By Terry Witt – Spotlight Senior Reporter

            Chiefland City Commissioner Lewrissa Johns Monday suggested the board consider adopting an ordinance to deal with the increasing problem of homeless people in the city.

            Three times this past week, Johns said, she was forced to ask for the assistance of city police in removing a homeless man from in front of a business. She had him permanently trespassed after the third incident.

            “It’s not just where I’m at, it’s becoming a problem everywhere,” Johns said. “They’re coming mostly from the Gainesville area. This guy that we were having an issue with came from Idaho. This was right in front of a financial institution at 8 a.m.”

            Resident Alice Monyei, a former city commissioner, said the city has an ordinance dealing with panhandling.

            “He wasn’t panhandling,” said Police Chief Scott Anderson. “He was pan-sleeping.” His remark drew laughter.

            Commissioners didn’t act on Johns’ suggestion for an ordinance, but she said the board might want to get ahead of the issue because it’s probably going to worsen.

            Commissioner Lance Hayes agreed.

            “I think it’s going to be more of a big problem. I see quite a few homeless people around,” he said.

            Longtime Chiefland chiropractor Bennitt Patterson, a spectator in the audience, told his own story about dealing with a homeless man at his business. He said his staff asked the man if there was anything they could do for him. His staff left a basket full of things for the man.

            “Then, as they were going out there at the end of the day, he’s standing there urinating,” Patterson said.

            Patterson said he decided to take a different stance on the situation with homelessness.

            Chiefland Drug Problem

            Mayor ChrisJones asked Anderson to address the drug situation in Chiefland. Anderson gave his assessment.

            “We definitely got an issue with fentanyl coming into our area. We have made a couple of arrests. I won’t mention any names but ever since the arrests we made, fentanyl deaths have stopped in Chiefland,” Anderson said.

            Fentanyl is a powerful synthetic opioid similar to morphine only 50 to 100 times more powerful.

            “Chiefland has a drug problem like everybody else has. It’s not as bad as it used to be. I ran the drug unit (Levy County sheriff’s office drug unit) in the early two-thousands. It was the wild west on the south end of town,” Anderson said.

            Commissioner Rollin Hudson asked the chief to tell him about fentanyl and how it is purchased.

            Anderson said fentanyl is made in China and shipped to the United States across the southwest border. He said the U.S. southwest border needs to be secured.

            “It’s smuggled across the southwest border along with marijuana, cocaine, heroin, and everything else, including methamphetamine,” Anderson said.

            He said southwest border agents seized 16 pounds of fentanyl recently, enough to kill the entire state of California.

            Earlier in the meeting, resident Michael Dockery said there had been seven drug-related deaths in Chiefland and nothing had been done about it.

            Anderson said there were three drug-related deaths in the past six months, two were cocaine and one was methamphetamine. In all three cases, the drugs were laced with fentanyl.

            Jones said in the last few years all the busts were made in Chiefland.

            “I’ve seen heroin for the first time in my life a few years ago, right here in town,” he said.

            Anderson said he made an arrest for heroin in the late 1990s, but it hasn’t been around since.

            “It’s been quiet,” Anderson said.

—————————–

City of Chiefland Regular Meeting November 8, 2021; Posted November 8, 2021