By DAVID MAMARIL HOROWITZ, Bowling Green Daily News

BOWLING GREEN — Jerry Szpyrka, an unhoused Bowling Green resident, fears he’ll go to jail if he falls asleep.

He slept outside the Lisa Rice branch of the public library for years. In August, a police officer awoke him late at night on a public bench nearby to say he couldn’t sleep in the area anymore. Since then, Szpyrka said, he’d been sleeping some 30 minutes at a time, from one place to another.

“What am I supposed to do … stay up all day, all night, walk until it’s exhausting, and then fall?” Szpyrka said. “If you’re homeless, you can’t stay anywhere.”

Officers ordered Szpyrka to move due to a law enacted July 15 known as the Safer Kentucky Act, the Bowling Green Police Department confirmed. The sweeping tough-on-crime law, among other provisions, criminalizes sleeping and camping on public property as well as threatens to hold local governments liable if they refuse to enforce it.

The General Assembly approved it in March and then overrode Gov. Andy Beshear’s veto, with nearly every Republican in support and almost all Democrats in opposition. Every regional representative voted for it.

Opponents say the law criminalizes homelessness. Supporters argue it will push unhoused residents to seek shelter and other resources.

A key part of the provision, State Sen. Mike Wilson, R-Bowling Green, said, is “to help guide homeless individuals, many of whom struggle with chronic substance abuse and mental health issues, toward behavioral health and rehabilitation services that they might otherwise not seek out.”

Rep. Robert Duvall, R-Bowling Green, told the Daily News that the goal was to make streets safer for people and businesses as well as “get vulnerable individuals the help they need.”

“Our ultimate aim is to aid in their recovery and help them achieve greater self-sufficiency,” Wilson told the Daily News.

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Interviews with around 30 people – primarily, homeless residents, service providers and law enforcement representatives – depict a law that is exacerbating fatigue and fear on the streets as it keeps unhoused residents continually on the move. Service providers described heightened difficulty consistently connecting with unhoused individuals after the law’s passage.

Together, these interviews paint a picture of a law that’s further destabilizing unhoused residents, who frequently are left without anywhere to stay.

“If there is a shelter, what if it’s full?” said Adrienne Bush, executive director of Homeless and Housing Coalition of Kentucky, summing up most interviewees’ main conundrum. “Because that’s the fundamental question here.”

There aren’t nearly enough available shelter spaces or affordable housing units to provide a sleeping space for all the unhoused residents in Bowling Green or in Kentucky. So, the law effectively restricts many unhoused residents from camping or sleeping anywhere here or across the commonwealth.

Duvall noted that the law allows local governments to designate temporary areas with sanitation facilities where people can stay. None exists in Bowling Green.

The Salvation Army, which offers 78 beds to people for typically up to two weeks, sometimes turns people away due to a lack of space, The Salvation Army Capt. Johnny Horton confirmed. The one other year-round shelter citywide, Bowling Green’s regional domestic violence shelter, turned away 128 qualifying crisis callers between July 2023 and this past July because it didn’t have space, said Tori Henninger, executive director of Barren River Area Safe Space.

Room in the Inn, which collaborates with churches to provide shelter during winter nights, is the one other organization that provides shelter citywide, interviewees said – but it’s solely available November through March.

Though there’s no accurate count of unhoused residents citywide, likely more than 320 residents who visited the nonprofit Lifeskill’s Bowling Green wellness connection center last year had been living on city streets when they first visited, estimated Amy Hinton, Lifeskills’ community support program manager. (She estimated that “around 75% to 80%” of Lifeskills’ 432 center visitors last year arrived from the streets.)

Across the larger region, homeless shelters only exist in three of the 10 counties across the Barren River River Area Development District, said Henninger and Rhondell Miller, the former executive director of the nonprofit HOTEL INC.

Additionally, multiple service providers noted that it’s typical for shelters to have restrictions and cater to different populations – another limitation to finding somewhere to stay.

