set up new fencing after campers set up last night.
Fencing was installed on Thursday morning along the west side of Division Street at Sprague and on the north side of Sprague on the east side of Division, according to Spokane Communications Director Brian Coddington. There are approximately 150 feet of fencing on each side.
Coddington said the fencing allows pedestrians to pass and use the sidewalks.
Similar fencing was set up on the Browne Street viaduct in an effort to keep people experiencing homelessness from camping in the area. The city called it a “health and safety measure.”
The city said it has been difficult to keep up with trash and other debris in the underpass. Spokane has hired extra litter crews to clean high-traffic areas.
"This was the next evolution of the pilot project that began in the Browne Street viaduct," Coddington told KREM 2. "Like Browne Street, City crews have struggled to keep the Division and Sprague areas clean, healthy, and safe for everyone. Frequency of cleanup increased a couple weeks ago and even the daily efforts weren’t enough to keep up with the volume of waste."
All the people who were camping in the area were asked to move in order for the cleaning to take place, which Coddington said is standard practice. However, many of the people camping in the area are still staying on the sidewalks outside of the fencing.
Coddington said there have been no reports of arrests or citations. He added a temporary night-by-night shelter remains an option for those who were asked to leave the area.
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KXLY
Posted: June 23, 2022 11:44 AM Updated: June 23, 2022 9:18 PM by Melissa Luck, Elenee Dao
SPOKANE – Just days after police and a cleaning crew cleared campers and tents from under the railroad bridge at Sprague and Division, the city has now erected fencing, blocking most of the walkways.
City crews were putting up the fences Thursday morning. Several people who had been camping underneath moved to a sidewalk just northeast of the underpass.
The city previously put up fencing at the Browne underpass near the House of Charity. That decision was met with criticism from homeless advocates, but the fencing remains.
PREVIOUS COVERAGE: City of Spokane adds fencing under Browne Street underpass
The new installation is also being met with disapproval. Within minutes of hearing about the move, developer Sheldon Jackson sent an email to Mayor Nadine Woodward expressing his frustration.
“You do understand that when you do this without fixing the problem, you are pushing the problems to other areas, especially areas not in the DSP (Downtown Spokane Partnership). You put a fence at Browne and Division turned to crap, now you put a fence on Division, what do you think is going to happen? You did not solve anything, just made another area worse. Why don’t we just put a big fence around Spokane?” Jackson wrote.
Jackson told 4 News Now that fencing is better for the underpasses, but just moves campers to other areas.
“Division was in good shape until they put up the Browne Street fence. Everyone just moved to Division. Now that they put up a fence at Division they will just move to another location,” he said.
In an interview Thursday afternoon, the mayor said she hears “far more people who are happy” about the fencing going up.
“Because their businesses are being impacted by the activity under the viaducts that’s not healthy or safe for anybody. Those are the people I will address right now because they’ve been asking for this,” Woodward said.
Woodward says the fences are a way to clear the homeless out of the viaducts and keep the area clean and safe for those who want to walk through. She said it’s been difficult for crews to keep up with all the trash and other activities that have been happening in the viaducts.
“I don’t know why we’ve got to the place where we think it’s okay for people to live under viaducts. That’s not humane,” she said.
Members of the Spokane City Council also expressed frustration, saying they did not know about the mayor’s directive until 4 News Now mentioned it.
“We had no idea. So, your text to me was the first I’d heard of it,” Council President Breean Beggs said to reporter Elenee Dao. “I did talk to the city administrator not long after that, and he apologized and said he forgot to tell council. And that’s just really unfortunate.”
Beggs wishes the mayor would keep them in the loop, especially with what he says is a controversial topic.
“This is an operational decision I made, and this is my decision to make,” Woodward said.
This comes as the city prepares to welcome tens of thousands of people for Hoopfest.
Beggs believes the fences will only push the homeless to camp somewhere else. In this case at the Sprauge and Division area, just a few feet from where they started.
Maurice Smith, with the Spokane Homeless Coalition, agrees with Beggs. Woodward says she knows the fences will not solve homelessness, but rather just clean up the area and keep it safe.
“I come back to the reality that fences are a stunt and not a solution,” Smith said. “And when the city admits that it’s not a solution, why are you wasting good taxpayer money on something you know won’t work?”
Woodward says the fences will stay up “as long as they’re doing their job.” In previous interviews with 4 News Now, Woodward said the number of calls for service dropped for the Browne Street underpass once they put the fences up.
“When we put fencing up in the Browne viaduct, that was a pilot project. I had mentioned, at that time, several times that if there were other viaducts experiencing a level of activity, that presents an unsafe and unhealthy environment for our community and for the people under there, we’d replicate elsewhere,” she said.
Both the Browne Street viaduct as well as the Division, Sprague viaducts are the two she said she wanted to address right away, as the city continues to put in a new homeless shelter.
The City Council will review a lease agreement during Monday’s meeting. Beggs also said he has also been working with Councilmember Kinnear about putting in an ordinance to keep the viaducts clear but also follow the law in giving the homeless somewhere to sleep.
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The Center Square
(The Center Square) – Spokane County has extended the operation of an isolation facility for people infected with COVID-19 at a cost of $150,000 per month, of which the local government pays 10%.
This week, Commissioners Al French, Mary Kuney and Josh Kerns granted a request by Dr. Francisco Velazquez to fund the facility for another three months.
FEMA covered the cost of the quarantine facility after COVID-19 was declared a global pandemic in 2020. However, the agency has announced that, starting in July, it will only cover 90% of operational costs.
The county agreed Tuesday to pick up the remaining $15,000 per month.
Velazquez, the Spokane Regional Health District’s health officer, initially asked for a six-month extension. The commission agreed to less time.
Kuney said the county needed to be looking at ways to transition out of the pandemic phase of COVID-19 and into treatment of the virus as tough it were the flu or other illnesses.
Local health records show that 28 people visited the isolation facility operated by the Salvation Army. To date in June, there have been 22 guests. That number is down dramatically from January when 72 people were at the site.
Kuney said data shows that families are figuring out how to isolate at home when someone is infected, and people were testing less.
“As that is happening, how are we transitioning out?” she asked Velazquez.
“At some point, we will get to our transition end stage – I think we are looking forward to that – but I think we still have a bit of a challenge,” he replied.
According to Velazquez, COVID-19 cases and hospitalizations are on the rise once again. He said 880 new cases were reported in Spokane County last week, up from 801 the week before and 702 two weeks earlier.
“We are still in a fairly high transmission mode,” he said.
He said wastewater testing indicates that COVID-19 cases are being severely undercounted. He said that was unsurprising given that more people are using over-the-counter tests instead of visiting the health district’s community testing sites.
Public health experts have learned they can gauge the number of COVID-19 cases in the community by analyzing wastewater, said Velazquez.
When people go to the bathroom, they shed the virus. By determining the concentration of coronavirus-specific proteins in wastewater, scientists can make an educated guess about the number of overall infections, he said.
According to Velazquez, people are not getting as ill with the BA.2 variant as they did from the original strain and delta variant, but many still end up needing more intensive medical care.
The DOH reported Thursday that 9% of hospital beds in the county were being used by COVID-19 patients.
The BA.2 variant was spreading among the vaccinated and unvaccinated, said Velazquez.
Spokane County has a population of about 513,400 people and the state Department of Health reports that 58% have been vaccinated.
Velazquez told the commissioners that the county facility is also open to people who have just been released from the hospital and need a place to stay, those with behavioral issues or experiencing depression.
“I do want to make clear that this facility is for all in the community,” he said.