By Emily Haerter

What exactly is uncomfortable about Sacramento? Is it the culture? Is it the food? The community? It’s clear from social media threads and public meetings that what many find uncomfortable about Sacramento is the unwavering crisis of unwell and unhoused citizens embedded in the heart of the city – an issue many hospitality workers are on the front lines of.

It’s safe to say that the majority of Sacramento, especially areas to grab a bite to eat, are public property and available to anyone. Nevertheless, restaurant and shop owners on the Downtown scene are frequently subjected to mentally and physically unwell citizens without homes or access to healthcare services, sometimes disrupting commerce or even driving customers off. Who’s ultimately responsible to ensure the safety of not only those in need of medical or psychiatric intervention, but also business owners or their customers who are threatened, injured, or sometimes even robbed?

Mayor Kevin McCarty recently posted a bleak update through his ‘Mayor McCarty Memo,’ asserting, “At the current rate, getting our unhoused neighbors off Sacramento streets and into permanent supportive housing would take 125 years.”

The mayor went on to note that the striking number is “unacceptable.”

Numbers for the houseless community may be improving. According to the 2024 Point in Time Count prepared by the non-profit organization Sacramento Steps Forward, homelessness in Sacramento was down 29% compared to 2022’s estimation. Despite numbers being comparably lower to previous years, the emotional discomfort throughout Sacramento hasn’t gone away. Some central city workers even report feeling a certain hopelessness about it. Concern is growing that this weary feeling is directly affecting everyone, from the people without homes to the business owners who have poured their life into a communal space here. Anecdotal evidence suggests that this conversation about how uncomfortable downtown and midtown Sacramento can be at times is leading many in the surrounding suburbs to visit the restaurants, cafes, and live music venues in the city’s urban core less and less. 

Golden Bear is the type of business weighing that concern. It’s typically a bustling yet charming place where out-of-towners can come grab a drink or pick something off its all-American menu. Josh Milholm, Golden Bear’s owner, has watched the ever-growing uneasiness in Sacramento surrounding the homeless crisis. He himself has dealt with traumatic situations inside his restaurant. While he understands being located in a metropolitan area comes with challenges, he and his staff being susceptible to a humanitarian crisis has taken a toll.

“It’s terrifying: Even if you’re looking at someone who I know couldn’t overpower me, it’s jarring having someone threaten to kill you, it’s upsetting.” Milholm acknowledged. “I’m a healthy fit person, but someone who is smaller, they might actually think, ‘This person can kill me.’ It’s disturbing.”

While most unhoused people aren’t violent, it is not uncommon at Downtown Sacramento businesses to encounter individuals who seem mentally unstable and pose a potential threat to themselves or those around them. How could the average person without behavioral health training know the difference? When a pair of Starbucks cafes in Downtown tried to unionize two years ago, it was because so many baristas had been assaulted by unwell individuals. Without Starbucks managers having access to some kind of threat assessment, the baristas wanted security guards inside the cafes.

Milholm mentioned that he reached out to the Sacramento Police Department. While he doesn’t send blame their way, it wasn’t until he contacted an elected official in Sacramento to have a meet and greet on Golden Bear’s patio that he was able to voice some of his concerns and frustrations. Milholm also mentioned that he feels there’s ebbs and flows when describing the city’s acts of relief. Some weeks, while taking his bike to work, he passes by homeless encampments in the bicycle lane. Other times those encampments are suddenly gone, then the encampments start up again.

“It seems like we are pushing the food around on our plate,” Milholm pointed out. ”It appears to be a combination of a possible housing shortage, people just being frozen out of the mainstream economy, and possibly people with untreated psychiatric issues, possibly self-medicating with drugs. And then the fallout is people who are not suited to take care of themselves … It’s super complicated, and so I’m not comfortable pointing a finger at any one entity. It’s a multi-faceted, multi-layered epidemic … Our community doesn’t feel safe, which is at one end of the spectrum, a very real end of the spectrum, but we would also say that there is component that feels really depressing, seeing a bunch of trash and a bunch of people who appear to be intoxicated or suffering from mental health problems, half naked passed out on the street. It’s not going to entice the average customer.”