“The reason why a person might not have a home can be as vast and different as the types of housing and shelter available,” Henninger said.

Some, she noted, are dealing with undiagnosed or untreated mental health or substance misuse issues; others, underemployment or unemployment; others, still, a lack of available housing. The list goes on.

For example, the shelter program at Bowling Green’s Salvation Army is limited to those seeking work or working who haven’t utilized the nonprofit’s services within the last year. There are additional restrictions for residents’ safety and security, Horton said.

“People are dealing with a multitude of issues, often simultaneously, that are prohibitive of making it an easy transition from being unhoused to housed,” Henninger said.

These factors, alongside a dearth of affordable housing across the region and state, have left unhoused residents such as Phillip Manning – lugging his belongings along Veterans Memorial Lane on a muggy September evening – to accept a bleak reality due to the recent law:

“There’s nowhere to go,” he said.

Calls, enforcement, movement: a cycle

Three times in 10 days, James Orrock said, police explained the new law as they ordered him to move.

Orrock lost both lower legs, at the knees and below, to diabetes. Last August, his in-laws evicted him from their home, he said. In the September humidity, he rolled his wheelchair down a Bowling Green street in search of a resting place.

“I fall asleep for however long, maybe 20-30 minutes … then, I wake up and I roll some more because the cops are constantly patrolling,” Orrock said. “I can’t help if my arms get tired, and I’ve got to stop and rest.”

Mandated by the state to enforce the Safer Kentucky Act, local law enforcement must continually decide whether to keep unhoused residents moving in spite of factors such as disability, fatigue, sleep or weather. Though they’ve all but avoided citations and arrests, officers have still overwhelmingly kept people on the move, according to the interviews.

BGPD has implemented what it calls an education process, where officers explain the law and provide unhoused residents a list of services. If officers get another complaint, they can cite or arrest someone if needed, BGPD Public Information Officer Ronnie Ward said. While BGPD will enforce the law if a person is visibly breaking it – for example, by sleeping on the sidewalk – Ward said that officers are enforcing the law primarily by responding to residents’ calls and not actively seeking out people to move.

Warren County Sheriff Brett Hightower said deputies redirect residents to services, and if a person doesn’t pursue them or continues to camp, the Safer Kentucky Act enables enforcement.

Katan Parker, the region’s public affairs officer for Kentucky State Police, said troopers primarily enforce the law on the interstate and mostly give people a ride off the roadway. KSP’s enforcement of the law can also occur when assisting BGPD and the Warren County Sheriff’s Office, Parker said.

Officers, showing leniency, sometimes let a person remain. Homeless residents and service providers observed that when it happens, it’s when a resident is avoiding visibility in public, refraining from making a mess or getting through exceptional circumstances such as a downpour. Among the numerous unhoused residents asked how officers spoke to them, each resident described them as polite.

“Officer discretion is a big part of our enforcement,” Hightower said. “If we come up to you, and you’re compliant, and you’re going to move along, and you haven’t created a huge mess … we can try to work with you.”

As of Sept. 19, BGPD cited one person and jailed none, Ward said; the Warren County Sheriff’s Office cited one person twice and jailed him, Hightower said; KSP didn’t cite or arrest anyone in this region due to the law, Parker said.

“We still want to be able to make a good common-sense decision on what is best for everybody,” Ward said. “How do we enforce the law that has been put in place and do what is the best for the people that are involved?”

Despite local law enforcement’s few citations and arrests due to the Safer Kentucky Act, this mandated enforcement is still continually destabilizing unhoused residents.

Most unhoused interviewees described enforcement as firm and constant, where law enforcement officers are ordering them and others to continually move from parks, woods, graveyards, beneath bridges and so on. Several said their sleep was unaffected because they hide well. One retained permission from a property owner to sleep outside their building.

Interviews with homeless residents and law enforcement depicted a cycle: People call law enforcement on homeless people staying in public areas; officers or deputies order them to move; these residents seek other areas, such as private ones; others, including property owners, call police; police again tell them to move.

