Escondido has finished moving more than 50 people out of a large creek encampment one day after the city manager declared an environmental emergency in the waterway.
The City Council on Monday unanimously signed off on that decision and a police official said 36 individuals had agreed to accept some form of help from the dozen or so service organizations that showed up this week as officers and clean-up crews sealed off part of Escondido Creek.
Leaders also budgeted $4 million to install a fence around the area and potentially remove thick foliage that has helped hide tents.
Mayor Dane White praised the sweep as a success while cautioning that growing homelessness in the region nonetheless showed the failure of many other systems. “It’s a failure of the mental health system in the state, the criminal justice system, and in some aspects, our own failures to provide adequate shelter to those who need it,” he said from the dais.
White again promised to expand the number of available shelter beds in the city, particularly for those needing addiction treatment.
City Manager Sean McGlynn said after Monday’s meeting that this was his first such declaration since being hired in 2021. The move was unrelated to Escondido’s camping ban, which passed over the summer as the U.S. Supreme Court gave municipalities more freedom to clear encampments regardless of whether shelter is available.
Paper notices were distributed early Sunday that warned those living in the camp by Harmony Grove Road that they had 24 hours to leave. By Monday afternoon, police SUVs lined the street. Orange lights flashed from city vehicles. An empty dump truck rumbled toward the water as a pickup pulled onto the road, its bed filled with bicycle wheels and baskets.
Across the street, a handful of people huddled by shopping carts overflowing with blankets.
Outreach organizations — including Interfaith Community Services, the YMCA and Neighborhood Healthcare — set up in front of the nearby Church of God, and officials said everybody in the camp who agreed to accept shelter got a bed.
The sweep was prompted by recent creek water tests that showed high levels of coliform and enterococci, bacteria that can represent the presence of human waste as well as other contaminants. But people living in the surrounding neighborhood have also complained that the encampment brought thefts and threats.
Last year, there were 24 calls for service in the area, according to Deputy City Manager Christopher McKinney. This year there have been 64.
One man who lives in a nearby home, Chris Bouchard, thanked the council for the sweep and said people from the encampment had repeatedly tried to break into at least one of his vehicles.
The five “yes” votes approving the emergency declaration included Councilmember Consuelo Martinez, a Democrat who’s sometimes opposed homelessness policies put forward by her more conservative colleagues. Martinez said Monday that she was conflicted about the cleanup but ultimately felt it was necessary.
The $4 million will be taken from the city’s general fund reserves. It’s not yet clear, however, exactly how much a new fence might cost.
Leaders said the clean-up will likely continue through the week.
Darrick Jackson, a 38-year-old who’d lived in the encampment, watched trucks pull in and out of the creek Monday afternoon. Jackson said he’d been up all night packing, and while he was able to grab his fiancé’s medication and blankets for his dog, a Brazilian terrier named Mala, he hadn’t been able to save their tent.
Jackson wasn’t sure where they’d sleep tonight, partially because he was still waiting for his fiancé to return from an errand.
A man and a woman on bicycles slowed down to greet Mala. Jackson lamented that they all hadn’t done a better job “policing themselves” and felt most of the confrontations with neighbors had been caused by a single individual. “We all know who it was,” Jackson said.
The man on the bike demurred. “It was a lot of people.” Then he asked how Jackson’s fiancé was handling the upheaval.
“She’s gonna be pissed,” Jackson said.
The man was stunned. “She doesn’t know?”