ROCK HILL, S.C. — Rock Hill’s mayor says they’re having a problem that city leaders can’t ignore, and a new policy aimed at preventing people from living in hotels just took a step forward.
The proposed crackdown on the length of time guests can stay in Rock Hill hotels and motels has sparked a lot of concern.
“What are we gonna do about those people, we just can’t kick them out of places when they need somewhere to go,” said Natasha Jones, an advocate for the unhoused.
Mayor John Gettys says taxpayers funder $20 million for improvements in the area, and they have to give a return on the investment.
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On Monday night, city council members voted to allow the proposed ordinance to move further along in the process, despite the city’s planning commission voting to reject it.
“This ordinance was not written for homeless people, though there was a provocative headline that led everybody to believe that was the case,” Gettys said.
If approved, the ordinance would prevent hotel stays longer than 30 days, require renters to allow room inspections, and prevent York County residents from renting rooms with exterior doors.
“It cleans up an area of our community so those staying in hotels, whether short term or longer term, are safe,” Gettys said.
The mayor says it’s clear hotels in the Cherry Road and Dave Lyle Boulevard corridors have public safety issues.
“You have over four calls a day every day for two years on average in this half-a-mile area,” Gettys said. “You have about one use of Narcan that we can track per week.”
Some of the hotels in that area received over 200 calls for police service last year. The calls were for things like drug overdoses, fights, and assaults.
“If you see, most of the calls are coming from Quality Inn, why, because I would always like to let officers know if any small activities are going on,” Gettys said.
One motel owner says she’s most concerned how a few bad actors may impact the unhoused families she is trying to be there for.
“Those families actually need us, and if the 30-days rules were applied, they’re going to face a big difficulty,” she said.
The proposed ordinance would give unhoused people more time to stay as long as they are in a program to eventually find permanent housing. For any future hotels built in Rock Hill, all guest room doors will have to face the hotel’s interior. Limits on maximum lengths of stay would also extend to campgrounds.
The next step is to have a second reading of the proposed ordinance. It could be a couple of months before that is scheduled.
Before that happens, city officials will meet with hotel owners, motel owners, and community advocates to work on potential changes.
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