In early June, Fort Wayne City Council opened their regular meeting up to public comment. They then heard nearly two and a half hours of testimony from residents on the proposed Anchor Resource Center.
While council heard from a number of individuals both for and against the proposal, a main driver of the opposition is about the location; 333 E. Washington Blvd.
Third grade teacher at St. Paul’s Lutheran School Kristin Hoem spoke in front of City Council, on behalf of her husband Administrative Pastor Joe Hoem. She told council she and her husband support the mission of the center.
“We believe Fort Wayne must do more for the people experiencing homelessness," Hoem said. "Our concern is the location.”
The proposed location is about 800 feet from the school.
Several other staff members also spoke that night, with a focus on the location being wrong due to the way students use the entirety of downtown as an “extended classroom.”
Peter Scaer, a resident from the North side of the city and former parent at St. Paul’s spoke about other concerns.
“I speak of Zachary offenders, those who pose the greatest threat especially to children," he said.
He’s referencing a law that requires registration of convicted sex offenders and details the responsibilities of law enforcement agencies, as well as responsibilities of the offender, according to the Allen County Sheriff’s Department website.
In an address to City Council two weeks later, Mayor Sharon Tucker responded to this specific concern. She said she reached out to the Fort Wayne Police Department for a report on crimes against minors within a one-mile radius of the proposed location for the past three and a half years.
The findings she presented were five crimes against minors which all took place in the residential areas and none of them by a homeless individual.
“There is a perception, but there is no factual evidence to support that having a resource center, and/or the Rescue Mission for that matter, within 1000 feet of a school has created danger to our children," Tucker said.
The location being proposed was chosen in part due to its proximity to the Rescue Mission, which is just down the block, as well as other resources in the area for shelter, food and healthcare.
But there was more to it, as well. Tucker’s Chief of Staff Andrew Downs explains some of the other criteria used to decide what location would work the best; non-residential, walkable or accessible by bus, space for an outdoor courtyard and enough parking.
Downs said there have been suggestions to get the center out of downtown and over by the new jail or the airport.
"When you start looking around, almost nobody lives on a bus line, almost nothing is on a bus line," he said. "So, the question is how far do you have to walk to get to a bus line?”
The goal of putting the center downtown is to meet people where they are.
The city solicited feedback from the community through a form on its website that was open for two weeks, with the promise of publishing and responding to each question or comment it received on the proposal. Several of those comments suggested other locations, such as the jail – which the city doesn’t own – or another property the city does already own.
Downs explained the problem with one such property being suggested, which currently houses city vehicles and doesn’t have a building on the property.
“We will have to build the building," he said. "And you’re probably looking into the $10 million range for the size of building that we’re talking about.”
While there has been a loud pushback against the project, there are many who also support it, even in its current location. Ahead of the city council meetings, nine organizations with presences downtown wrote letters in support of the proposal and more than half of those who spoke at both city council meetings spoke in favor.
In the final part of this series, we’ll look at how Fort Wayne City Council has responded to the proposal and how it has increased some tensions between that body and City Hall.
Find the previous part in this series here and the next part here.
