Some Minneapolis City Council members expressed concern Wednesday about allegations that a city contractor misused funds intended for homeless assistance.

A coalition of service providers and homeless encampment organizers wrote an anonymous letter to Minneapolis city officials in March alleging that Helix Health and Housing Services had misused city funds in its work to provide housing and support for the homeless. About a dozen people showed up at a meeting Wednesday to call on city officials to conduct an investigation and audit.

City council members did not address the activists’ demands, but said discussing the concerns on Wednesday would help them review future contracts.

Adam Fairbanks, president of Helix Health and Housing Services, denied the allegations. Fairbanks spoke with the Sahan Journal on Tuesday and Wednesday but did not attend Wednesday’s meeting. No Helix representative attended the city council meeting.

The issues were discussed Wednesday at a meeting of the Public Health and Safety Committee, which is made up of council members Jason Chavez, Robin Wonsley, Elliott Payne, Michael Rainville, Jeremiah Ellison and Linea Palmisano. The conversation was part of a staff presentation on a report on $18 million the city will receive starting in 2022 from a settlement with companies that manufacture opioids.

About a dozen activists at the meeting held signs reading “Does this look like dignified housing?”, including a picture of a broken front door covered in graffiti. Some expressed frustration with the lack of transparency in the city’s review of Helix and the city’s oversight of its work.

The city used $1 million from the opioid settlement to contract with Helix last December to quickly find housing for people in homeless encampments. Helix, a for-profit company that operates independently of the city, also provides culturally tailored mental health and addiction treatment for Native Americans.

The city’s contract with Helix began in December 2023 and ends in November 2024. There are currently no plans to extend the contract, said Scott Wasserman, a city spokesman for the health department.

The money is a “one-time investment” for start-up costs, Fairbanks said.

Minneapolis City Councilman Elliott Payne said he supported Helix early on because its services “offered everything we wanted to see.” But on Wednesday he questioned the city’s control over municipal funds and the city’s decision to select Helix without putting the contract out to bid.

Payne said Helix’s services “represent everything we want to see on paper, but then there’s what happens on the ground.”

Heidi Ritchie, deputy health officer, said she has “no concerns” about Helix’s work or the use of city funds based on her contacts with Helix staff. She mentioned that she recently visited a home where Helix provides services and which houses Indigenous women seeking recovery.

“I had no concerns,” Ritchie said Wednesday.

Wonsley asked Ritchie and city health officer Damōn Chaplin if they had spoken to Helix customers about their experiences. Ritchie said they were working to arrange meetings but had not met with any customers yet.

No other council member commented on the matter; Ellison was absent.

Fairbanks said he requested a voluntary audit from the city based on the anonymous letter and is now awaiting the results. Helix sent the city receipts and documents as part of the audit, he added. He has contacted Chavez several times to discuss the letter but has not heard back from the councilman.

When asked if the city is conducting an investigation or audit of Helix, a city spokesperson responded in an email: “City staff is actively reviewing the relevant documents provided by Helix.” The city did not provide further details.

Helix’s service providers visited Camp Nenookaasi, a well-known Indigenous encampment in south Minneapolis, multiple times to move residents into housing before the city first evicted it in January, Fairbanks said. The encampment has been evicted multiple times since then, each time relocated to nearby properties.

Letter sets out allegations

The anonymous letter from 10 service providers and camp organizers alleges that Helix misappropriated funds, housed homeless individuals in Airbnbs, and provided inadequate support. The service providers and organizers did not list their names in the letter, but described themselves as a community coalition.

Some of the service providers named in the letter told Sahan Journal they feared that mentioning their names would jeopardize their organizations’ relationships with the city and subsequent funding.

They wrote that they shared stories of homeless people leaving Helix’s services because they felt unsafe, were wrongfully evicted, or were in short-term rental housing.

The letter states that former Helix clients have been evicted from their homes without notice and that Helix’s claims about the number of people it has found housing for and the number of staff it employs contradict the cost of housing and salaries.

When the discussion ended on Wednesday, some activists followed Ritchie out of the City Council chamber, shouting at her and accusing her of lying. Ritchie gave one of the activists her phone number, exchanged a few words with them and walked away from the group.

Fairbanks denied the allegations in the letter, saying Helix is ​​not a landlord and does not own rental properties, so the company does not have the authority to file eviction cases or force tenants out of rental properties. Helix caseworkers support clients who have problems with their landlords and help them relocate if necessary, he added.

He also said social workers help clients apply for state and county assistance to cover costs such as rent and food. Helix’s budget is not solely dependent on city allocations, he said, adding that services such as drug addiction treatment are reimbursed through Medicaid.

Fairbanks said 98 people, including four children, from a camp were housed and supported by Helix this year. He said Helix has lost contact with 16 clients.

Helix originally planned to house 32 people, Fairbanks said. But as Helix spoke to landlords on the phone, they realized the number of apartments available allowed them to house more people. To accommodate the additional clients, Fairbanks said, they increased staff workloads.

Christin Crabtree, an organizer at the camp, told the Sahan Journal on Wednesday that clients Helix helped move into the building depicted on their signs were concerned about safety issues in the building. She also said many former Helix clients returned to the camps because they had experienced violent incidents at the sites provided by Helix.

Wednesday’s meeting was between city staff and committee members and did not include a public comment period.

Fairbanks said the problems in the rental apartments that house Helix clients are related to the difficulties many people go through in transitioning from living in a camp to living alone in their own apartment. Often, friends and harmful behavior follow Helix clients, he said.

One particular building, pictured on signs held by some activists on Wednesday, was broken into by a community member and caused problems for tenants, said Carrie Johnson, Helix’s executive director. Three Helix clients lived in the building and were relocated before the building was demolished, she added.

“This is not unusual,” Johnson said of the disruption.

Fairbanks said Helix spent the $1 million allocated by the city through May, mostly to fund support services at the homeless camps.

Fairbanks also said Helix does not work with Airbnb or similar services that offer short-term, vacation-oriented rentals. Fairbanks said he was frustrated that the letter was written anonymously because he could not reach the authors and discuss the allegations. He also contacted council members Wednesday night and invited them to speak about the concerns and Helix’s work.

CORRECTION: The article has been updated to reflect that Helix spent most of the allocated $1 million on relief services at the camp.