The Athens-Clarke County commission voted 8-to-2 Tuesday night to approve a reformed rights-of-way ordinance that will likely impact homelessness in downtown Athens.
The amended ordinance will now prohibit camping on sidewalks, bikeways, streets and other public areas adjacent to commercial districts. Mayor Kelly Girtz worked with a committee to amend the language of the proposed ordinance.
Girtz was hopeful that the vote would take place Tuesday as opposed to at a future meeting.
“My public service prayer to this body is twofold," Girtz said Tuesday. "One, it’s that you continue to work toward better lives for all of our residents. As a speaker stated, we’ve historically had a poverty rate of at least 25% in this community for the entire time this has been a place named Athens. We’re going to have to continue to work to make sure that people who are falling on hard times have better opportunities.”
The vote came after nearly an hour of public input and about 40 minutes of discussion among the 10 commissioners. The meeting room was filled with Athens residents and many of them voiced opposition to the ordinance, like Maristella Tuazon, an organizer for the Party of Socialism and Liberation.
“If it were you and your family, you would never want police to come in and sweep away whatever little belongings you have," Tuazon said. "You would never want them to force you and your family out of public spaces and further burden you with more fines when you’re already struggling economically.”
In addition to the regulation on camping, the ordinance will have $1 million in funding, which raised questions of how that money will be allocated.
”A million dollars floating in the ether as a budget line item is not a roof over somebody's head," said District 2 Commissioner Melissa Link.
The ordinance will go into effect 90 days after Tuesday's vote, on January 6.
