IFS Update June 2023

FEATURED

Posted on June 30, 2023 by admin

Last week the District Court issued a decision upholding the City’s approval of the CUP for Interfaith Sanctuary. District Court decisions may be appealed to the Idaho Supreme Court. Our legal team is still reviewing the court’s full written decision to evaluate our next steps.

Also IFS is getting closer to having their building permits (BLD22-04235 and BLD22-04236) issued – they just need to pay roughly $130K in fees. So be vigilant and report anything that doesn’t seem right or is unsafe. See Neighborhood Safety for how to report. Please also email us on all issues so that we can maintain a record.

Update on VPNA Appeal of IFS Design to City Council

Posted on February 6, 2023 by admin

At the 1/31 City Council meeting, City Council agreed that the fence separating Interfaith’s Proposed Shelter from the adjacent properties should be constructed of a barrier with soundproofing qualities sufficient to block conversational noise generated on the site. We are proud that our advocacy resulted in this improvement for the immediate neighbors of the property.

However, City Council did not even acknowledge our concerns that, since the project was approved, the promised re-opening of the Willow Lane Substation has been cancelled and de-funded. This is a major concern for the neighborhood as a whole, and we are not aware of any plan to address it.

Note – The Design Review process is separate from the CUP and focuses on design details. The VPNA lawsuit on the overall project is still in process with the first hearing at the end of March.

Appeal Hearing at City Council of Interfaith’s Proposed Homeless Shelter Design

Posted on January 24, 2023 by admin

Next Tuesday, January 31st at 6 PM in City Hall, the Boise City Council will hear VPNA’s Appeal of the approval of Interfaith’s design for their proposed homeless shelter at 4306 W State. This is an appeal of the design and it’s associated issues.

The hearing will be held at Boise City Hall, but you can also signup to join online at https://www.cityofboise.org/events/city-council/2023/january/city-council-2/

Those who have testified in writing or in person regarding DRH22-00345 may testify at the upcoming hearing.

Design documentation as well as comments and proceedings from the prior design review hearing and the appeal to Planning and Zoning can be reviewed and downloaded by clicking https://permits.cityofboise.org/CitizenAccess/Cap/CapDetail.aspx?Module=Planning&TabName=Planning&capID1=22CAP&capID2=00000&capID3=00X38&agencyCode=BOISE (select “Documents” under “Record Info and Documents” and then click “View Record Documents” below that).

We hope to see you at this important hearing.

Attend and Testify at IFS Design Review Hearing on October 12

Posted on September 29, 2022 by admin

Interfaith Sanctuary has been continuing to develop their plan for their proposed homeless shelter at 4306 W State St. They have applied for Design Review which will be held on October 12, 2022 at City Hall starting at 6 PM.

Details on the meeting including links to sign up for Zoom or join via YouTube are at https://www.cityofboise.org/events/pds/2022/october/design-review-committee/

WE NEED YOUR ATTENDANCE AND TESTIMONY AT THE HEARING. Please plan to join and testify.

WE ALSO NEED YOU TO SEND YOUR WRITTEN COMMENTS to the Design Review Committee by 5 PM Thursday October 6th. Send your comments to zoninginfo@cityofboise.org and be sure to indicate DRH22-00345 on the subject line and in your comments.

The Design Review application is DRH22-000345. It may be viewed on the City’s Accela website at https://permits.cityofboise.org/CitizenAccess/Cap/CapDetail.aspx?Module=Planning&TabName=Planning&capID1=22CAP&capID2=00000&capID3=00X38&agencyCode=BOISE. Click the “Record Info and Documents menu on the” on the left side of the page. Then click “View Record Documents”. The page will update with a list of available documents (including the VPNA Comment Letter). Key documents of interest include the following:

• Their updated Letter of Intent (PDS-Letter of Intent-). This highlights their intention to not build the Day Shelter building, and to increase the size of the main building by roughly 11,500 square feet.
• Updated site plans and building floorplans which have names beginning with “PDS-Maps and Drawings”. These drawings show the changed floorplan and site plans. You will notice the population changes between adult male beds and adult women beds (6 less men and 6 more women); significant changes to building entrances; use of existing kitchen building for beds; new kitchen in main building; etc. There are many differences from prior plans and we encourage your thoughtful review.
• The VPNA comment letter (VPNA COMMENT LETTER 9-22-22) which highlights some of the issues the VPNA has with this revised application.

