'A Tent Is Not A Roof': Salem Proposes To Remove Homeless Encampments

SALEM, MA — Salem moved a step closer to finalizing an ordinance that would allow the removal of homeless encampments when shelters are available in the city as a way aimed at both helping those living and sleeping in the elements and eliminating camps that could be considered a public health and public safety danger.

Salem Mayor Dominick Pangallo outlined the ordinance proposal to the City Council Committee on Public Health and Safety on Wednesday night, one month after City Councilor Cynthia Jerzylo introduced an order to bring the ordinance and discussion before the City Council.

Under the proposed ordinance, the encampments would be prohibited in city parks and public property when shelter is available. The city would be responsible for transporting the residents of the encampments to an available shelter of their choice and providing storage for the person's belongings.

"We know that every day that an encampment continues is a less healthy and profoundly dangerous day for its residents than the day before," Pangallo told the Council committee in front of a crowded room at City Hall. "We should not be OK with letting neighbors sleep on the street."

He said preparations are being made to make more shelter space available in the city in the coming weeks and months.

"If we have the capacity to put a roof over someone's head we shouldn't hold ourselves to such a low bar that we are willing to set that opportunity aside and just be OK with letting them live unsheltered," Pangallo said. "Everyone in Salem deserves a roof over their head. And a tent is not a roof."

He said that studies have shown that those living outdoors and in encampments had higher rates of chronic disease, substance abuse and mental illness, and that "none of those studies in that 2023 review showed that unsheltered individuals had better health than sheltered individuals.

"Every day of unsheltered homelessness is a step backward," Pangallo said.

He said moving the residents from outdoors into shelters would be the first step toward helping them secure more and more stable housing.

"We may not eliminate homelessness in Salem entirely," he said. "But we can work together to make homelessness rare and brief."

Several of the many residents who spoke out against the ordinance claimed it would contribute to a "criminalization" of homelessness in the city while criticizing shelter options as being too far away — up to 15 miles — and said that some shelter requirements, such as sobriety, create barriers to those in need.

U.S. Rep. Seth Moulton (D-Salem) issued a statement on Thursday morning supportive of Salem's efforts to address the issue both for the benefit of the homeless citizens and the general public.

"While there is a lot of criticism floating around today about the proposed plans for addressing the homeless encampments in Salem," he said, "I am grateful for what Mayor Pangallo and Police Chief (Lucas) Miller are doing to keep everyone in the community safe.

"There's clearly more we need to do to tackle the homeless crisis, across America and here at home. Everyone deserves the dignity of having somewhere to live. But the first job of the mayor and police chief is to keep everyone safe. The reality today is that many Salem residents, especially those of us with young kids, don't feel safe walking around encampments like this. They are also dangerous for people living in them.

"We are a country of laws and we need to have boundaries. It's time to stop just letting this slide."

Officials developed the ordinance based on the Boston ordinance that has led to the dismantling of some encampments in the "Mass and Cass" area of Roxbury near Boston City Hospital.

"This problem, like many others in society, is a problem that we, the police, can't arrest our way out of," Miller said. "The traditional way of dealing with homelessness, which is to 'move them along,' is not a power that we have anymore. We can ask people to move. But we can't say: 'You've got to move (if no shelter is available).'

"I think that is a very humane decision. This ordinance takes that into account but it adopts it as our way of handling this problem."

(Scott Souza is a Patch field editor covering Beverly, Danvers, Marblehead, Peabody, Salem and Swampscott. He can be reached at Scott.Souza@Patch.com. X/Twitter: @Scott_Souza.)