Santa Cruz City Council reschedules the closure of a homeless camp at River Street and Highway 1.
This time it’s set for April 17, and it’s supposed to coincide with the reopening of the nearby 1220 River Street homeless camp. The city also pinpoints six sites for another homeless camp, which will be discussed at a special March 19 meeting. We visit the current camp and talk with homeless people about conditions there, and possible solutions.
We’ve posted the transcript below.
Charles Stange, 37, from Berkeley, has been living in the Ross homeless camp for a few weeks. He speaks about how he keeps his tent, at left, dry in the rain. (Kara Meyberg Guzman — Santa Cruz Local)
TRANSCRIPT
STEPHEN BAXTER: Welcome to Santa Cruz Local, where we watch our public institutions and hold power to account. I’m Stephen Baxter.
On Tuesday night the Santa Cruz City Council set an April 17th deadline to close the homeless camp near River Street and Highway 1, known as the Ross camp. By that date, the city plans to reopen a more structured camp at 1220 River Street, a few blocks away. The current tent camp has become untenable and a public health hazard, according to city and county leaders. More than 100 people live in a cluster of makeshift shelters separated by narrow, muddy trails.
We’ll get into the details of the possible sites for a more permanent camp in a moment, but right now, let’s talk to some people in the current camp about the conditions there. Kara Meyberg Guzman has more.
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SB: So, what are we looking at right here?
KARA MEYBERG GUZMAN: So we just parked at the Ross clothing store and we’re walking up to the San Lorenzo River levee, where it looks like a different world.
KMG: On Monday, we went down to the Ross Camp to talk to some campers. Part of what we’re doing at Santa Cruz Local is trying to talk about solutions, so we wanted to hear from the homeless about how we can fix this cycle that the city seems to be trapped in.
If you’ll remember, about a year ago, the city was in the exact same spot, trying to close a homeless camp by the San Lorenzo River, and open a more structured camp, the 1220 River Street Camp. Back then, it was the Benchlands homeless camp by the county government building that the city was trying to close, and it kept getting delayed while the city was looking for a better spot.
So why are we here again? We talked with one of the homeless people who organized the Ross Camp, who said that the decision to set up camp in one of the most visible places in town was intentional. They wanted the city to take notice.
Michael Sweatt, 54, stands outside his tent at the homeless camp at River Street and Highway 1 on Monday. Inside, he has a couch, a propane grill, Christmas lights, a cooler, and a chair. (Kara Meyberg Guzman — Santa Cruz Local)
MICHAEL SWEATT
It was quickly thrown together. It came out of nowhere but it was agreed upon by people who knew this highway was here and hey since we don’t want em here, let’s put em up as a spectacle so everybody who comes here sees em and complains. Now we’ve got the support of people from out of town. See, I’m a smart guy, and that’s just simple.
KMG: That’s Michael Sweatt, a 54-year-old originally from Kentucky. We spoke to him inside his tent, which has layers of tarps on a metal frame. He had a music speaker on his sleeping bag and a propane stove that he cooked on and also used for heat.
He said he’s been in Santa Cruz for more than 20 years He worked at the Lipton tea factory on the Westside years ago. Now he’s trying to get a culinary degree from Cabrillo College.
MICHAEL SWEATT: Santa Cruz is a place that draws people. I don’t know how, it’s spiritual. I’m with the spiritual thing because I’m Native American. But it’s something that draws you here, and it’s just such a great place to live. I mean, where could you get the mountains and the beaches and the sand dunes, just everything right here?
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KMG: We spoke with another camper, who has been living in the Ross Camp for a few weeks. We spoke to him by the Port-a-Potties lined up along the river, so that’s the sound you’ll hear in the background – the slamming of the Port-a-Potties doors. The whir of traffic on Highway 1 never stops.
CHARLES STANGE: My name is Charles Stange. I’m 37. I’m from Berkeley, CA.
SB: What type of employment are you looking for?
CHARLES STANGE:
I might have a job working on a fishing boat out here in Moss Landing. I talked with a couple guys out there.
I can do all kinds of stuff. I’m a chef, a painter, landscaper, carpentry, a marijuana cultivator. I’ve done a lot.