Please contact the VPNA with any questions.

Quick Updates

July 12, 2022

1. We filed our legal appeal to the approval of CUP21-00026.

2. Good News!! A couple weeks ago we notified you that the Zoning Code Rewrite removed the requirement for a CUP for the placement of shelter homes. In today’s City Council work session and release of the Zoning Code Rewrite, it was reinstated. Shelter homes will require a CUP.

Thanks Luci Browning Willits for asking the question during the work session today and bringing clarity to the situation. (see comments for video of the work session).

We are still in favor of the 300ft buffer between shelter homes and residential properties that was removed from the original rewrite. We ask that you continue the momentum and email zoninginfo@cityofboise.org asking for them to reinstate the buffer

Interfaith Update

INTERFAITH UPDATE January 6, 2021 – On Monday night, the Planning and Zoning Commissioners deliberated for over an hour and a half, after three hearings dedicated to public testimony, eventually voting 5 to 1 to deny the application for Interfaith Sanctuary to relocate and expand to State Street. While we are still waiting for the final Reason Statement (the official findings), all of the Commissioners voting to deny the application agreed that the project proposed would create impacts on the surrounding area that were not mitigated by the proposed conditions.

It was clear from the deliberation that Commissioners had deeply engaged with the entire project record, and had spent a long time considering their decisions. Having spent the last year engaging with the questions this application raises, we can deeply empathize with the internal struggle many commissioners expressed in having to vote to deny a proposal for an organization serving an immensely important mission. However, the law requires that a Conditional Use Permit be issued only if the project can be implemented without adversely affecting other properties of the vicinity. Concerned neighbors have been asking questions about impacts to the vicinity since January of 2021, and Interfaith did not provide a response to these impacts.

Yet, in the days since the decision, we regret that we have seen social media attacking the Commissioners on a personal level, attacking the Commissioners as not taking their duty to make this decision seriously, and even calling this decision “NIMBYism” though, at least as far as we are aware, no commissioner lives or works in an area that may be impacted by the proposed project.

We would like to thank the Commission for the long hours they spent listening to testimony and reviewing the record to make an objective decision based on the required criteria laid forth in Boise’s Zoning Ordinance and Idaho land use law. While we see that the evidence on record unequivocally supports the Commission’s denial due to the impact on the surrounding area, we do recognize that this has been a difficult decision to make, and thank the Commissioners for their dedication to applying the rule of law impartially.

Here are a few of the quotes from the January 3 hearing that are worth highlighting https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U13xrX-S-fA:

Commissioner Mooney (1:12): “Frankly, I was amazed at the amount of detail and research that the neighbors did in understanding this problem. I mean, they treated it with wonderful compassion about what’s the right thing to do here.”

Commissioner Mooney (1:59): “I’m trying to bend over to accommodate what is obviously an immensely important mission that this charitable organization is up to.”

Commissioner Gillespie (2:02): “I just can’t figure out how to get conditions in that mitigate the adverse impact to that neighborhood.”

Commissioner Blanchard (2:04): “I didn’t see a way we could condition our way out of this. … I agree with one of the statements made earlier made by Commissioner Mooney – I think it is a really heavy lift and there’s not much we can do. IFS is going it alone, and that’s a shame! PDP 4 says the City is supposed to be taking a leadership role in planning for and coordinating regional growth, and that would include providing these kind of services to these residents. What’s happened throughout the Valley is that everybody has exported their homelessness to Boise… there needs to be a lot more of a solution than IFS going this alone.”

Commissioner Danley (2:07, on a vote to deny the application):

“To the applicant: This isn’t something I want to do; this isn’t something I don’t think any of us want to do. It drives me nuts that this State doesn’t help out in this issue more than it does. We don’t fund the Housing Trust Fund. We have so few limited tools. The applicant is absolutely not a person trying to ruin any part of this City. They are doing everything they can to support a part of this City that needs support. It kills me that this is where we are. Nevertheless, this is what I do believe at this point and time is the right thing to do.

