Former Mayor Rocky Anderson on Salt Lake City’s Rise in Homelessness

Former Mayor Rocky Anderson on Salt Lake City’s Rise in Homelessness And the Treatment of Homeless People By Current Salt Lake City Mayor Mendenhall.

Richard Markosian

May 28, 2023

One of many homeless abatements in Salt Lake City.

Former Mayor Rocky Anderson on Salt Lake City’s Rise in Homelessness And the Treatment of Homeless People By Current Salt Lake City Mayor Mendenhall

Two-term former Mayor Rocky Anderson is running again for Mayor of Salt Lake City because he sees Salt Lake City in a state of moral decay and turmoil for residents, members of the homeless community, and businesses due to current Mayor Erin Mendenhall’s policies and treatment of the homeless.

Last January, dozens of people living in tents on 500 West near the Rio Grande depot were being pushed out by police. The property of some was being confiscated and destroyed by city contractors. The homeless people had no alternatives, as police officers conceded, because all shelters were at capacity and the Mayor had provided for no other places for people to exist. One homeless man being pushed out by police was suffering in the freezing cold with snow collected on his body under a thin blanket.

Mayor Anderson was there to witness and record the raid when he noticed the man was not wearing shoes. He asked him why he was only wearing socks and the man replied he couldn’t wear shoes because of the condition of his feet. Anderson looked at his feet and immediately said, “Get in my car. I’m taking you to an emergency room now.”

Anderson took him to Salt Lake Regional Hospital, where the man was diagnosed with severe frostbite and trench foot. The condition ultimately causes skin and tissue breakdown which increases the risk of infection and increases associated morbidity and mortality. Several homeless people in Salt Lake City died or had fingers or toes amputated because of frostbite they suffered while left out in the bitter winter by the Mendenhall administration. Official Salt Lake City Police reports indicate only five have died, but the Salt Lake Tribune has found ample evidence demonstrating that this figure is inaccurate and at least a dozen died. Salt Lake City Records department is no longer communicating with Utah Stories on providing (UD) unattended death records.

“When you think of people having no alternative but to relieve themselves in various places throughout our community; when you think of people encamped in public places throughout our city; when you see untreated people, suffering from substance addiction or other mental illness, on our streets and in our neighborhoods, focus any anger or resentment you might have on the Mayor, who has repeatedly refused common-sense solutions that would serve the interests of residents, homeless people, and businesses alike,” said Anderson.

Anderson passionately believes that no homeless individuals should have died from exposure last winter and that deaths and amputations were caused by the inhumane homeless policies and practices of Salt Lake City Mayor Mendenhall. The policy is one of “continued abatements,” as they are referenced by City officials. Anderson believes the word “abatements” is dehumanizing and far too sterile for what it represents. “You abate mosquitoes and nuisances, not human beings.”

Anderson added, “The City raids human beings, it confiscates their survival gear–their tents and sleeping bags, their blankets. That’s what has been happening under Mayor Mendenhall’s administration.” Utah Stories witnessed this directly before the NBA All Star Game weekend last winter, as a man had his blanket stolen and another man’s tent and sleeping bag were taken and destroyed during an “abatement”.

In 2018, Salt Lake City allowed the demolition of The Road Home homeless shelter in the downtown area, which provided 1100 beds. Upon a personal inspection the conditions inside the Road Home were awful: the bathrooms were unsanitary, beds were unsanitary, and drug use inside of the facility was rampant. The Road Home was replaced by three “Homeless Resource Centers” one in Midvale and two in Salt Lake City. These centers were designed to be quick-turn around and provide the basic needs of homeless individuals to get back on their feet as soon as possible. It was all a recipe for immediate disaster, since the new “resource centers,” combined, had about 400 fewer beds than in The Road Home shelter.

Also, according to dozens of people Utah Stories has interviewed, the “resource centers” have not provided the case manager support, wrap-around job services, or the drug-free, safe environment that the homeless visionaries promised. Instead, we hear reports that the severely mentally ill are in the same sleeping quarters with recently homeless individuals and that the symptoms of the severely mentally ill, such as night terrors, including screaming, bed defecation, and masturbation have made it unsafe for those who need temporary, rapid-rehousing support to feel safe and secure while sleeping. The neighbors of the “resource centers” complain that the promises made to them by the “resource center” advocates have been repeatedly broken and that the neighborhoods have sustained a severe degradation in the quality of life for residents and businesses.

