Utah gamed out taking over S.L. County jail site for homeless shelter without county consent

In the lead-up to a key decision to alter how Utah grapples with homelessness, one of the state’s highest-ranking advisers on the issue shared a document that spelled out how to secure a coveted spot for a new 1,200-bed shelter.

The State Office of Homeless Services’ assistant coordinator, Nick Coleman, wanted to show Michael Parker, head of an influential philanthropic group called Utah Impact Partnership, just how complicated it might be for Utah to place a major shelter at one of its most prized sites: the Salt Lake County-owned Oxbow Jail along the Jordan River in South Salt Lake.

The document — a flow chart shared in a Sept. 25 text with Parker — captured the numerous hurdles the state would have to clear if it wanted the parcel.

Would county voters approve a half-billion-dollar bond that would close the Oxbow Jail and expand the nearby metro jail? If not, could the county find alternate funding and then approve a sale of Oxbow to the state?

Or, if it came to it, could Utah just take control of the site without the county’s consent?

Although state officials gamed out the possibility of using eminent domain, according to the message, the odds were long for taking over the jail.

“Based on everything we know,” Coleman wrote to Parker, “it seems like it would take an act of god for Oxbow to be the ultimate campus site.”

The text came at a time when state decision-makers were weighing a move from a homeless shelter system that scattered smaller sites across Salt Lake City and South Salt Lake to a model based on a larger, centralized campus. Officials hope the change can better provide additional services — not just more beds — to homeless Utahns.

Less than two weeks earlier, on Sept. 12, the Office of Homeless Services penned an internal memo for the state Homeless Services Board outlining possible sites for such a campus. Oxbow was near the top of the list.

Since then, officials have downplayed the possibility of using the site, and Salt Lake County voters snubbed the bond measure that would have opened up the land for another use.

State leaders have yet to decide where the massive shelter may go, but trumping the county to take over the Oxbow site is, they insist, no longer being considered.

“Our office is aware that eminent domain is not an option,” said Office of Homeless Services spokesperson Sarah Nielson, “as we do not have the authority to pursue such action.”

While Utah generally has the power to take over land owned by one of its counties for a more necessary use, not all state agencies — the department that houses the Office of Homeless Services included — are allowed to do so.

Text messages about Oxbow

Text messages obtained by The Salt Lake Tribune through a public records request reveal conversations between state homelessness officials and representatives from Utah Impact Partnership. The exchanges show officials were already evaluating site options for a gigantic new campus before the the state’s Homeless Services Board decided in October to change how Utah provides shelter.

In an Oct. 2 text to Randy Shumway, head of the Homeless Services Board and vice chair of Utah Impact Partnership, Coleman relays some pushback to the possible use of the Oxbow site from South Salt Lake Mayor Cherie Wood and Josh Romney, who sits on the board of the nonprofit Shelter the Homeless. South Salt Lake, one of the smallest cities in Salt Lake County, already hosts the county’s two jails and one homeless resource center.

Shumway responded, saying “Salt Lake City is headed the route of San Francisco,” and adding that he didn’t need to talk to “another 50 service providers who simply tell me to give them more money to know we must do some things differently.”

The board chair also shared with Coleman that he didn’t think “Oxbow is the ideal location.”

Shumway has previously said there are better options available for a homeless campus but has not revealed those locations.

Search for shelter site continues

The viability of the Oxbow site was directly tied to the passage of Salt Lake County’s public safety bond measure, which appeared on ballots this fall and would have allowed the county to shutter the jail and put up the parcel for sale. Residents narrowly rejected the proposal, with 51.6% voting against the measure.

For now, county Mayor Jenny Wilson intends to pursue upgrades to the jail instead of shutting it down and selling it.

The mayor said her feelings that South Salt Lake should have a role in deciding where the shelter goes haven’t changed since the bond’s failure.

“First of all, we’re going to need to be in a position to put the property up for sale, and [I] suppose it’s possible down the road. We’re not driving now with immediate action on that due to the failure of the bond,” she said in an interview. “I’ve also said we need to have South Salt Lake on board, and the mayor and others there have significant concerns about Oxbow being developed for a campus.”

Behind closed doors, the search for a place to put a campus persists, according to Jim Behunin, a Homeless Services Board member and West Bountiful’s former mayor.

“There are three sites we’re looking at in Salt Lake County, actively looking at. There’s more than that that are on the list,” he told a meeting of the Ballpark Community Council on Nov. 7. “But the list that was put into The Tribune, it’s an old list. Almost every one of those sites we have stopped considering, and we’ve got two new ones that we’re looking at.”

While he did not reveal the possible locations, he promised the state homeless policy board was not considering a campus in the Ballpark neighborhood. Behunin also said officials are seeking possible sites from Ogden to Spanish Fork, but conceded it will “probably be in Salt Lake County.”

Nielson, the Office of Homeless Services spokesperson, declined to comment on whether new sites outside those reported by The Tribune in October are under consideration, how many sites the state is investigating or where they are located, citing sensitivity around real estate transactions.

The state has until Dec. 15 to present three viable campus location options to the board. Behunin told Ballpark residents the presentation would happen at the board’s December convening, but no meeting is listed on the panel’s calendar.

Correction • Dec. 7, 2024, 2:15 p.m.: This story has been updated to note that Jim Behunin is the former mayor of West Bountiful.

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