Everett may limit alcohol sales in effort to clean up streets

EVERETT — The City Council is taking up three ordinances that would have a significant affect on the activities of homeless people in the city.

Everett is in the implementation phase of the Community Streets Initiative, a task force that released a long list of recommendations last year to combat chronic homelessness, street nuisances, mental health problems and addiction, especially downtown.

One of the priority recommendations was to establish an alcohol impact area where the sale of certain cheap, high-alcohol-content beverages would be prohibited.

Everett Police Lt. Bruce Bosman told the council that many other cities, such as Tacoma, Seattle, Olympia and Spokane, have already implemented successful programs to curb public drunkenness.

In Seattle’s Pioneer Square neighborhood, Bosman said, the city got voluntary compliance from area merchants and didn’t have to go to the state Liquor Control Board for mandatory sanctions.

“That is ultimately our goal,” Bosman said.

The areas that would be covered include most of downtown Everett; parts of south Everett between Paine Field, Cascade High School and the Everett Mall; the full length of Evergreen Way; and almost all of Broadway north of 41st Street.

Bosman said that there might be “push-out,” meaning people would go to stores outside the impact area to buy and consume their drinks.

The city might need to revisit the area or adjust the list of sanctioned products in response to that behavior.

“This is going to be a living project, if you will. We’re going to have to keep track of it,” Bosman said.

Councilwoman Brenda Stonecipher said she supports the ordinance but cautioned that it wouldn’t address the underlying problem of alcoholism among the homeless community.

“Until we really address the demand side, I think that we’ll see very little impact from this,” Stonecipher said.

Bosman acknowledged that the ordinance alone wouldn’t solve the city’s problem, calling it a “small piece of a big puzzle.”

Mayor Ray Stephanson said the proposed ordinance and other proposals in the city’s Streets Initiative are long-term projects.

“We’re going to get better as a community, I believe that in my heart of hearts,” Stephanson said. “But it’s an issue we’re going to have to stay on top of forever.”

The other two ordinances would regulate panhandling and sitting or lying on sidewalks or in other public rights of way.

The first would prohibit solicitation or other transactions between drivers and pedestrians within 60 feet of an intersection with a signal or in median strips.

The second would prohibit sitting or lying on sidewalks along a strip of Smith Avenue that stretches from the Everett Gospel Mission north past Everett Station to Pacific Avenue.

The anti-camping ordinance would also prohibit anyone from feeding or distributing other goods or services there without a permit, behavior that the city says only encourages the homeless to congregate in that area.

The latter proposal is in response to the large semi-permanent homeless encampment that had set up near the mission in the I-5 underpass.

A coalition of police, social service workers and church groups dispersed the bulk of the encampment in March, with some of the people being successfully steered into treatment or other programs.

A fence and new lighting was installed in the underpass to dissuade their return, but a smaller group of about 20 people is still camping on sidewalks nearby.

Deputy city attorney David Hall said that that particular location, given its proximity to the mission and the transit center, was attractive to the homeless and that other neighborhoods might not be as affected once the ordinances are enacted.

“There will be some pushing around, but hopefully it will not bring the same problems that came from this concentration” of people, he said.

All three ordinances are scheduled for a final vote of the council at 6:30 p.m. April 15.

Chris Winters: 425-374-4165; cwinters@heraldnet.com. Twitter: @Chris_At_Herald.