New's from: St. Louis, MO

[persistentchickainti]

St. Louis Park Rangers get tough on homeless

By Carolyn Tuft
ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH
11/06/2009

ST. LOUIS — A city official apologized hours after a homeless camp set up in a park next to two of the city's leading homeless advocacy centers was destroyed by park rangers Thursday.

Bill Siedhoff, director of the Department of Human Services, characterized the action taken by city park rangers as a "disturbing" display of disrespect for homeless people who had been camping in a small park near the St. Patrick's Center.

"I was just absolutely devastated to hear what happened this morning," Siedhoff said late Thursday afternoon.

Siedhoff said that the park rangers were out of line to destroy the belongings of the group of about a dozen people who were camped in Interco Park at Tucker Boulevard and Martin Luther King Drive. Siedhoff said he would be investigating to find out why the park was cleared out and who ordered it.

Arriving shortly before 10 a.m., the park rangers swiftly took tents, blankets, pillows, bags filled with belongings and threw them into an orange garbage truck.

Clint Smith, 38, who is homeless, rode up on his bicycle begging the rangers to return his belongings. Instead, the rangers turned on the compacting device in the truck and crushed everything that Smith owned. He was only able to save an umbrella.

"Oh, man," Smith said to the rangers. "That was my medicine. That was my stuff. Oh, man. What a waste."

Included in his belongings were heart and lung medicines.

The incident outraged some workers at the nearby St. Patrick's and the Catholic Charities outreach centers, which provide services for the homeless.

"Several (of the homeless) were staying here because, on any given day, we have more people seeking shelter than there are beds," said Karen Wallensak, who works for Catholic Charities' Housing Resource Center in the building next door and tried with other workers to intervene.

"These people have never caused a problem," Wallensak said.

Siedhoff said the city has a protocol that homeless people are to be notified that they are breaking the city's 10 p.m. curfew if they are sleeping in a park.

Also, Siedhoff said, city rules require that anything cleared from a park be taken to the city's health department and that the city workers do their best to contact the homeless and not destroy their belongings.

"The protocol was totally ignored and that is appalling; it should have never happened," Siedhoff said. "This is just really beyond belief. We apologize."


11.05.2009 2:57 pm
City official apologizes to the homeless, says park rangers violated protocol by throwing homeless’ belongings away
By Carolyn Tuft
St. Louis Post-Dispatch

UPDATED: 5:32 P.M. Thursday

ST. LOUIS — Shortly after 5 p.m. today, a city official called to apologize for what he characterized as a “disturbing” display of disrespect for homeless people who had been camping in a small park near the St. Patrick’s Center for the homeless.

“I was just absolutely devastated to hear what happened this morning,” said Bill Siedhoff, director of the department of human services. Siedhoff was speaking on behalf of St. Louis Mayor Francis Slay and the city, itself.

Siedhoff said that the park rangers were out of line to destroy all of the belongings of the homeless who were camped in Interco Park at Tucker Boulevard and Martin Luther King Boulevard. The city has set up a protocol that homeless people are notified that they are breaking the city’s 10 p.m. curfew if they are sleeping in the park.

Also, Siedhoff said, the protocol requires that anything cleared from a park is taken to the city’s health department on 13th Street in downtown St. Louis and the city workers do their best to contact the homeless and to not destroy their belongings.

“There is a protocol to be followed when things are left in parks,” Siedhoff said, “We have a protocol that clearly was not followed in this case. All I can say is, we screwed up.”

Siedhoff was referring the destruction at 10 a.m. today of the belongings of the homeless by St. Louis park rangers.

Shortly before 10 a.m. Thursday, the rangers arrived at Interco Plaza, next to the building housing the St. Patrick’s and the Catholic Charities outreach centers. And, quickly the rangers took tents, blankets, pillows, bags filled with belongings and, even, prescription medications and threw them into an orange garbage truck.

The rangers would not say why they were throwing away the homeless people’s possessions. St. Louis Parks Division Commissioner Daniel W. Skillman, who oversees the rangers, did not return a reporter’s call asking for comment.

Clint Smith, 38 and homeless, rode up on his bicycle begging the rangers to give him his belongings back. Instead, the rangers turned on the device in the truck that crushed everything that Smith owned. He was only able to save an umbrella.

“Oh, man,” Smith said to the rangers. “That was my medicine. That was my stuff. Oh, man. What a waste.”

Included in his belongings were heart and lung medicines.

About a dozen homeless men and women had set up camp a few months ago in the little park at Martin Luther King Drive and Tucker Boulevard after homeless shelters began turning people away.

“Several were staying here because, on any given day, we have more people seeking shelter than there are beds,” said Karen Wallensak, who works for Catholic Charities’ Housing Resource Center in the building next door.

“These people have never caused a problem,” Wallensak said.

About 10 a.m., she said she looked out of her office window and saw what the rangers were doing, then ran outside to try to stop them. She tried to make the rangers give her and her co-workers the belongings to hold on to for the homeless. The rangers refused.

“We are in the shadow of the city’s two biggest homeless providers,” Wallensak said as she grabbed a few garbage bags the rangers had left behind. “They say this is public, not private property, but when people have nowhere to go, what are they supposed to do?”

