FREMONT — This city could soon join other California cities in ramping up sweeps of homeless residents living in camps and vehicles in the wake of Gov. Gavin Newsom’s recent orders.
The Fremont City Council, which represents the Bay Area’s fourth largest city, last week discussed the possibility of amending city policies to add a 72-hour parking limit for residents on city streets, a potential “oversized vehicle parking” ban on recreational vehicles parked in residential areas and a ban on camping on public property. The council also discussed options for a permanent ban on RVs near schools, educational facilities and churches.
Similar actions have been taken by other major Bay Area cities who made national headlines for more aggressive tactics of clearing homeless encampments. San Francisco Mayor London Breed began ordering encampment sweeps this summer, as cities jumped into action at the direction of Newsom, following a U.S. Supreme Court ruling gave local jurisdictions greater power to clear homeless encampments. Oakland Mayor Sheng Thao on Monday announced the city would crackdown on encampments which pose fire, waterway or roadway dangers.
Newsom said previously that local governments which did not deliver results could suffer funding cuts from the state.
A row of RVs are parked along Albrae Street in Fremont, Calif., on Sept. 20, 2024. (Dai Sugano/Bay Area News Group)
Amy Huston, a homeless resident who lives in an encampment along Osgood Road and Washington Boulevard, was upset to hear the city wants to increase restrictions on camping. If the city were to clear out her camp, she said she wouldn’t know where to go next. City workers currently make weekly stops at the encampment for trash pickup, hygiene product deliveries and other services.
“There’s nothing I can do,” said Huston, 44, who has lived there for the past two years.
The city most recently swept the camp on July 9. But on Friday, at least a couple dozen residents remained in a tent camp with shopping carts, cooking gear and other belongings. As a local stray cat called “Whitey” prowled near the fence line of the camp, Huston reminisced about how she dreamed of becoming a veterinarian before she became homeless.
“Everybody gets along. It’s nice,” Huston said. “There’s places out here that you can go. We just don’t know if it’s safe or not.”
According to the most recent study of the homeless population, the city reported this year that the number of people living without shelter in Fremont dropped 21 percent, matching a countywide trend. But that’s after Fremont’s homeless population doubled between 2019 and 2022, from 608 unhoused people to 1,026, according to the point in time count, a government census measuring homelessness.
At last Tuesday’s council meeting, Vice Mayor Desrie Campbell asked city staff about the camp Huston stays at, and wondered whether residents were offered permanent or temporary housing. She asked whether the city could enforce permanent parking bans on streets throughout Fremont.
Housing Manager Lucia Hughes told Campbell that “outreach teams” go to the camp regularly and offer a number of things to residents, such as possible housing services. City Attorney Rafael E. Alvarado added that unless the council wants to implement permanent parking bans on certain city streets, it is inevitable that homeless residents “will come back.”
“What’s being contemplated is consistent with what a lot of cities do,” Alvarado said.
Mayor Lily Mei said she agreed with Campbell about the need for parking bans, saying it could lead to safer streets.
“Some of those need to be permanent,” Mei said.
For Councilwoman Teresa Cox, it remains important for school zones and places where children play to be free of encampments. She worried that “a lot of the people are not going to be background screened around children and families.”
Councilman Raj Salwan said the city should be “balanced” in how it approaches its homeless issues, while at the same time adding “we definitely need a buy-in from the community.”
“It’s not a crime to be homeless,” Salwan said at Tuesday’s council meeting. “These are folks that are here. If we just try to push them from one place, they’re just going to go to another place.”
The City Council could again discuss the new protocols as early as next month, though it is unclear when they could officially be implemented.