He added, “Nobody will want to see someone abjectly suffering at their own will.”

Other business owners have faced similar challenges. Jennifer Swiryn, the owner of The Morning Fork, is one of them.

“Homelessness is a visual reminder to the public that there is an obvious systematic problem,” Swiryn observed in an email exchange with SN&R.

Morning Fork is a prime-time breakfast spot in Midtown. It’s often warm and lively. However, there are also challenges to being on a busy street in a time of crisis.

“We have had to call the cops hundreds of times,” Swiryn noted. “I admit they have been more responsive lately, thankfully. I believe the city officials do want to find a solution for this, but the right plan hasn’t been formed yet: the help offered to the homeless is not a satisfying option for most of them. The rules are too strict, essentially giving the feeling of wiping away their freedom to get off the streets. Many don’t see it as a better option, but see it as a prison.”

When things go south

There are new ideas on the horizon, including tiny homes, being discussed as a way to relieve the number of people living on the streets. Governor Gavin Newsom has also discussed “stronger accountability measures to hold local governments accountable if they fail to make progress in addressing homelessness.”

Part of Newsom’s initiative was unveiling a new online accountability tool to help the public track their “community’s progress on housing, homelessness, and behavioral health, in addition to $920 million in new funding.”

Despite this, many align with Milholm and Swiryn’s perspectives. While some statistics may have improved, those living in Sacramento, especially in downtown, are not necessarily seeing stable results around people suffering on the streets.

The ‘ebbs and flows’ Milholm has noticed over the years beg the question: If the city and county governments are already doing the best they can, is another approach necessary to better manage, or ultimately cure homelessness in Sacramento?

The same conversation is happening between midtown and downtown at places like Camellia, a charming coffee roaster that doubles as a quaint, communal food spot. Manager Kelly Hill hasn’t had as many face-to-face challenges as the team at Golden Bear, and wonders if that is because R Street has its own partnership. The RSSP, or R Street Sacramento Partnership, pride themselves on keeping their side of town clean, safe, and welcoming.

Michelle Smira, founder and CEO of MMS strategies with RSSP, stressed there are many Property-Based Improvement Districts (PBIDs), including the downtown and midtown associations.

“Once property and business owners get together and say, ‘Hey let’s assess ourselves’, they pay more in property tax for a certain amount of services,” Smira said. “This could be marketing, events, promotions. It could be maintenance, security, it’s really up to them.”

In a PBID, the majority of business owners have to agree on the overall plans for the district as well as a set budget. One could easily notice how much more welcoming the atmosphere is while travelling through R street lately. Overall, there is less trash, reduced graffiti, and no visible encampments around any high-foot-traffic areas. Samira said there’s an active security system that includes a member of the partnership riding around the area, and either moving any problematic populace along, or offering services or individuals who are open to seeking help. Smira added that doesn’t mean unhoused people minding their own business are being roosted.

“It’s not illegal to be homeless,” she acknowledged. “If anything, security is there to make people feel good…It’s not necessarily just about the unhoused, it’s about the activity that we need to keep an eye on.”

She added, “For some who are experiencing homelessness, in particular experiencing mental health challenges, they would rather find a space not around people.”

Returning to Hill’s perspective, there are sensitivities involved in figuring out how to handle an unhoused person who appears to be suddenly descending into crisis or highly disruptive behavior. It’s something she has expressed frustration about to the city on multiple different occasions.

“It doesn’t feel good to do that [call the police], if someone is having some kind of episode,” HilI said. “I mean, we know what happens when you call the police. It doesn’t generally end well for them; and we don’t feel confident that they are going to get the help that they need with whatever it is they are going through.”

Such struggles can raise questions for managers about which of their employees are best suited to work up front around the problems, not to mention a broader issue of having to feel like they have to pick between empathy and their livelihood.

