10/5/2022
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The Spokesman-Review
COUNTY TO SUE WSDOT OVER CAMP’S ‘NUISANCE’ CONDITIONS
KREM
The Inlander
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The Spokesman-Review
COUNTY TO SUE WSDOT OVER CAMP’S ‘NUISANCE’ CONDITIONS
By Colin Tiernan
THE SPOKESMAN-REVIEW
Spokane County plans to sue the Washington State Department of Transportation over Camp Hope.
The Spokane County commissioners on Tuesday afternoon authorized the county prosecutor’s office to file a lawsuit against the department to pursue “the abatement of nuisance conditions” at the large homeless encampment along Interstate 90 in east Spokane. The resolution, which is supported by all three commissioners, was not included on Tuesday’s agenda.
Department of Transportation spokesman Joe McHale said Tuesday evening he couldn’t comment on the lawsuit because he had only just learned about it. Camp Hope sits on Department of Transportation land at Second Avenue and Ray Street.
The county’s lawsuit comes less than two weeks after Sheriff Ozzie Knezovich announced he intended to clear out Camp Hope by mid-October. The sheriff has since pushed back his timeline to mid-November at the request of Spokane Mayor Nadine Woodward. He hasn’t provided specifics on how his office plans to clear out the site.
The Department of Transportation has said it hasn’t attempted to disband Camp Hope because Spokane lacks the shelter space to house the reported more than 600 people staying there.
Legally, Spokane County will argue that Camp Hope constitutes a “nuisance.” Which nuisance law the county’s lawyers will cite isn’t clear.
Nuisance laws are often used to prevent property owners from accumulating trash and other materials, such as junk cars. With a Superior Court judge’s permission, counties and cities can remove nuisances from public or private property without the owner’s permission and make the owner pay for the removal. Woodward in September threatened to sue the Department of Transportation for violating the city’s nuisance laws. Commissioner Al French said Knezovich could clear Camp Hope on his own, even if a Superior Court judge rules against the county.
“The sheriff has the authority to do what he’s doing, but if we had the judge validate that and be able to allow all the stakeholders to participate in that decision, it just makes the decision stronger,” French said Tuesday afternoon. “Everybody will have their day in court and we’ll let the judge decide.”
Woodward on Tuesday morning wouldn’t say whether she supports Knezovich’s plans to clear Camp Hope.
“I would say that we are working with the sheriff to make sure that whatever we do with the encampment is going to be successful for the people in the encampment and the community around the encampment,” she said.
City spokesman Brian Coddington on Tuesday evening did not say whether the mayor’s office supports the county’s planned lawsuit against the Department of Transportation.
“The city is continuing to meet with the state about conditions at the WSDOT camp and a plan for moving people off of that property into housed situations as soon as possible,” Coddington said.
Spokane and state agencies have been meeting weekly about Camp Hope, but the city’s relationship with the state has been acrimonious – at least publicly.
After the city in early September threatened to sue the Department of Transportation, saying it expected Camp Hope to be vacated by Oct. 14, the state fired back with a scathing letter, accusing Woodward of being more “preoccupied by optics than action.” The state wrote that imposing deadlines was counterproductive and that finding housing for those staying at Camp Hope will take months, not weeks.
Woodward has repeatedly said she wants Camp Hope to be emptied before winter. She said she asked the sheriff to push back his deadline to November in order to ensure that the city can prepare housing for the hundreds of individuals living on the site.
“We don’t have the transitional and permanent housing available right now,” Woodward said. “We wanted to make sure that we did have a place for people to go, that we weren’t just breaking up an encampment so that people can just go with no direction and no better place than where they’re leaving.”
Woodward said that in addition to opening Spokane’s new homeless shelter on East Trent Avenue last month, her office is working to add capacity to the city’s existing shelters. The state Department of Commerce has made $24 million available to Spokane to find permanent housing for Camp Hope’s residents.
French said the commissioners support Knezovich, and that the county will work to disband Camp Hope even if its lawsuit fails.
“As a community, this is not who we are, and so I applaud the sheriff in saying we’re not going to stand for this, we’re going to fix it,” French said. “We can dobetter than this.”
Colin Tiernan can be reached at (509) 459-5039 or at colint@spokesman. com.
A basket of mums blooms among the tents at Camp Hope on Friday after fencing was installed around the east Spokane homeless encampment. Spokane County is planning to sue the Washington State Department of Transportation over the encampment.
KATHY PLONKA/ THE SPOKESMAN-REVIEW
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KREM
Police detained a man suspected of firing shots at a homeless camp near I-90 and Freya early Wednesday morning.
SPOKANE, Wash. — Spokane police arrested a man early Wednesday morning they say fired shots into the homeless camp near I-90 and Freya. Police said the shooting was not random.
At 3:04 a.m. someone called 911 to report a person driving around the homeless camp and shooting into it. During the call, dispatchers said they could hear shots being fired.
When police arrived, the suspect was no longer in the area. After investigating, police tracked the suspect to an apartment complex at South Southeast Blvd. and South Regal Street on the South Hill, where they believed he lived.
Police found a car matching the description of the one used in the shooting and detained a suspect on two counts of drive-by shooting. As of 6:00 a.m., police were waiting for a search warrant to search the apartment.
No one was hurt in the shooting. Police said it was not random and they believe the suspect was targeting one person at the homeless camp.
