HUFFINGTON
08.19.12
TAMPA’S MAVERICK COP
noon only to see him standing in the
same spot on Wednesday morning.
What if there was a better
way? That was what Donaldson
was wondering as he pulled up
to Swiger’s corner, and what followed was the first of a series of
encounters that have essentially
transformed the way the sheriff’s
department handles homelessness. For the last two years, Donaldson has been convincing police
and ordinary civilians alike that
the answer to the homeless problem lies not in arrests and jail but
in something far more subtle, the
relationship between a homeless
person and a cop. Since 2010, by
his account and others, he’s gotten more than 100 people off the
streets. And he’s done it at a cost
of virtually nothing beyond his
beat-cop salary.
In some cases he’s connected
people with safety-net benefits
like housing subsidies—entitlements they didn’t realize they were
eligible for or didn’t think they’d
receive. But as often as not, the
Wilber,
formerly
homeless,
is one of the
many Deputy
Donaldson
has helped
to obtain
a home
through his
initiative.