[ad_1]
Warwick Smith/Stuff
Support services check in on a man that slept in The Square.
A homeless man sleeping on top of a Palmerston North war memorial has been urged to move on from Te Marae o Hine – The Square.
Palmerston North City Council customer officer Kerry-Lee Probert said they were aware a man had stayed in The Square on Tuesday night.
He had set up a bed on top of a concrete block that was part of the Cenotaph.
Probert said they had reached out to support services who would be checking in to see what the man needed.
About 1.30pm on Wednesday, council staff could be seen speaking to the man and attempting to move him on while pedestrians walked past eating their lunch.
Warwick Smith/Stuff
Council staff speak with the man.
He appeared upset and remained quiet.
A bed, a mattress and several blankets were lying next to him on the grass.
When Stuff returned to the Cenotaph after 3pm the man and his belongings were gone.
He was one of many people sleeping rough in the inner city. People had also been staying in vacant doorways, and business owners were distressed about foot traffic and safety.
Probert said as these were private properties, business owners were free to ask people to move on.
“The owners can ask anyone to move to a different location and ask the police for support if they don’t do so.”
Warwick Smith/Stuff
Passersby look surprised to see a man camped on top of the war memorial.
But Manawatū area commander Ross Grantham previously told Stuff “rough sleeping, begging or being homeless are in themselves not criminal offences”.
Police were called from “time to time” to deal with issues such as public disorder or antisocial behaviour, he said.
According to the Ministry of Housing and Urban Development, more than 100,000 people were “severely housing deprived” in Aotearoa.
About 5.1% of that figure was in the Manawatū-Whanganui region. As at March 2023, 642 people were on the housing register in Palmerston North, and it took an average of 208 days to transition off the list and into a home.
Last year the council voted in favour of spending $100,000 on a feasibility study to create a night shelter.
Virginia Woolf/stuff
Nelson’s Balmoral Motel is among those providing accommodation to the homeless through the Housing First initiative. Video first published in July 2020.
At the time, council community development manager Stephanie Velvin said community agencies estimated 30 to 50 people were sleeping rough in the area.
The People’s Project, which had been studying homelessness in New Zealand, found one of the biggest myths about those were homeless was that they chose to be there.
However, most of the people it worked with wanted a house and a job.
Its research also found “worldwide, developing a stock of appropriately located and sized affordable housing has been key” to ending homelessness.
[ad_2]