Several council members expressed concern for the lack of meetings conducted by the Port Arthur Coalition/Advisory Board for the Homeless during the elected officials’ Jan. 7 council meeting.
The coalition, created by a Port Arthur City Council ordinance in March 2022, called for each council member and mayor to select two members to serve two-year terms. But, according to the ordinance, the members’ terms expired March 29, 2024.
Mayor Thurman Bartie said in October 2023 that the original coalition was handled by former council member Ingrid Holmes but, due to unforeseen events, regular meetings were not being held.
Mayor Pro Tem Doneane Beckcom said she was told the coalition has not met since early 2023.
In August 2024, the council approved three members to the coalition, but no decision was made by council on setting dates for coalition meetings.
Bartie reported in March 2024, the program was “not functioning.”
According to Bartie, meetings have firstly been paused as “being unhoused in America” has taken a new direction due to the United States Supreme Court’s opinion in the Grant Pass vs. Johnson case; secondly, he added, is the criminal component presented by the issues at hand. The mayor stated he’s sought guidance through dialog with leaders of municipalities of various sizes to attend to the homelessness issue in an “equitable and affair manner.”
“A very clear directive has not been offered by Texas and this mayor awaits this anticipated directive from our governor, as other states have done so,” he remarked. “However, the uncertainty of available federal, as well as state assistance, serves as an impediment to moving this idea forward.
“Now, the mission and the task of the coalition is to assist with the eradication of unhoused individuals within our community and to provide the wraparound services associated with this issue.”
Beckcom said the information from the mayor was appreciated but did not negate the coalition meeting.
“There’s no reason that our coalition for the homeless needs to wait,” Beckcom said, as some laws “change rapidly, sometime daily.”
Beckcom added that coalition members have attempted to get together to meet but have been told that they cannot “because the committee is the mayor’s committee and only the mayor can call a meeting.”
City Attorney Roxann Cotroneo was asked to look over the ordinance that established the Coalition for the Homeless. Should the ordinance fall solely under the auspices of the mayor, the council seeks to change that.
“We should amend it (ordinance) so that it reflect it’s not the mayor’s advisory committee,” Council member Harold Doucet Doucet noted. “Nothing in the city of Port Arthur is the mayor’s. Nothing.”
Council member Thomas Kinlaw III said he been “getting hit about the homelessness coalition” and believes the coalition should have been meeting since long ago.
“There’s money out there, but we need individuals to step forward and figure out what can we do for the best service to citizens of Port Arthur,” said Kinlaw. “I think we kind of dropped the ball on that. We talked about what type of funding that we can get. I think the last thing that I remember is about $1 million to address some of those needs.”
“I’m sure that all my colleagues agree, as well; we have to start now and prepare for the future, and if we don’t have meetings, if we don’t have a body established, we don’t have the governorship of that body, then we don’t have the great opportunity to assess out there,” he added.
Kinlaw said the council attends conferences and one of the main topics of discussion in homelessness.
“Every city is facing that problem, but we got to be ahead of the stick in making sure that the one thing that we have within our control is to make sure that our appointees meet,” he said.