Thread: Tent Cities

Originally Posted by blackgang

Originally Posted by attaboy

SACRAMENTO, Calif. -- A fire on a train trestle sent huge plumes of smoke over Sacramento late Thursday afternoon.

I don't seem to place that track, is that out where the new I-5 crosses the river close to the new air port?
The train trestle is west of Cal Expo state fairgrounds. Between Capitol City Freeway bridge (Business HWY 80) and HWY 160 bridge (which becomes 12th Street in town) over the American River. There's a camp under the Hwy 160 bridge.

Originally Posted by attaboy

The tent city near Sacramento has been there for forty years. It is inhabited by people who don't want to be told what to do

Must be the one by the lower end of I street or above, not sure which streets there by the SP tracks and close to the old SP maint yard.
But thats been skidrow since I was first in Sacto in 1942.

You are right that area has traditionally been skid row. Most of it was cleaned up when they made Old Sacramento a tourist destination. The railroad maint. yard is an EPA superfund clean up site. All the soil is being stripped off and disposed of. The camps have moved north east along the American River up from where it meets the Sacramento River. There's also a camp out near the Campbell's Soup factory in South Sac.

The private charity is at the 12th Street and 16th Street triangle. There is a mission just off of Richards Blvd. near I-5. People camp on private property or city property. The city is trying to sell some of it so they have been moving people off.


Panamahat - families with children and mothers with children are given priority. They are offered housing in motels which rent on a monthly basis. The tab is picked up by the state, county and city funds. Families if they don't want to be are not left on the streets.

CAPITOL PUBLIC RADIO REPORT:
Busting Some "Tent City" Myths


CPR photo/Ben Adler 1200 people, many of whom just lost their jobs or homes, scrunched into a tiny space, where crime is rampant. That’s what you might think of the homeless “tent city” along the American River – if you believe everything you’ve read or heard recently.

By: Ben Adler


Wed Mar 18, 2009


Listen



Aired 3/18/2009 on All Things Considered
Aired 3/18/2009 on Morning Edition
(Sacramento, CA)
Okay, so first of all, it’s not a tent city – at least, not to its residents.

Zoulas: “What the people out here refer to it as is the Wasteland. That’s what it was called before somebody tagged it as Tent City.”
Carol: “Because this used to be a dump.”

That first voice isn’t a resident; it’s Officer Mark Zoulas with the Sacramento Police Department. He’s one of the two cops on the homeless beat out here, and he knows just about every resident by name. The second voice is a homeless woman named Carol. She brings up another misconception: that the tent city – I mean, Wasteland – is a land of waste. It’s actually not that bad, she says.

Carol: “We have food, fire, we have light, whether it’s candles or flashlights or lanterns. We have almost everything here that houses do except for electricity, and one camp, I had electricity.”

Now, don’t get her wrong – it’s certainly not your typical suburban home, and there aren’t any bathrooms or dumpsters. In fact, rubbish is strewn across the grassland next to the Union Pacific railroad tracks. But Officer Zoulas says some of the tents are pretty big.

Zoulas: “You see this here, and what we’re looking at is, not really tents at all, but pretty much like – what’d you guess? Fifty feet long by about 12 feet wide series of tarps and such that make actually quite a cabin of sorts. That belongs to China and Eric. So that’s two people.”

Which brings us to one of the most important myths of all – the number of people camping out. This one’s been bugging cops and homeless advocates alike.

Zoulas: “I’ve heard anywhere from 100 to 1200, and I’ve heard anything from 100 new tents a night to 50 new people a week.”

Uh, no, says Zoulas. He thinks there’s probably between a hundred and 130 people here at any given time. And Zoulas says he doesn’t know of a single one of them here because of the down economy.

Finally, what about crime? Well, the police department says it doesn’t get too many calls. That’s because Zoulas and his partner jump in on the big stuff – and let the residents handle the rest. As a homeless man named Eric says:

Eric: “Just don’t do anything you wouldn’t want done to yourself. If you do, there’s more of us than you, you know what I mean? Kinda govern ourselves a little bit, make sure nobody’s getting too badly beaten up around here.”

To be clear, this does not mean everything’s all hunky-dory out at the Wasteland. There are serious problems that the city and county are struggling to address, like the lack of toilets and dumpsters. But police, residents and homeless advocates all say the picture painted by some media reports is simply not accurate.



CPR: Story- Busting Some "Tent City" Myths Capitol Public Radio


This quote was taken from another local public radio report:

Hersh: “We don’t wanna lose our tent city. We have survived there – many of us have been out there for 15 years. Some people are third-generation tent people. And you taking it away from us doesn’t solve the problems.”



Third generation? Come on. The reporters were probably talking to one of the mentally ill people. They are always good for a quote. You can lead them to say anything you want to hear.