In the seven years that Johnalma Barnett has served the local homeless community, she hadn’t heard of continual movement like that. But from what she has seen and heard since the law’s passage, it’s “very common” that people will tell her they’re being forced to move more than before, she said.

“There’s one woman that sets her watch to go off – in four hours, she moves,” Barnett, the Mount Zion Baptist Church coordinator for Feeding America at Lampkin Park, said about one of multiple people who’ve opened up to her. “You’ve got to keep moving so you don’t get caught.”

Hightower said he would “definitely” understand the law causing people to move.

“Before, they were used to setting up a sleeping bag and going to sleep on either private property and or public property,” Hightower said. “Now, they know they can’t do that.”

Perpetual human toll

Timothy Hayes called one number after another for assistance moving his belongings elsewhere.

Hayes said that as he struggled finding a place to stay, a property owner told him he could remain in the woods within his property line but later revoked that permission. When police ordered him to leave, Hayes – whose hip was injured in a 1983 truck wreck – couldn’t find someone to help.

“And even if I got a hold of anybody, I wouldn’t know where to tell them where we was going,” Hayes said somberly. “Because I have no idea.”

He said a large part of why he had nowhere to go is due to the new law. Because camping or sleeping in public spaces is illegal, unhoused residents more than before are seeking resting places on private property, often out of sight in rural wood areas, unhoused residents and service providers observed.

“I really don’t know where to go … I really don’t know where to go,” Hayes said, on the verge of tears. “There can’t be no stability because … no matter where we move to, we’re made to move again.”

Service providers and unhoused residents say they’ve observed fear and anxiety surge on the streets since the recent law’s passage. Unhoused interviewees said that being kept on the move these past two months has exhausted them more than before, and a continual loss of sleep has compounded their fatigue.

Unhoused residents and service providers described the law as one that, instead of getting people to resources, is destabilizing residents.

Samantha Rose, an unhoused resident seeking a resting place, said her stress had risen and time for sleeping had decreased since the law passed. Recently ordered to move from beneath the Jennings Creek bridge, she lugged her belongings, alongside Manning, beside Veterans Memorial.

“I’ve been sick all day because of (exhaustion),” Rose said.

Service providers expressed concern over the ways a loss of sleep works against the law’s purported aim of getting people to services and resources.

“It is like a torture technique that keeps people delirious,” Magnolia Gramling, a co-founder of the homelessness services nonprofit Bowling Green Neighbors, said about the continual movement. “Nobody can get a job or work a job if they have no place to sleep. You can’t be doing … factory-industry work with no sleep. It’s a liability and a hazard.”

Hinton, from the nonprofit Lifeskills, added that if a person tires from walking constantly, they’re less likely to seek out programs.

Unhoused residents and service providers observed officers scattering camps more and a greater number of unhoused residents walking the sidewalks.

On one hand, scattering camps continually means health hazards sometimes present, such as litter, feces, needles and vermin, have less time to build up. However, this has caused at least some service providers to experience heightened difficulty connecting with unhoused residents.

For nearly a year, Bowling Green Neighbors has provided services directly to unhoused residents. From mapping out recent encampments on a whiteboard, to exploring the woods to bring people resources such as medical care alongside other nonprofits, members have a focus on building relationships with the unhoused community.

Connecting with unsheltered residents has become more difficult since the law’s passage, Bowling Green Neighbors co-founders Gramling, Emily Wittuhn and Tim Wittuhn said separately. Barnett said this has been her experience, as well.

“Being able to keep in contact with folks that our medicine team is monitoring has been really difficult, especially in the last two months,” Emily Wittuhn said two months after the law’s passage. “For example, if we need to follow up with someone about a health issue that our street medicine team has been monitoring, and they get displaced, it’s harder for our street medicine team to find them and to follow up.”

Hinton added that building consistent connections with providers is particularly important.

