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The Spokesman-Review

Amid housing crisis, Spokane hires new director

The Washington Post

OPINION: Smart policy on homelessness requires empathy, not contempt

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The Spokesman-Review

Amid housing crisis, Spokane hires new director

By Greg Mason

THE SPOKESMAN-REVIEW

The city of Spokane has hired a new full-time leader for the Neighborhood, Housing and Human Services division, a city department that continues to rebuild after a flurry of staff resignations last year.

John E. Hall III has been appointed by Mayor Nadine Woodward with the Spokane City Council’s approval to oversee the city’s housing, homelessness and community development initiatives. The division encompasses the Department of Community, Housing and Human Services; MySpokane/311 and the Office of Neighborhood Services.

Hall will take the reins amid a housing emergency in Spokane, as declared by Woodward last summer due to the city’s rising homeless population and record-high housing prices.

Woodward said Hall’s immediate priorities will include navigating the development of the new East Trent Avenue homeless shelter and the city’s efforts to relocate the hundreds living in the Camp Hope homeless encampment on state Department of Transportation land along East Second Avenue.

“What I’m excited about John taking over the division … is his level of experience with housing in all different cities,” Woodward said. “He’s going to be hitting the ground running.”

Hall, a native of Wichita Falls, Texas, most recently served as executive director of the Indianapolis Housing Agency.

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The 51-year- old has two decades of related experience, h a v i n g served as the Wichita (Kan.) Housing Authority’s executive director, the city of Wichita’s Housing and Community Services Department director, a field director for the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and the District of Columbia’s director of the Department of Housing and Community Development.

Hall, who has a master’s degree in public administration from Syracuse University, said he was impressed by the “level of commitment” and the “collective need to move the needle” he observed from Woodward and the City Council.

“Being a housing practitioner for over 20 years now, it is rare that local units of government have housing as a priority,” he said. “Most cities across the country are having a housing crisis I think, in part, due to the lack of sustained commitment to housing for decades.”

‘Rebuilding’ the division

Hall will start July 11 with an annual salary of $142,923.60, said city spokesperson Brian Coddington.

His predecessor, Cupid Alexander, resigned a year ago. Though his resignation was official July 31, Alexander was forced by City Administrator Johnnie Perkins to leave more than a month earlier.

Alexander then alleged Perkins racially discriminated against him because he is Black. A city-hired investigator found no evidence of racial discrimination against Alexander.

Alexander’s departure expanded a void in the Neighborhood, Housing and Human Services division, as Tija Danzig – a senior department manager – left for a new job that March, while former Community, Housing and Human Services Director Timothy Sigler stepped down some weeks before Alexander. Three more department employees also stepped down in the weeks following Alexander’s resignation.

Eric Finch, the city’s chief innovation and technology officer, has served in the interim as director of Neighborhood, Housing and Human Services. Meanwhile, the city in January hired Jennifer Cerecedes to serve as the director of Community, Housing and Human Services.

Woodward said she believes Hall and Cerecedes “are going to make a great team.”

“This is a great opportunity because we’re rebuilding that division,” Woodward said, later adding, “We’re going to be able to concentrate more on housing and what we can do at the city level because of his expertise. We do have a housing specialist in CHHS, but we do need more recommendations.”

Applications for the division director’s job were open from Jan. 19 to Feb. 20. Seventeen applied; two of the four selected for virtual interviews withdrew, Coddington said.

The candidates met with a panel of city officials as well as an external panel of community constituents, Woodward said, with invites sent for one representative each from groups including the Spokane Housing Authority, the CHHS Board, the Spokane Homeless Coalition and the Downtown Spokane Partnership.

The mayor said Hall also had an opportunity for one-on-one meetings with members of the City Council. The confirmation of Hall’s appointment sailed through the council Monday.

“Just based on his background and experience, I think he’ll be a great addition. Happy to have him,” said Councilmember Michael Cathcart.

Councilmember Betsy Wilkerson echoed that sentiment, saying, “His depth of knowledge was very impressive.”

Moving the needle forward

Hall recalls growing up in an impoverished community, saying he was “the little kid that had to run errands for all of the neighbors” who struggled with unmet needs, particularly those related to housing or social services.

Hall served for three years as executive director of the Indianapolis Housing Agency in a political appointment. Brought in to guide the organization through a change management process, Hall decided not to pursue an extension, saying it was time to move on.

In September, Hall was picked by the Tacoma Housing Authority Board of Commissioners as the authority’s new executive director. The agency pivoted, however, selecting April Black – who was then interim executive director – following public and staff concerns with alleged statements Hall made during his interview for the job.

The Tacoma News Tribune reported Hall was accused of making transphobic comments, referred to housing authority clients as “criminals” and somehow demonstrated a lack of knowledge pertaining to diversity, equity and inclusion.

While not all of the interviews were recorded, the News Tribune reported in October that a review of those available for viewing provided no evidence to support the claims. Videos of the interviews once posted on the housing authority’s website are now unavailable.

Hall and the Tacoma Housing Authority went through a mediation process in May, resulting in a $300,000 settlement to Hall paid through the authority’s insurance policy, according to a letter obtained by The Spokesman- Review. The housing authority board also issued a formal apology through a resolution for subjecting Hall to a “painful and undignified flurry of divisive remarks.”

A Tacoma Housing Authority spokesperson did not immediately return a request for comment.

Hall has consistently denied the allegations, saying he felt the housing authority’s process was done “with ill wills toward any external candidate.”

“I look forward to putting this attempted character assassination behind me,” Hall said. “I’m proud of my track record as a leader in the affordable housing industry. I’ve been doing this for well over 20 years and I’ve had great successes as a leader on workplace diversity, racial and income equity, and I’ve always promoted inclusive communities for all.

