Police push homeless out of park after Spokane shelter closure raises controversy and tent city
Spokane police officers ordered dozens of people experiencing homelessness to leave Coeur d’Alene Park on Thursday evening after a warming shelter closed and those affected pitched tents in the Browne’s Addition park.
The problems happened as the city’s contract with Jewels Helping Hands, the nonprofit running the warming shelter, was about to expire.
When residents left the closing shelter and began setting up tents in the nearby park, the city of Spokane scrambled to reopen its Cannon Street warming center on Thursday with a different operator.
That was an abrupt change of course for the city, which had planned to leave the building vacant when Jewels left, but those new plans didn’t work out.
Read more: https://www.spokesman.com/stories/2020/apr/30/city-reverses-course-will-reopen-cannon-street-war/
