Feeding Homeless Assailed By Malibu Resident As Council Resumes Holding Meetings
Written by 991KBU on April 14, 2020
Malibu’s city council met last night … its first meeting in three weeks.
NEWSCART 75530 AGENDA MUMBLE:
MAYOR: “May I haVe an approval on the agenda?”
FOUR VOICES AT ONCE SECOND THE MOTION.
In many ways … it was a fairly typical city council meeting.
The ordinance requiring that commercial dump bins be locked passed.
Also … the city council awarded the construction bid for the temporary skateboard park at Bluffs Park.
The ban on commercial and residential eviction passed … as well as the rent freeze.
All of those by unanimous vote.
City manager Reva Feldman has bad economic news.
After making a nearly complete financial recovery from the Woolsey Fire … the pandemic is going to ne a major hit to the city checkbook.
NEWSCART 75528 FELDMAN BUDGET
“We’re looking probably somewhere between about $2 million down this year in revenue.
“And we’re closer to another $3 million down … maybe $4 million down next year, so it’s significant .
“And we are doing everything we can to trend these down so that we can deliver a balanced budget.”
The city manager said her team is still learning about new financial issues every day … and she hopes to provide a full report for the city council at a special budget meeting on April 29th.
One controversy… came up during the call to the public.
Marnie Kamen accused the loose Malibu organization that feeds homeless people … CART … of endangering the public.
She referred to an encampment that has sprung up at the old Civic Center.
NEWSCART 75511 MARNIE KAMEN
“I’m just – I’m at a loss as to how the city is allowing this to happen. They’re giving thousand dollar tickets to surfers for going into the ocean along with maybe one other person hundred feet away from them.
“I can’t walk my dog without a mask.
“And I can’t have a play date with my daughter and another kid at the Bluffs Park … yet it’s somehow being allowed … that they can feed the homeless in this really unhygienic way during a pandemic.
“I would like to hold CART – the organization – to some standard since I imagine those are not homeless people those volunteers.
And I’d like to know why that’s being allowed to happen three times a day every day.
“I can’t go on a bike ride by there but they can all congregate there and basically all have a party.”
No one from CART spoke at the meeting.
But city officials say they have asked the sheriff to enforce public health laws.
And the city manager said regional efforts to get the homeless off the streets have been stepped up.
Caseworkers are working with the homeless in Malibu … to get them out of public places … and into a shelter.