Podcast

homeless, Rocky Anderson

Richard Markosian

I am a story teller and journalist. I have a passion for farmers, local craftspeople, and folks who aspire to create, build and grow their business in the local marketplace. Why local? By supporting locally-owned businesses we create more opportunity for entrepreneurs, and we claim our sovereignty to shape our communities how we want to see them. I aspire to build Utah Stories Magazine into a household Utah name, and assist Utah businesses and makers with marketing. On the journalism side of things my passion is investigative journalism that offers true insight into issues. I believe strongly in the forth estate: strong, meaningful, insightful journalism is essential to a free market Democracy.

Podcast

When Main Street Burned: The Aftermath of the Salt Lake City Fire That Hit Downtown Bars

Fire doesn’t respect zoning, property lines, or even the most popular block on Main Street. On the evening of Monday, August 11, 2025, a blaze that began around 8:40 p.m. on Main Street. It moved quickly through a row of aging, interconnected buildings that had become the heart and soul of Salt Lake City’s fledgling bar district. By the time firefighters brought it under control, multiple businesses were damaged, dozens of workers were displaced, and one of the city’s most active stretches went dark.

The fire started at London Bell and spread into neighboring structures, severely damaging Whiskey Street. White Horse never caught fire, but smoke, water, and a partial roof collapse caused extensive interior damage, forcing a full rebuild. Other nearby businesses were affected as well, including some that had helped turn this part of Main Street into one of its most active and economically stable stretches.
Podcast

Whiskey, Bullets & a Buried Town: Archaeologists Reveal Alta’s Wild Past

Before Alta was known for powder days and lift lines, it was a silver mining town clinging to the side of a narrow canyon. In the late 1800s, men lived at 8,000 feet, went underground each day, and endured winters that regularly buried buildings in snow. This past summer, that mining town resurfaced — literally — during construction at the Alta Ski Area.

To understand what Alta really looked like, you don’t begin with legend. You begin with its trash — and this time, that happened almost by accident.

Alta Ski Area was installing underground water reservoirs to support snowmaking. Because the project sits on Uinta-Wasatch-Cache National Forest land, an archaeologist was required to monitor the excavation. No one expected the trench to produce much.

But, It did.

Artifacts began surfacing almost immediately. Enough that the Forest Service contacted the Utah State Historic Preservation Office for help. Lexi Little, who coordinates the Utah Cultural Site Stewardship Program, helped mobilize nearly 30 volunteers to assist with what quickly became a focused two-week excavation.

Winter deadlines were approaching. The pipes for the reservoirs had to go in the ground. There wasn’t time for a slow, extended dig.

“It was two weeks of digging in the dirt and helping figure out exactly what we were looking at,” Little said.

Most of the people screening soil weren’t professional archaeologists. They were trained stewards from around Utah — part of a statewide volunteer network that now approaches 500 people. They poured dirt through shaker screens, scanning for fragments that could piece together a town long buried.

“Archaeology is human trash,” Little explained. “Archaeologists are very into trash.”

Alta had left plenty behind.

https://youtu.be/hzIHzx3OGoo?si=dKcl2CEz-t6FZzYw

Victorian-style ceramics appeared first — the kind typically used in hotels. Medicine bottles followed. Ink bottles. Hand-blown glass. A porcelain doll’s foot surfaced from the soil, a small detail that shifted the mental image of the town. Families were here. Children were here. This wasn’t only a camp of miners.

The bottles helped establish time. Manufacturing details — whether glass was hand-blown or mold-made, whether a maker’s mark appeared on the base — allowed archaeologists to date many of the artifacts to the 1870s through the 1890s, when Alta was booming as a silver mining town.

“That gives you that range of dates for when Alta was really booming,” Little said.

One reusable soda bottle clearly stamped “Salt Lake City” connected the canyon to the valley economy below.

Then something unusual rolled out of a dirt pile.

A corked bottle. Intact. Liquid still inside.

To access this post, you must purchase Utah Stories (Digital + Print) or 3 month free trial (Digital).
Podcast

The Only Full Bottle of Alcohol Ever Found in Utah Was Unearthed in Alta

When a backhoe rolled a corked bottle out of the dirt at Alta this summer, no one immediately grasped what they were holding. It wasn’t empty. It wasn’t shattered. It was full. “The bottle that was discovered up at Alta is the only bottle of alcohol ever discovered in an archaeological excavation in the state…
Podcast

How Horses Help Kids Heal: Inside Utah’s Equine Therapy World

Kelty Johnson trains horses for a living, but her deeper work happens in the quiet space between animal and human. On the Utah Stories podcast, she explains how equine therapy helps children regulate emotions, build confidence, and reconnect through presence rather than pressure.