Salt Lake County wants to build 1,000 new housing units over the next five years and make major investments in drug enforcement officers as Utah sharpens its focus on fighting homelessness.
The steps, outlined in Mayor Jenny Wilson’s newly released plan to tackle homelessness and reform the criminal justice system, come as state and local leaders take a more aggressive posture toward illegal homeless camps.
The 1,000 new housing units would be made up of 300 new group home housing units and 700 new permanent supportive housing units.
“We have committed governmental leaders not just here at Salt Lake County, but [also in] our cities [and] the state,” Wilson said Friday afternoon. “And what we really need to do is stop working in isolation. We need to be more deliberately coordinated.”
In addition to the new housing and hiring of 10 additional Drug Enforcement Administration Task Force officers, Wilson’s plan calls for training law enforcement to use a new receiving center facility as an alternative to jail and to respond to mental health crises.
She also wants to build a new 100-bed jail “step-down” facility to help inmates transition back into the community, and create a new “Justice and Accountability Center” that would connect people to housing, behavioral health services and community support.
“The goal is to stabilize each individual,” Wilson said, “and create an environment where they will be able to thrive and find stable housing in the community.”
The plan would cost a little more than $106 million over the next five years. Some of the funding is expected to come from Medicaid, opioid settlement dollars and grants. A little more than $42 million would go toward law enforcement and criminal justice reform efforts.
A spokesperson for the mayor said that the first year of plan is funded and some opioid settlement dollars have been set aside for DEA agents.
“We’re looking at every option right now, including internal funds, state funds, federal funds, and philanthropic support,” Wilson said.
The county mayor stressed that she had worked with the County Council on the five-year plan and that addressing homelessness was a nonpartisan issue.
“This is a great mix of compassion and accountability,” said council member Aimee Winder Newton, who also serves as a senior adviser to Gov. Spencer Cox. “It’s not compassionate to allow people to live on the streets. It’s not compassionate to allow the drug cartels to target our populations. It’s not compassionate to only have a jail or an ER as a place for people to get mental health help. This is about real solutions.”
Last year, Cox spoke out on illegal homeless camps, saying officials “have to stop unsanctioned camping in our state and in our capital city” and that his office was working with mayors and authorities to do that. Since then, Salt Lake City police have stepped up enforcement of camps.
Correction • 9:50 a.m. July 21, 2024: A previous version of this story incorrectly stated how much funding Salt Lake County had obtained for its five-year homelessness plan.