With regard to the public: A lot of folks were part of this process. A lot of folks wrote us, a lot of folks came and spoke to us. It takes a lot of courage to do that, and I appreciate that. I know that some things were maybe said that maybe shouldn’t have been with regard to some folks who might be homeless. I regret hearing some of those things.

But I also regret hearing that the neighborhood, by and large, is nothing but NIMBYs, because I don’t believe that to be true as well. I think there’s a lot of concern on both sides of the aisle here its being worked out in this discussion.

…A conditional use permit can not be granted due to the lack of information regarding mitigating the adverse effect that the development and or operation of the proposed use may have upon other properties or upon the ability of political subdivisions to provide services for the proposed use. That’s where I am, we just simply don’t have enough information. I can say with a full heart that I’ve tried the best I can to get us there. I KNOW that to be the case.

I was disappointed in some of the responses. I really want to go further, I really want to say more, especially having experienced certain comments that were made, especially at the second hearing, that I didn’t think were right. I will say this, we were accused of injecting our own personal beliefs, or whatever the comment that was made.

That was nothing but a distraction from our responsibility as a Commission, as per LLUPA, as per our Code, as per representing the public, the Commission, the City, AND the Applicant. That’s what we have to do. The effort we put forward that night was about THAT, pure and simple.”

Commissioner Mooney (2:11): “We’re asked to assess the claim of future impact. And its sleepless nights to figure that out. I can’t in my mind understand how we can approve this without impacting that neighborhood.”

Commissioner Mohr (2:13): “A lot of my mind was based on, ‘Well, can we condition it properly?’ Being left in that realm of leaning on the Commission here to condition it from the dais, as opposed to being conditioned before it makes it here…is a tough position to be in.”

Commissioners Gillespie, Blanchard, Danley, Mooney, and Mohr voted to deny CUP21-00026. Commissioner Stead did not support the motion to deny.

Interfaith Sanctuary Update – 11/02/2021

See the below update for

• An update on the project
• Neighborhood concerns
• Take the survey
• Write Letters to P&Z and City Council
• Attend and Speak at the hearing
• How to donate

Project Background

–The proposed project to operate a low-barrier emergency shelter at the former Salvation Army building at 4306 West State Street would replace Interfaith Sanctuary’s current shelter, located at 1620 River Street, and would differ from the existing shelter in several ways:

–The proposed project would offer 205 beds, plus space for cribs, and an additional capacity of 20 to 40
floor mats (or more, they said no one will be turned away) for overflow sleeping (this has not been clarified). (Total 225 (to 245 or more) plus children in cribs and/or toddler beds.) The facility size is approximately 30,000 square feet.

The 205 beds reflect:

• 100 beds for families (not including cribs/toddler beds);
• 22 beds for medically fragile guests;
• 34 ‘incentive’ beds for guests participating in case management, participating in – programming offered by the shelter, or holding a job;
• 15 private rooms for men holding a job but unable to find housing;
• 10 beds in double rooms for women holding a job but unable to find housing; and
• 24 unconditioned emergency beds in large dorm rooms for single guests.

–The proposed project reflects an increase in capacity over the existing location, which currently (during COVID) offers approximately 146 beds and 20 floor mats (total 166). (Interfaith is currently also operating additional shelter spaces at the Red Lion Hotel as a temporary response to COVID.)

–The proposed project would provide emergency overnight shelter as the existing facility does, but would also offer onsite day use privileges to all guests, rather than only a subset participating in programming, as under the current model.

Interfaith Sanctuary is the only low-barrier emergency shelter in Ada County. Low-barrier shelters do not set restrictions on who may enter based on religion, gender identity or sexual orientation, or sobriety, for example, while some other shelters in Ada County restrict entry to some individuals based on the above.