Take Hugo Cervantes, owner of Cilantro’s Mexican Restaurant located on J and 8th, as an example. He’s been operating a business around the homeless problem for more than 20 years, and has watched it grow substantially over time. Cervantes says he’s been spit at, as well as attacked by unwell individuals – and even had his premise broken into “a few times.”

“As soon as you call the police with a situation, or an issue, it seems as soon as you mention ‘homeless,’ it wouldn’t be the top of their priority, it would be at the bottom of their priority list,” Cervantes articulated. “So, that tells me that, once again, they aren’t taking it as seriously, and they should.”

What are authorities doing now?

As a proprietor who says he loves his town, his customers, and his community, Cervantes wants to see things change in Sacramento for the better. He proactively cleans his side of the street and sometimes offers help to those in need, setting the standard of goodwill despite unfortunate circumstances.

Cervantes also wants accountability. He believes that loving your city means you have a responsibility to push for better changes and conditions.

“I don’t know, all I can tell you is…I hope they are doing everything they can,’ Cervantes reflected. “That’s what I hope.”

District 4 Councilman Phil Pluckebaum campaigned on tackling how the homeless crisis is affecting small businesses. Since getting elected, Pluckebaum has met with business owners, held meetings in the community, and discussed options with the various PBIDs. He says he understands the frustrations, noting that he’s pushing towards new strategies for housing options as well as immediate sources to unhoused citizens.

“I go to all of the usual things, chamber meetings, small business gatherings, trying to figure out what we can do differently to support them and also provide help for the people in crisis-people experiencing some real-life traumas,” Pluckebaum said. “Folks are all looking for different outcomes, and looking for how to get folks off the streets as quickly as possible in a way that’s defensible and humane and responsible, but also effective. The current model of sweeping folks is not currently effective, so everyone’s looking for a place for people to be that’s not the street. And that’s the bottom line.”

Pluckebaum points to the city’s Department of Community Response as part of the current tactics. The department, better known as DCR, surveys the homeless outreach line for Sacramento (311). Julie Hall, the city’s spokeswoman for DCR, said that the team “assesses the urgency and scope of the situation to determine the appropriate response.” It also provides a public data dashboard for transparently illuminating how the Incident Management Team responds to homeless-related calls, and posts relevant records for each week. The dashboard also shows the results of calls.

So, what is the priority if the phone lines are flooded?

“Prioritization factors include immediate health and safety hazards, violations of City codes and State laws, as well as the number and type of calls received related to a specific location,” Hall answered in an email. “In addition, [Incident Management Team] personnel, coordinated by [Department of Community Response] staff, are in the field providing contact and services at encampments every day and contribute to prioritization through observations of conditions and hazards.”

This team effort from the city is multi-faceted, including elements of code enforcement, Sacramento police and fire, park rangers, public works, and animal care. Hall added that the Incident Management Team has additional support from Sacramento County Behavioral Health services, as well as a cleanup contractor.

Since coming into office, Pluckebaum has familiarized himself with how the Department of Community Response intervenes in different situations on a day-to-day basis.

“DCR goes out to meet with folks, makes them aware of the services that are available, tries to get them to accept whatever offer of help that we have at that time,” the councilman explained. “If they’re unable or unwilling to accept the services, there are follow up conversations about compliance enforcement. Most of the camping fines are misdemeanor, or nuisance tickets. The conversation will escalate if the camp has been there for a long time, and the amount of debris around the campsite accumulates to the point of a public health crisis, that’s when we will call folks to clean and get the campsites cleaned up and swept.”

Pluckebaum thinks sweeping camps should be actively avoided when possible, noting it’s expensive and often futile, as well as “harmful” in the way it disrupts people who are struggling.

“What we are trying to do is get them stabilized, get them services somewhere, and meet them at whatever their expectation is,” he reflected, adding that mental health and addiction treatment resources being underfunded and underserved “since the Reagan administration” makes it a constant challenge.

“I think everyone is aware of that deficit in the system,” Pluckebaum said, “but no one’s quite figured out how to crack the code on how to provide for that.”