“If I’m constantly connected with you, I’m able to build that relationship, I’m able to talk to you to see what is going on with you, seeing what resources I can give you to help you get on your feet and get you to a life where you’re housed,” she said. “But if you’re not able to get to me on a regular basis … it may take longer, or it may not happen … .”

A dearth of affordable housing

Although the law’s supporters say it’ll push homeless residents to find resources, a job and ultimately, housing, Bowling Green – like many other cities nationwide – has a dearth of housing, especially affordable units.

Evidence-based research such as the Benioff Homelessness and Housing Initiative’s California Statewide Study of People Experiencing Homelessness – “the largest representative study of homelessness in the United States since the mid-1990s” – has long found the main cause of homelessness to be a lack of affordable housing.

“The cause of homelessness is the lack of housing across the board,” Bush, from the Homeless and Housing Coalition of Kentucky, said.

Bowling Green’s non-market-rate housing – units subsidized by tax credits or the government – stayed completely filled in 2019 and in 2023, according to the city’s commissioned Bowen National Research studies from each respective year.

Additionally, with Bowling Green’s population surging quicker than that of any other city in the commonwealth, the 2023 study estimated that between 2022 and 2027, the city will experience a rental housing gap of 2,848 units in extremely low-income, very low-income and low-income rentals. The gap will total 4,204 units of rentals and 2,887 units of for-sale housing.

Meanwhile, Kentucky is short more than 200,000 units, around half rentals, half for-sale. Among all these, nearly 80,000 are for households at 30% of the Area Median Income, according to the Kentucky Housing Corporation.

While affordable housing gaps will remain here and across the state, the city and county are both making progress.

The city is investing some $155 million into affordable housing, Brent Childers, director of Bowling Green Neighborhood and Community Services, told Bowling Green city commissioners Sept. 17. This, he told the Daily News, will cover “in the neighborhood of” 700 affordable housing units; these units, spread across about eight projects, will be under construction within the next two years and likely be completed within the next four, Childers said.

“This does not fill that whole gap,” he noted. Still, he said, “this is the largest single time we’ve made an investment in affordable housing in history.”

Meanwhile, Warren County is partnering with Live the Dream Development Inc. to build “$4.5 million in affordable housing and is working with developers to construct hundreds of more units in Warren County over the next few years,” county Judge-Executive Doug Gorman said.

Bowling Green City Manager Jeff Meisel emphasized that Bowling Green has helped fund a variety of nonprofit services such as Goodwill’s Another Way Program, the new LifeNav Collaborative Center and the upcoming, newly funded mental health intake center, known as the Anchor Project Center.

Interviewees agreed that such resources are crucial to address widespread drug addiction as well as mental health issues on the streets. Treating these is essential to getting people housed, said Melanie Watts, regional executive director at Lifeskills.

“A person might have a mental health issue or substance use issue, which makes it more difficult to obtain a job,” Watts said.

And so, the city and county have additionally made strides providing essential services for unhoused residents.

Still, a great need for housing, and ways to make it affordable, remains. Another example of this is the lengthy waitlist for Bowling Green’s Section 8 vouchers, a federally funded means of housing assistance.

More than 1,000 people are waiting for one of Bowling Green’s 750 vouchers to become available, Childers said. Among those waiting, around a third are local, which increases their priority on the waitlist. An average local, not accounting for other factors, may wait around eight to 10 months for a voucher, he estimated.

Hayes, the man who’d sought assistance moving his belongings, is one of the city’s Section 8 voucher applicants. In September, he sounded hopeful as he spoke of a job prospect and a voucher opportunity.

But he’s also all too aware that for the time being, the Safer Kentucky Act has taken away places he can stay.

The day after Hayes couldn’t find assistance, officers booked him in the Warren County Jail for third-degree trespassing – the only jail-time he’s spent in 16 years, according to the jail website.

The jail released Hayes the next day. In that time, people raided his camp, taking tents, tarps, bags, food and clothes, he said.

“It’s like we have to start over every single time,” he said.

David writes for the Daily News via a partnership with Report for America.