Issue link: https://newsleader.uberflip.com/i/352007
downtown merchants complain about how homeless and vagrant people were driving away customers, they were slapped with a Sunshine suit for having been in the same room together while a public issue was being discussed. Meanwhile, the population migration con- tinued to grow as the weather worsened up north. While this produced the normal sea- sonal influx of homeless people, the numbers seemed larger. In January, when the annual homeless census was conducted, and then in February, when the bed-tax dollars were counted, hard numbers backed up the "guess- timates." It was proving to be a bonanza season for tourists and homelessness alike. A Texas-based consultant was hired by the city and county last year to devise a plan to somehow abate the problem of the "visibly homeless." In the meantime, merchants and landlords traded horror stories, vandals were tearing up landscaping to make trinkets that they could force on tourists as "gifts" and pol- iticians were getting panicky again. This time Atwell was not alone in feeling the heat. The consultant virtually demanded that any shelter be constructed near downtown, and neighbors virtually demanded it be someplace else. When asked for public documents to back up his assertions, the consultant told the city commissioners to make public records requests about facilities in other cities. After two Sarasota sites were investigated for a shelter location, the $9 million price tag turned official enthusiasm limp. Homeless people gather on Lemon Avenue in late June. Photo by Norman Schimmel Sarasota News Leader July 25, 2014 Page 41