Landowner fights to help homeless on Akron site

AKRON — In the early days, Sage Lewis admits, the homeless encampment he allowed on his property was like “the wild, wild West.” Residents drank alcohol, built campfires and argued loudly. It smelled bad. Neighbors complained.

As the months passed, and as the campsite grew from a few people to a few dozen, Lewis said, conditions improved. Drinking was banned, residents elected their leaders and volunteers dropped off food and clothes. Lewis came to see the encampment as a model for using private land to help people who are homeless.

In city after city, similar encampments have sprung up on sidewalks, in parks and under bridges, vexing local governments. In Akron, the rows of battered tents, some patched with tarps and rope, were erected on private property and with the landowner’s blessing. But where some see an altruistic effort to take a problem off the city’s hands, Akron officials see a blatant zoning violation. They want the tents and the residents gone by Thanksgiving.

“This has always been a private person with private money on private land helping the homeless,” said Lewis, who filed a lawsuit Tuesday appealing the city’s refusal to exempt him from zoning rules, which ban camping. “I don’t want anything from the government. I don’t want any of that. We can take care of these people.”

Lewis, an auctioneer and the owner of a marketing business, has no experience in social work and never planned to be landlord to 40 or so homeless people.

But during an unsuccessful campaign for mayor, Lewis befriended several homeless people in Akron. Last year, when a few of them asked to pitch tents behind a commercial building he owns, he approved.