To see Interfaith Sanctuary’s complete description of the project, the full application materials are available here, including a letter of explanation describing the project and drawings showing the proposed floor plans: https://permits.cityofboise.org/CitizenAccess/Cap/CapDetail.aspx?Module=Planning&TabName=Planning&capID1=21CAP&capID2=00000&capID3=00F7O&agencyCode=BOISE

Neighborhood Concerns

Veterans Park Neighborhood Association (VPNA) has publicly taken a position opposing the project, and is currently preparing comments on the project to present to the City of Boise. Our board voted to oppose the project following a January meeting where Interfaith presented a prior iteration of the project, which included 331 beds (150 beds for single men; 72 beds for single women; 72 beds for families; and 27 beds for medically fragile guests). Due to the project schedule presented at that meeting of applying to the City in February, we were forced to move very quickly, and based our vote on a survey of only the residents who attended the meeting. (This meeting had attendance of over 100 people, the largest turn outs we’ve seen at one of our monthly board meetings. The vote was 97% of residents opposed to the project.)

As part of our comments to the City, we would like to present a broader survey (Click to take the survey) of our neighborhood residents’ and neighborhood business owners’ stance on the proposed Interfaith Sanctuary project, especially as the project description has now been modified from that presented prior to the original vote. This vote will remain open through October 29 or longer – please, ask your neighbors to take it, too!

Some of the VPNA’s main concerns are that the relocation of Interfaith Sanctuary would concentrate a large number of people living in poverty and disproportionately relying on the City of Boise’s emergency response services to this neighborhood, where the level of emergency services available is much lower than in downtown. In addition, guests will have reduced access to the supplementary social services organizations, court system, and medical providers downtown that they currently rely on easy access to. Brief summaries of some comment areas are presented below:

–Concentration of Poverty. Veterans Park Neighborhood is one of 9 Boise census tracts identified as having greater than 50% of low-income residents. Approximately 25% of our residents are living in poverty. The current Interfaith proposal reflects an approximately 10% increase in our neighborhood’s population of individuals predominately living in poverty. We know, from the research, and from looking at any other city in America that has done it, that when we concentrate need and poverty, we perpetuate income insecurity, increase crime, reduce educational outcomes, increase negative health outcomes, and diminish neighborhoods for all in that area. HUD has identified that the negative effects of concentrating poverty begin to rise rapidly once a neighborhood reaches 20% poverty and continue to increase as poverty rates reach 40%.

–Incompatible with surrounding residential use of adjacent properties: two of the property lines abut either single family homes or a mobile home park, and the route to the Greenbelt passes by additional homes. The proposal has not included measures to reduce the noise generated by the facility. We anticipate noise generated by the use of the outdoor spaces and the evening intake line along the eastern border to disturb adjacent residential neighbors along the eastern and northern fence lines. We also anticipate that the facility will generate frequent sirens (multiple times per week) based on the high call volume for emergency services, especially Fire/EMS, responding to the existing facility operated by Interfaith Sanctuary. Many of these calls are at night.

–Safety Concerns for Proposed Shelter Residents: housing a vulnerable population along the high-traffic State Street Corridor, especially where the project design requires residents to cross State to access the two major transportation options the project has identified: the bus line to downtown and the Greenbelt.

–Public Safety Impact – Fire/EMS: Interfaith Sanctuary generates a high volume of calls-to-service Fire/EMS services. Fire services to Interfaith Sanctuary downtown are currently provided out of Station 5, which includes both an engine company and a ladder company, so that even when one company is responding to a call in the high call volume district, another company is available for additional emergencies. By contrast, Station 9, serving the location of the proposed shelter, has only one company, and is also already unable to meet service standards for response time (240 seconds) to portions of its Northwest Boise service area. Inclusion of a high call volume facility in the service area could reduce response times even more if emergencies overlap. Medic services are dispatched from separate facilities, and are also more robustly available to the current Interfaith Sanctuary location. There are no medic units within the benchmark response time serving the proposed location on State Street.

–Public Safety Impact – Police: Interfaith Sanctuary generates a high volume of calls-to-service for Police services, and the City of Boise has acknowledged this need by housing a recently opened police substation less than 1/2 mile from Interfaith Sanctuary- an investment which the City planning record noted was specifically to be near Interfaith Sanctuary. This same new police substation is also the nearest to the proposed location, at nearly 3 miles away. This relative distance would result in increased call response times for police services to the proposed shelter location.

