Charleston Mayor William Cogswell is touting new plans for less restrictive temporary housing and more robust public programs to address homelessness in the city.
The mayor’s plans, however, have been met with some skepticism, largely due to the plan including a caveat that calls for police to arrest unhoused people for minor offenses if they previously refused offers of help. Charleston director of communications Deja McMillan did not respond to requests for more information.
Reports last week said city officials were looking for policies that produce long-term results that keep people from sliding back into life on the streets. One outlet even reported the city’s police department was butting heads with the administration over that idea.
But Charleston Police Lt. Anthony Gibson told the Charleston City Paper June 25 that wasn’t the case.
“There’s no friction,” he said. “We work with the city of Charleston constantly on homelessness. … The city has really opened their doors on this. The mayor’s willingness to look at the issue holistically is good.”
Gibson added the department does not yet know the specifics of the plan, but said department leaders are working with the mayor’s office to ensure its efficacy.
As of now, he said, police do not take people’s status of having a home or being homeless into consideration when responding to calls.
“Often, we come across homeless individuals on calls for service,” Gibson said. “It’s just an expectation of what we do. We just respond to everything all the time with everybody, and some people we come across happen to be homeless.”
On the streets
Gibson continued: “The vast majority of interactions with unhoused people do not have to be from a criminal standpoint,” he added. “There’s a variety of ways in which we interact. Being homeless is not a crime. Someone’s homeless status does not influence what we do as a police agency.”
He explained that several behaviors often are associated with someone’s housing status, including panhandling, but that protocols used by Charleston police officers vary depending on specific situations when answering calls.
“We get there, and immediately ask, ‘Who is the complainant, what was said and is there a crime being committed,’ ” he said.
The answer to the last question often depends on time, location and other factors, he said. Panhandling, for example, he said, is not in itself a crime, but the passing of items to and from vehicles is, as well as pedestrians who stand in a roadway.
In any case, when officers deal with unhoused people, Gibson added, officers generally refer them to city-sponsored programs designed to help people get off the streets.
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