KMG: Have you gotten any services here while you’ve been here? Like has anyone helped you?
STANGE: Yeah people, actually it’s pretty amazing. People come by, and there’s chefs that come by, they cook and bring us food. The people come by all the time and bring us clothes. We got St. Francis over here, they feed. I got socks from there today.
KMG: Stange goes on to say that what he really needs is help getting an ID since he lost his, because he wants to find a job. He also can’t access his food stamps, since he’s still registered in another county. We asked him about what he’s going to do if the Ross Camp closes in a month.
STANGE: Back to doing what we were doing before. Just camping and sleeping and staying where we can.
SB: Staying in Santa Cruz or somewhere else?
STANGE: Who knows? I don’t know if I’m going to stay in Santa Cruz indefinitely. Who knows?
SB: Going back to people coming from other places, my sense is you’re damned if you do provide a place and you’re damned if you don’t, because maybe it’s attracting more people. What do you think, does it attract more people?
STANGE: I think it is what it is. Just because they build 1 facility, all these people are going to come? Eventually they’re going to have to address the problem and build people [expletive] houses … It’s like, I went from here to Moss Landing. If you look around, there’s space everywhere. How come we can’t have riverfront property? Get people jobs. I’m willing to work.
KMG: Stange also mentioned that he’s been sober for about a month from a heroin habit he’s trying to kick. County health officials said they’ve been trying to prevent the spread of Hepatitis A by offering clean needles.
DR. ARNOLD LEFF: We have a large percentage of the people at the camp who are injecting drug users and require from 300 to 600 syringes a day.
KMG: That’s Dr. Arnold Leff, the city’s and county’s health officer. He asked for the city’s permission to allow his team to provide the syringes to the camp. Currently, campers are getting their syringes from the county clinic on Emeline Avenue. Leff said it’s in everybody’s interest for the campers to be using clean needles – to prevent the spread of disease, to prevent deaths, and to cut public health care costs.. There was an overdose death at the camp, according the Santa Cruz Fire Chief Jason Hajduk.
We’ll talk more about long-term solutions for Santa Cruz’s homeless problem in a future episode. For now, let’s turn back to Tuesday’s city council meeting which was focused on what to do about the Ross Camp and finding alternatives.
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SB: The council decided to shut down the Ross Camp by April 17th. By that day, there are supposed to be 60 beds available at a city-owned property at 1220 River Street. The city is in talks with the Salvation Army to potentially run that site. The Salvation Army already has a shelter for the homeless on Laurel Street.
The city council on Tuesday night also started to consider other city-owned properties for a potential pilot program. It would be what’s called a “transitional camp,” and its aim would be to get people into permanent housing and connect them with mental health and drug rehab services.
Other cities like Portland and Seattle have done similar projects in the past 10 years.
Santa Cruz city staff has identified six potential sites for the camp. They wanted access to public transit, access for security and police, garbage service, limited habitat impacts and a place where the homeless remained part of the community.
The first is on High Street on the upper Westside, between two churches. The second is at a storage yard near the Santa Cruz Wharf. The third is a parking lot near Depot Park and the Santa Cruz Police station. Other sites include a parking lot near Kaiser Permanente Arena, the benchlands at San Lorenzo Park and a site at the Jessie Street marsh.
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The council plans to come back in a week for a special meeting on March 19 to discuss where to put the new camp. If you have comments, be sure to email the city council at citycouncil@cityofsantacruz.com.
That’s it for this episode. In the meantime, we want to hear from you about what kind of news you want to hear. Take our survey at Santa Cruz Local DOT org and sign up for our email newsletter. We’ll have news about our upcoming crowdfunding campaign and official launch soon.
Thanks for listening to Santa Cruz Local. Thanks to Podington Bear at Sound of picture dot com for the music.
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Kara Meyberg Guzman is a co-founder of Santa Cruz Local. From 2017-18, she served as the Santa Cruz Sentinel’s managing editor. She had other previous roles at the Sentinel, including working as a reporter covering transportation, education and the environment. She has a biology degree from Stanford University and lives in Santa Cruz.