Domain dispute at Lodi homeless encampment
Sheriff’s cleanup efforts halted after Caltrans serves cease and desist letter
On Tuesday morning, the San Joaquin County Sheriff ’s Office was in Lodi to clean up a homeless encampment along the Mok el um ne River that has been a health and safety hazard to the community for a number of years.
But as the Sheriff’ s new Community RevitalizationUnit and Special Services Division were cleaning the area, Cal trans officials served them with a cease and desist letter.
The letter claimed the Sheriff’s Office acted “prematurely” and was “unauthorized” to set foot in the encampment near Turner Road and Highway 99.
Sheriff Pat Withrow said those claims are false, as his department had given Caltrans several notices that it planned to clear the area.
“We had been working two to three weeks, doing our due diligence and following Boise,” Withrow said Thursday. “First, we go through and we clear out people with warrants, then we go out and offer services such as mental health, then we go out and post that we’ll be clearing the area. It’s all documented with police reports.”
In 2018, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that jurisdictions cannot arrest or punish individuals for sleeping outside if they have nowhere to go. In addition, Withrow said when an agency clears a homeless encampment, it must give those living there warning that they have 72 hours to vacate the premises.
He said deputies posted signs warning of the
clearance, and handed flyers to the homeless living in the encampment, on Thursday, Aug. 26, giving more than 72 hours notice.
Deputies also went to the site on Monday to give those still in the area one last chance to gather their belongings and leave.
During the three weeks prior to the cleanup, Withrow said Caltrans had made claims that the homeless encampment was on state property. Withrow said he researched the site, and found maps indicating that Caltrans’ property is only on the south side of the Mokelumne River, not the north, where the homeless encampment is located.
“They think that both (sites) are their properties,” he said. “And they told us that this was a ‘level 3’ (priority), and that they were going to get people out, but it wouldn’t happen until November. The day we showed up, their tune changed ... and said they planned to clean it up next weekend. But what they do, is they move people out of there, leave all their belongings there, and clean it up later.”
But cleaning up the site couldn’t wait, Withrow said, as he visited the area the week prior with staff from county environmental health.
Staff saw the debris, waste and human feces present in the camp and river, Withrow said, and declared an emergency that needed to be resolved immediately.
“(Caltrans) clean up is that they move the people 100 feet from the river’s edge and that they would stay there,” he said. “Like the people there wouldn’t walk 100 feet to dump their waste in the river.”
In a statement to the News-Sentinel, Caltrans spokesman Matt Rocco said the agency is willing to work with the Sheriff’s Office.
“Caltrans identified this Mokelumne River encampment as a priority for cleanup when the San Joaquin County Environmental Health Department determined that the encampment needed to be removed to protect water quality,” he said. “Caltrans planned the cleanup for next week so it could work with San Joaquin County Behavioral Health Services to provide those living at the encampment with resources and services for better living situations and coordinate efforts with the San Joaquin Sheriff’s Department.
“The premature and unauthorized clearing by the Sheriff’s Department was done before Caltrans could provide its 72-hour cleanup notice to the people living at the encampment or the county could help them find suitable alternative shelter and other services,” his statement said.
The Sheriff’s Office has routinely cleaned up homeless encampments throughout the county, including one along the diversion canal between Waterloo Road and West Lane in Stockton.
Withrow said that cleanup occurred in 2018, and deputies and county staff removed 70 tons of trash and human waste. Since that cleanup, Withrow said the homeless have not returned to the area, and the burglary rate in the adjacent neighborhood has declined by 80%.
The main problem in this week’s dispute, Withrow said, is that his agency and Caltrans have two very different ideas as to what constitutes an emergency.
“The difference is Caltrans judges priorities by whether something is affecting the freeway structures,” he said.
“We are judging a situation by its affects on the quality of life to the community. We did everything we could to be good neighbors.”
Withrow said a San Joaquin County Superior Court judge was expected to make a ruling Thursday as to whether his agency could return to the site and finish cleaning.