“I look forward to doing the same in Spokane,” he continued, “There’s a lot of work to be done and I have the knowledge, skill and abilities to work with everyone to move the needle forward.”

Coddington said Hall voluntarily disclosed details of the situation and the housing authority board’s resolution of apology with the city during the interview process.

“For the board to make that kind of public statement and public apology, the city considered that to be something that adequately addressed the situation and really affirmed his version of events,” Coddington said.

Bestowed with another government appointment, Hall said he is more focused this time around on making a long-term home, with plans to buy a house in Spokane and establish roots.

“I want to do things outside of work that will have me part of the community. So not just work, which is what I’ve done most of my career,” he said. “I’m hopeful that this appointment to the city, although it’s with Mayor Woodward’s administration, that it is a long-term one in that I’ll be viewed as an asset to the community and I can finish out my career here.”

As someone who has “been on all sides of the housing transaction” between lived experience, serving as a housing director for various cities or through his HUD work in helping local governments leverage federal resources, Hall said he is excited to contribute and work with the city as a whole.

In addressing homelessness, Hall said public officials have to “work with people where they are” and adopt strategies based on their individual needs, with the end goal each day of reducing homelessness closer to zero.

“My strategy as a public administrator is to create the opportunity for victory,” Hall said. “No individual is the same or has the exact same needs, so we have to create a multifaceted approach of options.” Greg Mason can be reached at (509) 459-5047 or gregm@spokesman.com.

Hall III

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The Washington Post

OPINION: Smart policy on homelessness requires empathy, not contempt

These days, homelessness is considered far less in relation to the suffering of those living on the streets and more as a “quality of life” issue. The focus, especially in election campaigns, is on middle-class people distressed and sometimes harassed by those without a home.

Of course, makeshift tent cities are not what public parks were built for. And people hurrying to work have a right to be upset about what are sometimes deeply disconcerting interactions with troubled people.

But there is a moral and practical obligation to avoid dehumanizing fellow human beings who have fallen on difficult times, and purely punitive policies will never resolve homelessness.

Empathy is a better guide to problem-solving than contempt. For taking us down this path, we can be grateful to Wendy Abrams, an artist and environmental activist who created the stirring exhibit “Invisible Words.”

Abrams went about collecting the signs that homeless people hold, usually when pleading for help on the streets. In her hands, works of desperation are transformed into works of art. And like all good art, the display reaches into both the mind and the heart.

There is nothing precious or contrived about the exhibit ending this week at the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial Library in downtown Washington. The signs were framed in a simple but elegant way — a mark of respect. One after another, without any editorial comment, they reflect the complicated emotions of the human beings who made them: pride co-exists with shame; anger goes alongside a longing for connection.

“Poverty and homelessness will never be eliminated but they can be humiliated,” reads one. “I want to remind all fortunate people of what they’ve forgotten: The Unfortunate.”

Many convey an intense sense of personal responsibility.

“Please help. Please. I’m not a bad girl. I just made bad decisions.”

“Please help. Homeless, Alone and Ashamed. Seeking a random act of kindness. Thank you. God bless.”

“Not my proudest moment. Never thought this could happen.”

Also evident, and remarkable, is the empathy that the signs display from those who made them for the people made uneasy as they walk past. One used a stylish script and a laugh emoji to declare: “This is awkward 4 me, too.”

“Need a miracle,” reads another.

“Vet. No Job. I don’t like this. I just need a little help. God bless.” Yes, God is much on the minds of the forsaken.

The sponsorship of the exhibit’s Washington stop by the Ignatian Volunteer Corps, a service program for older people rooted in Jesuit ideals, reflects the display’s purpose, described as “an exercise in empathy.”

“When we become disconnected from one another,” Mary McGinnity, the organization’s president and chief executive, told me, “when we lose our capacity for compassion for one another, we lose our humanity.”

The imperative is to transform the backlash against homelessness into effective and comprehensive national policies on housing and substance abuse.

The essential step, said Steve Berg, vice president for programs and policy at the National Alliance to End Homelessness, is to understand homelessness first and foremost is a housing market problem.

Yes, roughly 40 percent of homeless people suffer from “substance use, mental illness or both,” according to Berg, but that means a majority do not. It’s important to ask, “Why can’t we get treatment for people who are dealing with substance use?” he said in an interview. But even more critical is recognizing how the cost of housing puts it out of reach of too many.

Any long-term solution will require more affordable housing. In the meantime, Berg calls for recognizing that rent voucher programs currently reach only about a quarter of those who are eligible.

“Everybody who is eligible for Medicaid can sign up, and they will get Medicaid,” Berg noted. “Everyone who’s eligible for food stamps, for the SNAP program, they can sign up, and they will get help affording food. But with the housing programs, for whatever historical reasons, they’ve never been set up that way.”

Berg argued that we need to see housing as no less of a necessity than nutrition or health care. And a better rapid-response system would “engage people who have lost their housing, keep them safe and get them back into housing as quickly as possible.”

There’s nothing wrong with wanting safer, more orderly environments. Indicting city dwellers troubled by the chaos they sometimes experience on urban streets will get us nowhere. But the very stability and order they seek will endure only if all of us “fortunate people” try to meet the homeless on their own terms.

“All these people living on the streets is bad,” Berg said. “Who holds that opinion the most strongly? The people living on the streets.” The signs they carry remind us of this every day.

E.J. Dionne writes about politics in a twice-weekly column for The Washington Post. He is a professor at Georgetown University, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution and a frequent commentator for NPR and MSNBC. His latest book is “Code Red: How Progressives and Moderates Can Unite to Save Our Country.”