Miami to put ‘tiny homes’ for homeless on an island after commissioners change course
One hour after Miami commissioners rejected a concept to create a temporary homeless shelter on Virginia Key, one commissioner flipped his vote, allowing the city to pursue a plan to set up “tiny homes” for 50 to 100 people on the island.
The idea for a “transition zone” was first suggested by Commissioner Joe Carollo in 2021 and was pitched Thursday as a way to connect people who are homeless with social services. But it sparked an outcry among outdoor enthusiasts and cyclists who bike, hike and paddle in the area, and was criticized by the Miami-Dade County Homeless Trust.
City staff had presented a list of three possible sites across the city that could host a shelter. Initially, Carollo and Chairwoman Christine King were the only two votes in favor of a pilot program to build several dozen small rooms on the northeast end of Virginia Key. When Carollo moved to launch the program, the vote failed Thursday evening. Then less than two hours later, Commissioner Alex Díaz de la Portilla asked to reconsider the idea.
Díaz de la Portilla then endorsed the pilot program and asked City Manager Art Noriega’s staff to analyze options for other locations in Miami and outside city limits. The administration is expected to produce a report in late September.
“My objection to the issue was based on the limited number of sites that they offered and the lack of due diligence they took in offering those three sites,” Díaz de la Portilla said.
The reversal quickly revived a controversial plan that appeared to be stalled for at least a few months. Díaz de la Portilla joined Carollo and King to pass the pilot program. Commissioners Manolo Reyes and Ken Russell voted against.
Now, the city is planning to buy small dwellings and place them on Virginia Key, near several outdoor recreational areas. Noriega told the Miami Herald it would be at least six months before the city could purchase the tiny homes and run utility connections to the land.
Earlier in the day, King said she saw the idea as an opportunity to provide more support for the city’s homeless population. Carollo was defiant in the face of the opposition to the Virginia Key plan. After mocking critics with references to Alcatraz and Devil’s Island, he argued his case for why he thought the approach was reasonable.
“We see it clearly. No one wants this in their neighborhood, it’s always somebody else’s they want to dump it in,” Carollo said. “I think we could move on in looking at one particular site that does not affect any of the population areas. Then we could see, if it works in one site, if we want to expand it.”
Even when the first vote failed, other commissioners said they supported more analysis of the idea and exploring other sites in the city for a possible transition zone.
Russell, who represents Virginia Key, rejected building the shelter in his district, and he said he thought it was a bad idea overall.
“It’s not in compliance with the Virginia Key master plan; we’ve got a lot of hopes for that area with regards to recreational and conservation activities,” Russell said. “It’s not that I don’t think it should be in one location more than the other, I simply don’t think we should be doing it.”
King took issue with the master plan comments.
“Homelessness is not in anyone’s master plan,” said King, who sits on the board of charity and homeless shelter Camillus House. “It’s just not. And it’s offensive to say it’s not in a master plan. It’s not in anyone’s master plan.”
William Porro, the city’s director of human services, presented the concept as a humane way to help “chronically homeless” people, or people who live on the street and refuse to go to a shelter. He described a facility where an outside management firm would provide security and enforce a zero tolerance policy on drug use, alcohol and violence. The “transition zone” would be a voluntary program.
In his comments, Porro acknowledged the criticism of the idea.
“I know I’m probably alone on these types of things, but I’m OK with that,” he told commissioners. “The way that they’re living currently is just deplorable. And they do it day in and day out. I don’t know how they do it.”
Díaz de la Portilla grilled Porro for presenting a list of possible locations that included Virginia Key, a lot under Interstate 95 in Liberty City and other addresses without studying upcoming adjacent real estate projects or, in one case, not speaking with private property owners. Porro also said he had not consulted with entities like the Virginia Key Advisory Board before making his presentation Thursday.
“It wasn’t vetted. It wasn’t thoroughly analyzed. It wasn’t well-thought out. It wasn’t deliberative. It was done, in my opinion, either on a whim or your own opinion on what should happen,” Díaz de la Portilla said. “There are community actors and people that are impacted.”
Before he changed his vote, Díaz de la Portilla said he’d be open to exploring an idea that didn’t come to his desk last minute.
Community advocates who blasted the Virginia Key idea criticized the city’s approach.
“The city could have avoided the embarrassment of floating this absurd idea,” said Leah Kinnaird, a founder of the Virginia Key Alliance advocacy group and a former nurse at the Camillus House clinic.
Esther Alonso, owner and operator of the Virginia Key Outdoor Center, said the opposition against the project is not about not-in-my-backyard elitists.
“This is about land like no other natural area in Miami,” she said. “Nobody wants a homeless encampment in their backyard, so we’ll put it in everybody’s backyard, in a gem of a public park. It would not be a good co-existence situation. You can’t have a bunch of homeless men around teenage girls in bikinis.”
King emphasized that the city must work on alternative approaches toward convincing some people living on the street to connect with services. She said she met a woman while working with Camillus House who has no services and refuses any from Camillus House.
“This would be a wonderful solution to her,” King said. “Is it perfect? No but it is an option.”
This story was originally published July 28, 2022 at 6:07 PM.
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