By Catherine Cuellar, KERA 90.1 Reporter
Dallas, TX –
Catherine Cuellar, KERA 90.1 Reporter: Among Dunning's first and most critical decisions will be where to put a new, 24-hour Homeless Assistance Center. The center will get $3 million dollars in seed money from a bond measure approved last year. It will replace and quadruple the size of the city's overcrowded Day Resource Center just south of Dallas City Hall, which currently provides showers and laundry facilities for up to 500 of the county's more than 5,000 homeless each weekday. Yesterday, the suggestion that the center should be built downtown drew sharp criticism from several city council members, led by Mayor Pro Tem John Loza.
John Loza, Dallas Mayor Pro Tem: What we're going to be doing by locating the center over by the Day Resource Center is that we're going to condemn that part of downtown to no development for the infinite future. I though the whole point of this process was to get the homeless out of downtown.
Cuellar: Councilman Bill Blaydes agreed.
Bill Blaydes, Dallas City Councilman, District 10: I won't support one in downtown - when I look at what has taken place in just the southeast quadrant because of the problems that we have and the millions of dollars of tax base that is available in a city that is strapped for cash is going to waste because we have not taken a stand and done something about the homeless situation in Dallas.
Cuellar: Blaydes wants the center built at a former rehabilitation hospital on Harry Hines, between downtown and Parkland Hospital. But Mayor Laura Miller doesn't want to spread non-profit organizations supporting the homeless too thin.
Laura Miller, Dallas Mayor: This center is one piece of the puzzle, and it may be that there is a role for a site like Harry Hines that would be transitional housing or some part of this. Obviously one building isn't going to solve all our problems.
Cuellar: Lois Finkelman chairs the Health, Environment, and Human Services Committee, which recommended building the center downtown, like every other major city.
Lois Finkelman, Dallas City Councilperson, District 11: We had unanimous agreement we would focus on a site somewhere in the vicinity of downtown south in some direction from City Hall. After lots of discussion with lots of different folks, it did appear to us that the success of this center as an intake facility and as a basic services facility was going to rest on its location.
Cuellar: City Council will consider Dunning's task force recommendation this winter, in hopes of opening the new center in three years.
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