Aberdeen’s downtown business improvement committee and a city council member want to add a zoning ordinance that restricts where social services for low income and homeless people can be built in the future.

During the council’s Public Safety committee meeting last week, Aberdeen City Council member Karen Rowe presented an example ordinance from Vancouver that in 1991 made it so “human services facilities” such as shelters, free clinics and food pantries can’t be located in certain areas of the city. The Vancouver ordinance also required that any additional social services added to the city be at least 1,320 feet from a pre-existing one, and that transitional housing sites need to be at least a mile from another such facility.

Rowe said the city’s Downtown Parking and Business Improvement Committee would like the city to add a similar ordinance in Aberdeen, that would “specify what services can be in a certain location, preferably within the Downtown Parking and Business Improvement District.” Rowe added that she’s looked at multiple cities that have similar zoning ordinances for social services, and that existing social services would not be affected and get grandfathered in. The matter was referred to Community Development Director Lisa Scott to create a report for the council to consider.

Vancouver has scrapped its ordinance. In December, the city council voted unanimously to repeal it after the city attorney’s office raised concerns in 2016 that it violated laws that prohibit discrimination against people based on their disabilities or family status. The attorney’s office suggested the city replace the rule to avoid future legal action. This included concern the ordinance was out of compliance with a recent 9th Circuit Court of Appeals ruling regarding human services facilities.

The city attorney’s analysis noted that the original task force for the ordinance based its conclusions at least partially on stereotypes of clientele who used the social services, instead of data that showed a correlation to the perceived impacts of those services in the area.

“The task force, looking at the issue, said things like, ‘The services decrease property values if it’s close to residences, or if they concentrate together,’ but they didn’t have data to demonstrate that was the case, just assumptions,” said Vancouver City Planning Manager Chad Eiken.

At last week’s meeting, Rowe said when social services are located on the city’s main streets like Heron and Wishkah, it can “deter a lot of people” from using the service because they feel exposed. She also said the ordinance could be helpful for attracting businesses.

“For their own pride, they’re probably not going to be somewhere that visible,” Rowe said, referring to some of the social service clients. “This would help people not only access the services they may need, and probably wouldn’t use, this helps everyone, and we can get businesses into the downtown location.”

Rowe declined to discuss in-depth how she thinks the ordinance could look in Aberdeen because the idea is in an early stage. But in a later interview she said it would help create a more centralized area in Aberdeen for social services.

When asked if the ordinance is intended to push homeless and low-income people who use social services to less visible areas of town, Rowe said that’s not a goal. Rowe, who owns a downtown business, added she doesn’t view the ordinance as a way to limit how much businesses like hers are affected by people loitering outside on the sidewalks and in store alcoves.

“They’re two separate issues,” she said.

In Vancouver, the ordinance was replaced with more lenient policies for prospective social service givers, greatly increasing where the facilities can be located in the city, and getting rid of the spacing requirements.

For example, Eiken said shelters are now allowed wherever commercial lodging is allowed, day centers where community centers are allowed, and meal services wherever eating and drinking establishments can go.

Eiken said some neighborhoods felt they were “bearing the brunt of the impacts of having social services” in close proximity of each other, which led to the ordinance. He said the ordinance was well-intentioned when it was first adopted, but over time court rulings made it clear the ordinance needed to either get repealed or fixed after conducting studies that demonstrate such facilities did result in the perceived impacts like higher crime and lower property values nearby compared to other facilities.

Scott will likely present a report to the Public Safety Committee at the next council meeting.