Anchorage police and municipal workers are set to clear out two of the city’s largest homeless camps next month, as notices went up Friday in Mountain View’s Davis Park and the nearby snow dump.
That’s under a mandate from Mayor Suzanne LaFrance, who says the camps have negatively affected the wellbeing of the surrounding neighborhood, reduced residents’ access to public spaces and increased risk for the nearby military base. The mayor’s office says it’s also an unsafe environment for people living in the camp.
People have been living in the two camps for years, but extra federal money makes the timing right to clear them now, said Farina Brown, special assistant to Mayor LaFrance on homelessness and health.
“We have about $5.1 million of emergency rental assistance that will be flowing through the system that will help move individuals that are experiencing homelessness into housing,” Brown said.
The plan is to prioritize rental assistance for people already in the city’s shelter system, but that is expected to open up shelter beds for the roughly 100 people living in the Mountain View camps, she said.
The city also plans to prioritize outreach, Brown said, getting campers connected with shelter, housing and rehabilitation programs.
“We have seen a lot of individuals that are very interested in exiting the camps,” she said. “What is critical for us is ensuring that we can move them as couples, as cohorts.”
That’s because people are more open to outreach when they feel like they can maintain their social safety net, she said.
Still, Brown said, some people will likely try to relocate within the area, something the Anchorage Police Department is expected to address.
“We are absolutely working with APD to ensure that they are able to quickly respond to any re-encampments that we're seeing, so that the community knows that we want to address their concerns,” she said.
The city plans to begin clearing the camps at Davis Park and the snow dump on June 17. Once the police department’s Community Action Policing team has made sure that all campers have left the two camps, the city’s Healthy Spaces team will begin cleanup. The mayor’s office estimates that it will take several weeks to complete the work.
After that, the mayor’s office said it plans to post “No camping” signs and work with police to enforce trespassing laws. The police department plans to increase patrols in and around Mountain View to make sure new camps don’t pop up.
While there was plenty of work ahead, Brown said there had been a lot of human-to-human contact already taking place.
“We often forget that in any human interaction, trust is going to be paramount,” she said. “And what we see, the level of engagement that has been received from the campers in Davis Park, is a reflection of the work that's happened well in advance of where we are right now.”
