'Where do you want us to go?' homeless ask as city weighs camping ban
The scores of homeless people camping along creeks, trails, parks and other public property in Colorado Springs may have to find another place to live soon.
The Colorado Springs Police Department, which suffered a public relations nightmare earlier this year for its role in city-sponsored sweeps of homeless camps, is proposing a new law that would prohibit camping on public property.
The proposal was met with scorn and anguish from some of the many homeless people living in tents and under tarps along the snowy banks of Fountain Creek on Friday.
“Where do you want us to go? Out of town?” asked Chris, a 44-year-old man huddled underneath nothing more than two old sleeping bags. “Everybody hates the homeless.”
The proposed law makes it illegal for “any person to camp or to set up or occupy a tent, shack or other temporary shelter that could be used for camping on any public property.” The city also amended an existing law that bans camping “on any park property.”
“These ordinances have been crafted as a result of ongoing problems associated with sanitation, open fires and criminal activity involving makeshift campsites on public property,” police Chief Richard Myers said in a report to the City Council, which will discuss the proposed ordinances at its informal meeting Monday.
The big question is how police would enforce them.
“I think it would be presumptuous for us to talk about that before it’s presented to council,” police spokesman Lt. David Whitlock said. “Really, what we’re doing is giving the information to them to use as a tool and then they’ll give us direction on how they intend for us to act, if they even want to engage the ordinance.”
City Councilman Sean Paige, whose district includes many of the city’s homeless camps, said he needs to see a “plan of action” before he can support the no-camping law.
“I’m open to the idea of a camping ordinance, but I’m going to be looking for a more holistic plan to deal with the problem and not just displace it,” he said.
Robert Moran, an advocate for the homeless, said the city this year has been doing a “great job” showing compassion toward homeless people. Among the examples is the Police Department’s Homeless Outreach Team, he said. But the proposed no-camping law would take those efforts in a “completely opposite” direction, Moran said.
“It would be criminalizing homelessness,” he said. “People have the right to survive, and people that are homeless are part of our community as much as anybody else.”
The Salvation Army’s shelter only has 220 beds, he said.
“We have more people than that living in tents in the Springs,” he said.
Paige, who was recently appointed to the council, said the homeless camps, or “tent cities,” are a source of complaints from many residents and business owners.
“The homeless issue, nationally, is a very intractable one, and we’re dealing with it here on a smaller scale,” he said. “But it’s equally as challenging. I think we’re going to have to find the right balance of compassion and tough love if we’re going to deal with the problem.”
According to the police chief’s report, the City Attorney’s Office advised police against enforcing trespassing violations on public property “without updating municipal ordinances with more specificity” as a result of unspecified recent legal decisions.
Loring Wirbel, co-chairman of the Colorado Springs chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union, said the proposed ordinances have been crafted in such a way “that it’s going to make any legal challenges tough.”
The city “has protected itself in a legal sense in a pretty comprehensive way,” he said.
Still, Wirbel said enforcement will be tricky from a public relations standpoint.
“Let’s face it,” he said. “There is no way they’re going to be able to enforce something even that totally passes legal muster in a way that looks good. They’re going to look bad one way or another.”
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