Documents
Since launching our website on Jan 3rd, 2025, our advocacy group has organically grown to over 1,300 people signing our petition to voice concerns and opposition to the Kaley shelter that our City Council approved with zero community engagement. Hundreds of us have emailed Mayor Dyer and Commissioner Sheehan questions but all we have received is a cut and paste PR release that offered no new information. In our quest for transparency and answers we are sharing various documents that pertain to the situation before us.
Orange County & City of Orlando
Interlocal Agreement
Stop SoDo Shelter - List of Unanswered Questions
City of Orlando SoDo Vision Plan
Florida Statutes 125.0231 - Unauthorized Public Camping &
Public Sleeping
Stop SoDo Shelter -
Direct Mail Info Flyer
This is the official signed agreement between the City of Orlando and Orange County which includes the arrangement to lease and repurpose the Orange County Work Release Center as a "low barrier" homeless shelter and after "conducting appropriate community engagement and reaching community consensus." DOWNLOAD
This PDF includes over 35 unanswered questions SoDo residents and property owners have about the approved Kaley Shelter. Feel free to use any part of this doc in your messages to our elected officials. DOWNLOAD
"South Downtown is envisioned to be a vibrant, recognizable, mixed-use, multi-modal neighborhood that thrives on the synergies afforded by the Orlando Health Medical Campus. These investments total over $1 billion & generate up to 16,000 high-paying jobs. The Sodo mixed-use project brings new retail and restaurants along with more than 300 multi-family apartments." LINK
StopSoDo shelter is committed to ensuring that the information we put out is factual and well sourced. In that spirit, we want to clarify a statement that we’ve made on this site. While the information was sourced from local news sources and statements from local politicians, it is, in fact, incorrect. According to the new Florida Statutes 125.0231, it is NOT illegal for a person experiencing homelessness to sleep in a public space. What the law makes illegal is for local municipalities to ALLOW sleeping/camping in public spaces. When a homeless person sets up camp in a public space, they are not doing anything wrong technically (we can all sympathize with someone thinking they have nowhere else to go). It is in fact the city who is breaking the law, the city who has failed, and the city who can be held accountable (can be sued if the situation is not rectified in 5 days). Because the city is now liable for what has always been their responsibility, they are fearful of the consequences. This fear is leading to bad decisions, solutions that research shows will not work (i.e. Kaylee shelter), and the homeless, yet again, being failed by the city. In our opinion, the city doesn’t so much care about permanently ending homelessness, they care more about running afoul of state law which is why we haven’t seen a reasonable proposal from them (i.e. evidence based solutions like affordable housing or smaller disbursed shelters). Those solutions would require more thought, more resources, more political will, and most importantly, more money. Money that the city would rather spend on stadiums and a new Lake Eola amphitheater). STATUTES DOWNLOAD and LAYMAN WORDING DOWNLOAD
This is a front and back sheet that lists many of the issues associated with opening a large mega shelter so close to the SoDo region. Please use it to talk with your family, friends and neighbors. DOWNLOAD