–Potential for increased camping in the wide riparian corridor along the Greenbelt in this area: We anticipate that individuals who do not arrive before intake closes, individuals in excess of the (unknown) Fire Marshall capacity for the building, individuals who choose to leave the shelter at night, or individuals needing a break from the crowded shelter environment may choose to camp locally along the Greenbelt corridor, although camping is not legal if there are shelter beds available in Boise. We anticipate that increased frequency of camping in this corridor could impact water quality, vegetation, wildlife, and may serve to deter Greenbelt use by the general public due to perceived safety concerns and/or erode the sense of public stewardship of the area.

–Potential for overflow parking to impact surrounding neighborhood: Based on the limited number of parking spaces available at the proposed facility (approximately 30), neighbors have expressed a concern that staff, partner organization staff, volunteer, and resident vehicles may overflow into the surrounding residential streets and commercial parking associated with other businesses. Interfaith has been in search of an off-site parking solution since the fall of 2020. They have reported that they have an additional property in mind for offsite parking, but have not released details of its location or whether it would provide parking for visitors to the site, or only off-site storage for unregistered and/or non-functional vehicles. Interfaith has not addressed questions of how transportation to and security of any off-site parking will be managed.What else can I Do?Thank you for your time! Instructions to submit public comment are below.

Submit written comments!
Send an e-mail to the following:

zoninginfo@cityofboise.org

City Council Email Addresses:
• Elaine Clegg – eclegg@cityofboise.org
• Lisa Sanchez – lsanchez@cityofboise.org
• TJ Thomson – tjthomson@cityofboise.org
• Holly Woodings – hwoodings@cityofboise.org
• Jimmy Hallyburton – jhallyburton@cityofboise.org
• Patrick Bageant – pbageant@cityofboise.org
• Mayor McLean’s Email Address: mayormclean@cityofboise.org

You are welcome to copy us at:
vpnaboise@gmail.com

Reference CUP21-00026 in your e-mail, and state whether you support or oppose the application.

You are welcome to use the talking points above for inspiration, but we strongly encourage you to use your own words and share your own experiences for maximum impact.

Ideally, comments will relate to the review criteria:
1) is the location compatible with other uses in the general neighborhood?;
2) will the use place an undue burden on transportation and other public facilities in the vicinity?;
3)Is the site large enough to accommodate the proposed use?;
4) Will the proposed use adversely impact other property in the vicinity?;
5) Is the proposed use in compliance with Boise’s Comprehensive Plan?

Attend the Planning & Zoning meeting on November 15, and testify. Bring your neighbors.
(Sign ups will be available around the beginning of October. We anticipate the meeting will go very long; your testimony can be very brief if you’d like – name, address, and support/oppose position. We’d like to have a huge turn out.)

*Note, the planning and zoning decision will likely be appealed, either way, and the project will then be presented at City Council at least one month later. It could also take a few months to get on the City Council calendar. To testify at City Council, you will need to have provided written or oral testimony to Planning & Zoning as well. Plan to attend when the meeting is scheduled!

Sign the petition on Change.org!
http://chng.it/mrcK2ZBSrX

Donations to the legal fund are being collected by Boise Neighbors for Better Housing, and can be made in the following ways:
1) PayPal at this link or to info@BoiseBetter.org
2) Venmo to @BoiseBetter under “Businesses” (or, last four digits are #3227)
3) Checks can be deposited to BNBH at the USBank in the Albertsons at 36th and State St.

Interfaith Sanctuary Update – 4/15/2021

We understand that Interfaith Sanctuary proposes to relocate and expand their low-barrier emergency shelter to a Site located at 4306 State Street in Boise, Idaho, located within the Veterans Park Neighborhood Association (VPNA) boundaries. As of April 14, 2021, Interfaith Sanctuary has not submitted a CUP application to the City of Boise, and no public hearings have been scheduled. The most recent timeline Interfaith has distributed indicates they will close on their purchase of the State Street property on April 23, and plan to submit their CUP application on April 28th. We currently assume the first public hearing before the Planning and Zoning commission would be held in early June.

