The Salt Lake Tribune has published an article on the Pioneer Park Coalition’s troubles with members withdrawing. The Road Home and Crossroads Urban Center have officially withdrawn their membership.
The Road Home shelter is officially out of the Pioneer Park Coalition — the second homeless-service provider to leave — after top coalition leaders’ presentation earlier this month seeking funding from the state Legislature for a housing project on west North Temple.
Matt Minkevitch, executive director of The Road Home, said his organization left the coalition because it cannot sign on to such initiatives without the approval of its board of directors. He added, however, that The Road Home will continue to work with the coalition.
The leaders of the Coalition, according to the article, gave a presentation to the Legislature on the request for state funds to build housing based on the consent of all Coalition members.
In their Feb. 11 presentation to the Legislature, coalition executives Scott Howell, Bryson Garbett, Josh Romney and Jonathan Harmon listed 85 group members — including The Road Home — as supporting the request for $1 million in state funds to build housing units on Salt Lake City’s west side.
“We wanted to make sure we were not implying consent for various programs without the consent of our board,” Minkevitch said. “But we consider ourselves a friend of the coalition.”
Last week, the executive director of the Crossroads Urban Center, Glenn Bailey, resigned from the coalition because, he said, it listed his organization as one of the supporters of the housing proposal on the west side. Bailey said he hadn’t seen the plan and would never have supported the proposed sites. He complained the coalition was operating in a top-down fashion that left most members out of decision making and suggested it had an unspoken agenda of moving homeless services out of the Rio Grande area.