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La Crosse council prepares to seek help for the homeless from higher levels of government

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State and federal leaders could be hearing soon from the city of La Crosse, to get help for homeless people in the area.

The city council’s judiciary committee has approved a resolution calling on Washington and Madison to make resources available to cities trying to provide shelter for unhoused people. Council member Chris Woodard says other cities in the region are taking similar steps. He calls it “very similar as to the one that Eau Claire had just passed several weeks ago. I guess as we say, the more the merrier.”

The resolution received 4 yes votes in committee, with 2 members abstaining. It moves on to the full city council next week.

In other committee business on Thursday, a step was taken toward converting the old Grandview building on Main Street into apartments. The judiciary committee has also voted to approve a developer’s plan to remodel the interior of the former hospital into 40 units or more.

The proposal also calls on the city to remove a deed restriction placed on Grandview years ago, which would prohibit the building from being used for housing. Grandview was originally built as a hospital early in the 20th century.

4 Comments

  1. Come On Man

    January 3, 2025 at 11:10 am

    So what was the straw that broke the camel’s back?
    The city has been dealing with this issue for years, many years, hired a homeless coordinator, recently sought help from the county board, spent God knows how much money and now they are asking for federal help?
    WTF? When the homeless coordinator did not work (He was hired how many years ago?) why was the city not looking for help then?
    The voters should send a strong message in the future that we need city leaders who ask for help on issues that they are in over their heads early in the process and not wait until the taxpayer money is gone.
    Most people will agree that all of these good ideas the mayor and council came up with no proven or fact-based answers were insane.
    So much for building a library with the mayor’s name on it after he retires considering it was his number one priority to solve the unsheltered population issue.
    Obviously, it was not his number one issue to solve because he was able to travel out of the country to a global meeting about not throwing plastics and garbage into our waterways.
    Who knew that was bad for our planet? Go figure.

  2. R Head

    January 3, 2025 at 2:20 pm

    Trump is going to cut off money for sanctuary city’s so I guess La Crosse will have to kiss Evers ass to get money. The city pissed away all the Covid money!!!!!

  3. Bob N

    January 6, 2025 at 2:24 pm

    To our local officials who think they can fix this situation by begging to the state-read this Op-Ed page letter from the WSJ today:

    No one should be surprised that homelessness increases when governments spend more money to “solve” the problem (“The Blue State Homeless Boom,” Review & Outlook, Dec. 31). One starts to suspect that the consultants, community organizers and nonprofits to which governments outsource are getting paid on a per-homeless-person basis, and the metric for success is how many homeless are “served,” not a reduction in the homeless population.

    The greater the homeless head count, the bigger the “crisis,” the louder the plea for funds, and the larger the share of the budget allocated to it.

    If you think California has a homeless problem now, after spending $24 billion over the past five years, wait until California spends $48 billion.

    William Matthews

    Mattapoisett, Mass

    My reaction to the current situation is-we have the squatters on the run after kicking them out of the parks. This, after years of watching them pollute the parks, parking ramps and river banks. Now, they are not seen nearly as much. Keep the pressure on. It’s working.

  4. walden

    January 6, 2025 at 2:40 pm

    La Crosse needs to do it because other cities are doing it…wow there is some deep thinking.

    How about we let Eau Claire increase their own Homeless Industrial Complex, thereby attracting the homeless to Eau Claire and saving La Crosse the taxes, crime, drug use, collapsing downtown shopping, etc.

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