Q&A with Jacob Kupin, District 19

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First-term councilmember Jacob Kupin, representing District 19, recently won the Nashville Scene’s Best Current Metro Councilmember reader’s poll, as well as appearing among the top three Best Politicians alongside Mayor Freddie O’Connell and State House Representative Justin Jones.

Kupin’s position, which covers Nashville’s core, including downtown, was previously held by O’Connell. Kupin describes the district as “very diverse.”

“We’ve got everything from public housing to big businesses, we’ve got urban [areas], and we’ve got neighborhoods,” he says. “And then I also have hundreds of thousands of tourists coming from around the country and around the world …. There is so much going on from a growth perspective and a money perspective. It’s really an exciting place to be.”

Wasn’t the East Bank Development newly added to your District?

Every 10 years district sizes are newly redrawn based on census data. In the 2020 census, Downtown has probably added between 10,000 and 15,000 people. My seat is the first time that the East Bank is included in District 19.

Mayor O’Connell has put together a phenomenal team in a number of areas, but in the East Bank especially. Bob Mendes, his Chief Development Officer, has been running the show over there. Thanks to Bob Mendes and his team, we were able to get about half of the first 1,500 units dedicated to affordable housing. Normally in a lease like this you’ll see maybe 10-15 years of affordability before it falls off and reverts to the regular market rate. We are able to build the affordability into the duration of the entire 99-year lease.

Now we’re in the process of creating the East Bank Authority, which is going to transcend mayoral administrations to allow for consistency as we get this East Bank development up and running. Of course, we’ve also seen in the news the former PSC Metal site going up for auction. It’s really an exciting time.

We recently published an interview with Benton McDonough, who is known as our city’s Night Mayor and works on quality of life issues in Downtown. How closely are you working with him and what are so far the biggest issues the two of you have tackled?

I can’t say enough what an asset Benton is to our city. He’s kind of flying underneath the radar a little bit, but he’s doing some incredible work.

He and I work very closely together on quality of life issues. We often go on night walks Downtown to see what’s going on, what’s working, what’s not working.

Benton is saving lives. He and Councilmember Erin Evans recently worked to get these Narcan ONEboxes installed in bars. It’s this little box with an emergency opioid overdose reversal kit in it.

And you may have heard of my efforts with trying to get a group called Red Frogs here. They’re a nonprofit organization out of Australia. They set up tents with water and snacks for people. They charge people’s phones and help them figure out where they’re going and reconnect them with friends when they get lost. I had gotten connected with them early on, and I handed them off to Benton and off he went, and they are here now.

We’re working hard on those efforts, and then also on homelessness.

There has been quite a bit of news lately regarding homelessness in your district. On the good news side was the opening of the city’s first permanent supportive housing development called Strobel House. How is that going?

I’m really excited to be part of the opening of the Strobel House. The credit certainly goes to the folks who were there before me. I think it’s really important that we’re focusing on having a permanent supportive housing option where folks not only have a roof over their heads but get the help that they need to make that roof sustainable.

I’ve met folks that had VA benefits that stopped, don’t have birth certificates, don’t have driver’s licenses. Things that some folks may take for granted, people don’t have it, and they don’t know how to get them. So to have the support and services close by is huge. I’ve been working with Judge Lynda Jones with the Shelter Court and continuing to expand that and eventually doing that through the Strobel House.

So there is a lot of work going on there, and I hope we have more housing that is supported and follows the Housing First model that allows people to put a roof over their heads and start to get the resources that many of them want.

On the more contentious news side, there has been coverage of what is likely the city’s largest encampment referred to as Old Tent City, which is also located in your district. What is happening there?

It’s really interesting. I think there [were a few] crossed wires that happened. Basically folks seem to get the impression that the whole camp was being closed last month or two and that was not the case. What happened was there were about six to eight structures with wood [roofs], windows, electricity and water that were deemed unsafe by the Codes Department. Some signage went up that was a little bit unclear. Anyway, I reached out and Open Table Nashville reached out. We spoke to the Office of Homeless Services and a number of parties, and then thankfully the Mayor decided to convene a task force involving a number of stakeholders, myself included, to work with the residents to understand what they needed and what time they needed.

I really appreciated the Mayor’s leadership in pulling that task force together, and I think we made some really good progress on that. [The encampment] is not currently slated for closure, but we have some safety issues we need to address. We’re getting calls for service down there. It’s not safe for people who are living there. So, I think there are some things that we need to address in that space, and I hope that at some point soon we can do a housing surge. I’ve talked to some of them who don’t want housing, but many do. I hope that we’re able to get to that soon.

Do you know how many people are in Old Tent City?

I have heard somewhere between 120 and 140, but it could be different.

Unhoused people in your district are also part of your constituency. And I once estimated that in your District, you probably have over 1,200 people experiencing homelessness on a daily basis including the shelters, library, and encampments. How do you, as a Council Member, try to represent them?

It’s always interesting to me when I hear folks say, “Well, they don’t pay taxes.” My response is, they do pay taxes, they pay sales taxes. And if you want to go down an analytical perspective and look at property taxes, well, a renter doesn’t pay property taxes.

To me, they pay taxes, they live in the district and just like anybody else, I treat them as my constituents. My job is to represent them. Right now I recognize that camping on public land is not allowed. It’s not legal. That being said, that’s the reality that our country is currently living with.

And my job is still to represent. I take that very seriously. I have been down to Old Tent City a number of times and we had a community meeting about these structures. It felt to me like any other community meeting in any other part of town. There were 20 or 30 people there who had reasonable concerns.

I think there is this kind of mystery around homelessness, around who are these people? What’s going on? But then you get into it, and you get to know folks. People are people. I think it’s important for folks to know that yes, there are some human beings that are engaged in certain behavior, just like any other constituents. I think it’s an important balance to have, and it’s a challenge.

Take for example Cement Plant Road camp, which is along a greenway. You have folks in the neighborhood who want to use that greenway and I understand why they would feel unsafe potentially running along that greenway with the number of folks camped on either side that they can’t really see. I understand that concern and that frustration of not being able to comfortably use a public space. And my job is to represent everyone, also the folks that live there and try to get them resources and try to not just move them along but actually find ways to [link them to] positive resources.

What, in your opinion, is Metro Council’s role to ensure the city implements a comprehensive approach to prevent and end homelessness?

If you watch the [Metro Council’s] Public Health and Safety meeting where it was shared that a provider wanted to potentially go in a different direction on how they were providing services that might have left some unhoused residents in a tough situation (read more on Pg. 5), I think that moment captured how we feel and what our reaction is. Because you watched Councilmember Bradford and Councilmember Evans and a number of others go into battle mode, in an almost protective-like mode, for these folks, basically saying that’s not acceptable. We need to plan for these people. We need to make sure we take care of these people. So I think you have a Council that really cares about the people — of all walks of life. And as Metro councilmembers, our job is to make sure we’re protecting the people and taking care of them.
We want to let departments do their job. We want to let entities do their job. We don’t want to micromanage. And at the same time, when things rise to the surface, our job is to step in and figure out how to get it back on the right track.

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