On October 13th, the city of Pittsfield, Massachusetts is holding a public forum aimed at answering questions about municipal policies concerning unhoused city residents. The event comes after weeks of city council debate about how to address residents living in public parks and amid a push to build new permanent supportive housing that’s been opposed by some business owners and politicians. Mayor Linda Tyer says the goal of the event is to let officials and community partners respond to misleading narratives about Pittsfield’s unhoused residents and clarify what the city is doing to support them. She spoke with WAMC.
TYER: The forum will actually cover a whole variety of issues, things that we have come to believe the community is interested in learning about. There seems to be a lot of confusion about, for example, what's different between emergency sheltering and permanent supportive housing. So, we want to have a community forum to have that conversation and bring people up to speed on the distinction between those things and the investments that we're making. Panhandling is also an element of what the community is talking about, so we thought we could cover that topic during the forum.
WAMC: Now, there's been a lot of conversation in city hall about the unhoused and about panhandling and about how the city responds to these different needs, and we've heard a lot of rhetoric from those conversations, specifically in city council meetings, that's brought out as what seems like a lot of negativity towards some of the city's most vulnerable residents. Is this at all in response to some of that conversation?
Well, I agree with you. It has been discouraging, honestly, to hear some of the negative rhetoric and the negative, disparaging remarks that are being made by some who have the ability to influence people's thinking. We certainly want to sort of bust the myths that are being described by some. But we also believe in the dignity of the people that we're trying to serve. And so our forum will be geared toward helping the community come together in a way that will be supportive of the initiatives that we want to launch.
Now, as I understand it, you've actually opened this up to folks in the community to submit questions for the forum. Can you break down that process for it? How are you going to get that public input?
Yeah, sure. So, anyone who would like to submit a question for us to consider as part of our forum can send that question to this to the mayor's office at mayorsoffice@cityofpittsfield.org. And we will collect those questions in time for our forum and try to tackle those concerns or those questions that are raised by community members. But I would say also, Josh, that we're not going to entertain any kind of rhetoric or remarks that are in any way disrespectful or disparaging of the people who need us the most.
It does seem like the city's investment in the permanent supportive housing on West Housatonic Street is making major strides towards actually becoming realized. Are you hoping that this is going to clear the way for future discussions about that project down the line?
Absolutely. We want to make sure that the neighbors around the new project understand what it is and what it isn't, and will welcome and feel comfortable having this new development in their neighborhood. We're not in any way trying to dismiss people's questions, we want to answer them. And we're hopeful that we are moving in a direction where we can quickly have this project and White Terrace and the emergency shelter coming online so that we can be responsive to the needs of our people.
Is there anything about this I've not thought to ask you, Linda, that you think it's important for folks to understand?
Please tune in because I think we're going to have a great panel. We're going to be having some guests join us who have expertise in the field of housing, in the field of substance recovery, in mental health, and even we will have someone there to talk about reentry programs for people who are formerly incarcerated. So, it should be a really good forum