For more information about the proposed Interfaith Sanctuary project, please see: https://boiseneighbors.wixsite.com/ifsmove

On January 27, 2021, VPNA hosted a meeting at which we heard from Interfaith Sanctuary directly about the proposal, where we had the largest resident turn out we have experienced for one of our board meetings, with over 100 people in attendance. A survey distributed to residents in attendance indicated that 97% opposed the project, so our board voted to oppose the project at the public hearings before the City of Boise. (The project has been delayed several times since then, so the public hearings have not yet been scheduled.)

While Interfaith Sanctuary’s mission is widely well-regarded among our residents, we find that the selected location for the proposed project – a low-income residential neighborhood – is misguided. We encourage Boise’s elected and appointed officials to ask Interfaith Sanctuary to identify an alternate location (or locations) for their proposed expansion and/or relocation.

As a matter of policy, we strongly object to this move that would concentrate poverty in the Veterans Park Neighborhood area of Boise, which is also contrary to the goals in Boise’s comprehensive planning document, Blueprint Boise, including the goal to “Disperse low- and moderate- income housing throughout Boise” to avoid any overconcentration of lower income or special needs populations.

Veterans Park Neighborhood is already one of Boise’s poorer neighborhoods; it is located within one of seven census tracts in Boise designated as having greater than 50% of residents classified as ‘low income’ (based on the Analysis of Impediments to Fair Housing Choice commissioned by Boise in 2016 as required by the United States Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) to receive federal funds) and in the “21% to 40%” category of percent of residents living below the poverty line (based on the City of Boise Community Development Analysis).

It is well documented that neighborhood poverty level has an independent negative effect on outcomes for children and individuals living in those neighborhoods (independent of household income, for instance). The concentration of poverty that is inherent to moving a large homeless shelter to a low-income neighborhood would be detrimental both for neighborhood residents and for prospective future Interfaith guests, as negative outcomes of concentrating poverty rise rapidly as the percent living in poverty rises from 20% to 40%. Concentration of poverty can lead to negative outcomes through many pathways recorded in the academic literature, including: competition for resources, such as limited employment opportunities or local institutional resources; effects on the distribution of local private markets such as fresh food markets, liquor stores, restaurants, or illegal drug markets; social effects such as peer influences, role model selection, and normalization of behaviors associated with poverty; and others. Concentration of poverty represents the collection of many individuals who have experienced or are experiencing trauma in their lives, and this leads to trauma responses re-triggering traumas in others such that response behaviors continue to reinforce one another and/or escalate.

There are two communities to consider, and we need to ensure that we can help the homeless community Interfaith Sanctuary proposes to serve without disproportionately damaging the low-income and high-poverty community in this area. To be clear, our residential neighborhood begins along two fence-lines of the proposed site, with additional residences present along the route to the Greenbelt.

Furthermore, it is well documented that Interfaith is a high call-volume facility (CPTED, September 2020) for emergency services (Fire, EMS, and Police), but emergency services available at the proposed location are much less robust than those available at the existing Interfaith Sanctuary downtown location. In summary, the overburdening of public services described below, may impact public safety for the community at large, including neighborhoods outside of the Veterans Park Neighborhood area.

Interfaith Sanctuary’s existing downtown location is served by:

• Fire Station 5 that houses two crews, which offers built in redundancy for a high call volume area;
• a medic station with transport capabilities within the ideal 240 second response time; and
• the newly completed $4.3 million police substation 0.4 miles away, which city records document was moved to this location to be in the vicinity of Interfaith Sanctuary and the high-call volume community served.

Instead, the area of the proposed State Street location is served by:

• Fire Station 9, which has only one engine crew and is already not able to meet the 240 second response time standard in a portion of its service area, an issue that could be exacerbated by the high call volumes to Interfaith;
• no medic station within the 240 second response time radius; and
• no police station closer than the one located 0.4 miles from Interfaith’s existing location, approximately 2.5 miles from the proposed location, and with a correspondingly higher response time.