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The Inlander
Nate Sanford
On Friday, the Washington State Department of Transportation put up a fence around Camp Hope to help address security concerns.
How many people actually live at Camp Hope?
It's not a trivial question. The answer will inform how money is spent, resources are allocated and the development of the path forward for the East Central homeless encampment.
Over the past several days, people and organizations working to decide the future of the camp have given a wide range of estimates.
"About 600" is the most commonly cited number. That's based on a July survey by Jewels Helping Hands that got responses from 601 residents. Julie Garcia, the director of Jewels Helping Hands, says organizers did another headcount two weeks ago and counted 580 campers.
Garcia says there are plans to give residents badges this weekend, which will provide a more up-to-date headcount. She says people have been leaving the camp, and predicts the number will be closer to 400 or 450.
Spokane County Sheriff Ozzie Knezovich, who has pledged to clear the camp by mid-November, gives inconsistent estimates about the camp's size. On Sept. 25, he told the Inlander the total number is probably "more like 400." During a phone call two days later, he said "300." In an article published that same day in The Center Square, the sheriff — who has not been to Camp Hope himself — said the camp has "about 200" residents. During a Sept. 28 appearance on Fox News' morning show, Fox & Friends, Knezovich said firefighters told him it was "anywhere from 150 to 200."
Garcia is skeptical of Knezovich's tallies. "I don't know how the sheriff comes up with his figures, seeing as he's never been to the camp," she says.
As part of his plan to clear the camp, Knezovich has asked Guardians Foundation CEO Mike Shaw for help coordinating outreach work. Shaw says he doesn't know how many people are staying at Camp Hope.
"No one really knows, quite frankly," Shaw says.
Maurice Smith, who helps manage the camp with Jewels Helping Hands, says he thinks the number is still close to 600. Many people have left in recent weeks, he says, but new residents have also come and taken their place.
Gary, who has lived at Camp Hope since February and asked that his last name not be included, thinks the total number is closer to 700.
"Last one I heard was 750," says Sam Marks, who has also lived at the camp since its beginning.
Zeke Smith, president of Empire Health Foundation, which has been tapped by the state to do outreach work at the camp, says he thinks the population has decreased slightly since the summer, but he hesitates to make firm estimates.
Smith says Empire Health Foundation is starting to do assessment work at the camp that will provide a more accurate picture of the total number of campers and their individual needs in coming days.
"Once we have those initial assessments, we'll be in a better place to understand some realistic goals," Smith says.
Empire Health Foundation plans to send out weekly updates about the camp's population and how many are moving into shelter, Smith says. Organizers are doing work to connect campers with identification restoration, life skills classes and substance use treatment.
When I visited on Sunday, Camp Hope did look a bit smaller than it did over the summer, but it's really hard to say for sure. Some of the RVs and tents on the periphery have been moved inwards to make room for a perimeter fence, which does make the camp look a bit smaller. It's tricky, since some of the people I talked to that day said they camp in other parts of the city, but still visit Camp Hope often. If I had to make a rough visual guess, I'd say the camp has somewhere between 450 to 650 residents, but don't quote me on that.
A few days after he announced his plan to clear Camp Hope, Knezovich told me that critics were "gaslighting" when they accused him of criminalizing homelessness. He insisted that his department is criminalizing behavior that breaks the law, not homelessness itself.
"Homelessness is not against the law," Knezovich said. "Behavior during your time as homeless breaks the law."
I asked the sheriff if he thinks every person at Camp Hope is breaking the law.
"If you're putting poison into your body and buying drugs... well I guess I forgot we live in the state of Washington [where] that's okay. But morally, it's not," the sheriff said. "Morally, that is state-assisted homicide."
Knezovich is referring to recent changes in Washington state law that effectively decriminalized some types of minor drug possession. It's worth noting that the sheriff's job is to enforce laws, not morals.
Even then, does the sheriff think every person at Camp Hope is using drugs?
"If those people really wanted help — because you're telling me now they're clear-thinking, logical individuals?" Knezovich said. "You're telling me that after nine months nobody could get them help? Honestly?"
Knezovich said he doesn't think there are people at Camp Hope who aren't doing drugs.
"If you can find them, I want to meet them," Knezovich said.
On Sunday afternoon, Sam Marks and Gary were working to patch holes that appeared in Camp Hope's newly-constructed perimeter fence overnight. Both men are employed as security by Jewels Helping Hands. They say the sheriff is misinformed. Not just about the size of the camp, but also about the campers themselves.
"Not all of us are scumbags," Marks says.
"Not everybody steals, not everybody does drugs," Gary adds.
They're both open about the fact that crime and drug use are a problem at the camp, but they say it's not a majority of residents. In many cases, the crime is caused by bad actors who don't live at Camp Hope, but still use the camp for cover and shift blame towards the residents, Gary says.
"Everybody blames everything on the homeless anyway," Gary says.
Gary says he hasn't done drugs since 1988 when he was "young and dumb." Gary, 59, joined the military in the 1990s, and says the trauma associated with his service has made it difficult for him to stay in shelters.
"I can't be around that many people," he says, "my head starts clouding up."
Gary also has two large dogs, Scout and Little Mamas, who wouldn't be allowed in.
"You can go back to him and tell him: 'No, they aren't all doing drugs,'" Gary says of the sheriff.