Following an incident in which the police were called to stop a fight between two homeless men at the Renton Salvation Army, the Renton Meal Coalition is re-evaluating its safety guidelines for each of its meal programs.

On March 9 the police were called to the Salvation Army building on Tobin Avenue South to respond to two males fighting in the street. According to police records and witness accounts, a 71-year-old man struck a 25-year-old man with his canes and then pulled a knife on the 25-year-old.

In the end, both men were banned by the Salvation Army from the meal program there for six months.

That decision sparked debate between Renton Ecumenical Association of Churches (REACH) and the Sanctuary for All Needing Equality and Respect (SANER) about the punishment that was meted out by the Salvation Army and the safety guidelines that exist around the groups’ meal programs. Members of REACH and SANER have both said in meetings that food should not be used as a punitive tool.

The Salvation Army and REACH make up the Renton Meal Coalition. SANER is a group of homeless individuals and volunteers, who meet at the Harambee Center during REACH’s Warm-up Breakfast program. All three organizations currently have their own set of guidelines for community conduct during the meals.

The relationship between the Salvation Army and REACH has been “fine,” according to Maggie Breen, REACH executive director, but there seems to be a need for more communication.

“We just want to make sure that the three programs are talking to each other as well as we possibly can,” she said. “And I’m just concerned because we had this incident and the community was upset by it, that we do that as well as we possibly can.”

The 25-year-old who was involved in the fight has not been banned from any of REACH’s meal programs because, Breen said, the group has a different relationship with him than the Salvation Army. The older man in the incident has disappeared, but Breen said they would talk to him first if he were around and then decide appropriate consequences for his actions.

“Bottomline, if someone is acting in a way that makes the community unsafe, then they can’t come in,” said Breen. “But we’re not just going to drop people. We’re not going to say you can’t come in for three weeks and we never want to see you again.”

Breen said it’s about maintaining relationships with people and making sure they are getting referred to the proper resources. She doesn’t disagree with the Salvation Army’s decision, but maintains that REACH has a different relationship with one of the individuals involved.

Michael Lifer, a member of SANER, is formerly homeless and knows how hard it is to be on the streets day in and day out. Lifer thinks that there is a philosophical difference in the way that the Salvation Army and SANER construct their community guidelines.

SANER’s guidelines were established by the homeless people they were to govern and the Salvation Army’s guidelines were created by management, Lifer said. The reason why incidents don’t happen in the other meal program settings outside the Salvation Army is because the people there intervene themselves when others get unruly, he said.

At the Salvation Army, people wait for the staff to intervene because that’s how the rules have been set up.

“It doesn’t feel like it’s their place; there’s no ownership,” said Lifer.

He was absent from the last attempt to align the rules of all three organizations because he didn’t like that the meeting was being held in a back room of the Harambee Center and not in the main lobby amongst participants of the Warm-up Breakfast program.

“These are well-meaning people, it’s just that they’re trying to superimpose their values on us,” Lifer said of the Salvation Army and REACH. “The Salvation Army is all about rules; REACH is all about nurture, you have to put them together.”

At the meeting, representatives of the other two groups agreed to keep the community-established guidelines that SANER developed, but use REACH’s guidelines as the over-arching rules for all of REACH’s meal programs, including the programs that SANER members attend.

“The recent confrontation that prompted this conversation happened at the Salvation Army Program,” said Breen. “We are interested in being good partners and offering our support where we can, but we are very happy with how things have been going at our programs. We take this work very seriously.”

According to Breen, there have been no “issues” at any of REACH’s meal programs.

Renton Salvation Army representatives did not attend the April 6 meeting with REACH and SANER on community guidelines. Requests for comment from the Salvation Army were not returned before deadline of this issue.