CAMPERS AND ADVOCATES LOOK FORWARD TO SHELTER ASSESSMENTS
Shelter spaces filling quickly
CHICO » Interim City Manager Paul Hahn said shelter assessments and 7-day enforcement notices will be given Wednesday to people camping at Comanche Creek Greenway.
Hahn said anti-camping enforcement of an estimated 102 people living at Comanche Creek Greenway are set to be completed without concern of running out of appropriate shelter spaces — 58 beds at Torres Community Shelter and 61 Pallet shelters available last updated June 21.
“There’s not going to be a whole lot of question about enforcement at Comanche,” Hahn said. “I think we have the capacity to do things there.”
In the future if shelter is not available, Hahn said the city is looking for “different kinds of alternatives” to make sure enforcement may proceed. Hahn said he could not name a specific alternative, though acquiring private property may be a possibility.
People who live at Comanche Creek Greenway have been waiting to enter the Pallet shelters since it opened
Amanda Taylor lives at the park and said she had been following news about the shelter online, sharing it with friends and neighbors.
Taylor said she looks forward to moving into the Pallet shelter with her partner, but is concerned about staying long term.
“We hope that it will be a permanent home, and that we don’t have to be told we can’t do this, we can’t do that — we just want to live our lives” Taylor said.
Taylor said she likes that the shelters have locks and air conditioning, but said they may be too close together.
Nancy Wirtz is a board member of Safe Space Winter Shelter which provides services at Comanche Creek Greenway and said she feels frustrated with the length of time it has taken to begin accepting people from the park.
“There are people here who are not in the best of help who would have been loved to be picked earlier,” Wirtz said. “They were doing it by area and it wasn’t their turn yet; that was pretty frustrating.”
Wirtz said the Pallet shelter serves a great need and has been good for the people who were able to enter, benefitting from a door that locks, showers and other services not available at the park.
Charles Withuhn is the director of the North State Shelter Team which has done weekly cleanups at the park. Withuhn said while the Pallet shelter is good and serves a great need in the community, more attention towards finding private property to keep campers safe is needed.