72 of 1,085 camping-ban contacts accepted services, Anchorage commission told

Anchorage police contacted 1,085 people under the city's camping ordinance between August 2025 and June 2026, but only 72 accepted services. Jamie Lopez, a public commenter, called that acceptance rate effectively a failure at the Housing, Homelessness and Neighborhood Development Commission's August meeting.

Lopez, of East Anchorage and formerly with the Coalition for the Homeless, said the Anchorage Police Department dashboard behind the mayor's annual report lists 123 arrests, 962 people who voluntarily complied and 72 who accepted services, a subset of the 962 total. "72 Divided by 1,085, 6.6% acceptance rate of services. If you do the 72 divided by 962 exclusively, it's 7.5%. But it's effectively a failure," Lopez said. The lower figure treats all 1,085 field contacts as the denominator. The higher figure counts only the 962 who voluntarily complied. Lopez argued that pairing outreach with police contact discourages people from accepting help.

Thea Agnew-Benben of the Mayor's Office described the outreach process differently. "The first step in the process is outreach and outreach is multidisciplinary outreach team. There's only one officer on that," she said. She added that everyone else involved is a community partner. Municipal data show 88.7% of contacts ended in voluntary compliance.

The Anchorage Assembly approved the ordinance July 15, 2025. Enforcement began that September. Officers must check shelter availability before issuing a citation or making an arrest. Refusal to relocate can still bring a citation or arrest.

Agnew-Benben said a cross-department presentation on the issue goes to the Assembly's Housing and Homelessness Committee on Aug. 19.