Erin Ives, who also works at Catholic Charities, came out to try to persuade the rangers to stop. They ignored her, too.

“I’m appalled,” Ives said. “All they had to do was pick up a phone or walk in our door and let us take possession of this stuff. This could have all been avoided.”

Ives and Wallensak took the homeless men into their building to replace as much of their destroyed belongings as possible, especially their medicine. That meant that donations and funds including public grants paid by taxpayers will have to pay for the same things twice.

“Now, we have to drop everything we were doing and figure out who lost what and try to replace it,” Wallensak said.

Tremayne Gates, 29, a homeless man who preaches the gospel at the homeless camp, came out of St. Patrick’s, where he was taking a class, to find that everything — including his tent — had been destroyed.

“I can’t replace what was taken,” Gates said. “It might not look like much to someone else, but these were priceless items to us. It protects us from the cold and the elements.”

Siedhoff said that the mayor had nothing to do with the destruction of the property. Siedhoff said he would be investigating to find out why it was done and who ordered it. He said that in no way should the park rangers have taken a truck with a compactor and smashed the belongings in front of the homeless and their advocates. He said it is protocol for any city employee to take a regular truck and take the belongings to the city office so that the homeless owners can claim them.

“The protocol was totally ignored and that is appalling; it should have never happened,” Siedhoff said, adding that the protocol will be reviewed to find out if it can be improved. “This is just really beyond belief. We apologize.”

[persistentchickainti]

City may have broken court agreement with homeless

By Carolyn Tuft
ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH
11/06/2009

Updated: 8:54 a.m. Friday
ST. LOUIS -- A federal lawsuit settlement agreed to by the City of St. Louis in 2005 may have been violated when city park rangers, considered park police, destroyed all of the possessions of a camp of homeless people on Thursday morning, according to court records.

The agreement settled a lawsuit filed in federal court that accused the city of mistreating homeless people. On page 3 of the agreement, the city and its police agreed to "not destroy, damage, hide or cause to be abandoned the personal property of any homeless or homeless-appearing person."

The agreement also made it illegal to harass homeless people or sweep them off the streets. The lawsuit alleged that the city arrested and cleared homeless people from the downtown St. Louis streets during the city's Fourth of July celebration in 2004.


The agreement could explain why a city officials, acting on behalf of Mayor Francis Slay, admitted that the parks department rangers "had screwed up" when they took a garbage truck to Interco Plaza at North Tucker Boulevard and Martin Luther Kind Drive to throw away, then crush the belongings of homeless who had been living in tents just outside the St. Patrick's Center for the homeless.

Hours after the park rangers refused to let homeless men and their advocates from Catholic Charities and St. Patrick's Center retrieve the belongings, the city official apologized.

About 10 a.m. Thursday, journalists watched as the rangers and parks workers ignored pleading from the homeless and their advocates and threw their belongings into a parks department compacting truck, then crushed the belongings.

Bill Siedhoff, director of the Department of Human Services, characterized the action taken by city park rangers as a "disturbing" display of disrespect for homeless people who had been camping in a small park near the St. Patrick's Center.

"I was just absolutely devastated to hear what happened this morning," Siedhoff said late Thursday afternoon.

Siedhoff said that the park rangers were out of line to destroy the belongings of the group of about a dozen people who were camped in Interco Park at Tucker Boulevard and Martin Luther King Drive. Siedhoff said he would be investigating to find out why the park was cleared out and who ordered it.

Arriving shortly before 10 a.m., the park rangers swiftly took tents, blankets, pillows, bags filled with belongings and threw them into an orange garbage truck.

Clint Smith, 38, who is homeless, rode up on his bicycle begging the rangers to return his belongings. Instead, the rangers turned on the compacting device in the truck and crushed everything that Smith owned. He was only able to save an umbrella.

"Oh, man," Smith said to the rangers. "That was my medicine. That was my stuff. Oh, man. What a waste."

Included in his belongings were heart and lung medicines.

The incident outraged some workers at the nearby St. Patrick's and the Catholic Charities outreach centers, which provide services for the homeless.

"Several (of the homeless) were staying here because, on any given day, we have more people seeking shelter than there are beds," said Karen Wallensak, who works for Catholic Charities' Housing Resource Center in the building next door and tried with other workers to intervene.

"These people have never caused a problem," Wallensak said.

Siedhoff said the city has a protocol that homeless people are to be notified that they are breaking the city's 10 p.m. curfew if they are sleeping in a park.

Also, Siedhoff said, city rules require that anything cleared from a park be taken to the city's health department and that the city workers do their best to contact the homeless and not destroy their belongings.

"The protocol was totally ignored and that is appalling; it should have never happened," Siedhoff said. "This is just really beyond belief. We apologize."

[beatonthestreet]

Thanks for this info, I also have been following this story with a keen interest...
As a homeless friend, who is a member of our community here (the young Big Cutter lol) commented earlier when he was sending this info to me...

It doesn't take much to wreak havoc on the lives of those with barely a pot to pee in and definitely no window to toss it out of....

Which I thought was an accurate analysis of the situation....

Hopefully the comments by Bill Siedhoff, director of the department of human services isnt just PR BS....

“The protocol was totally ignored and that is appalling; it should have never happened,” Siedhoff said, adding that the protocol will be reviewed to find out if it can be improved. “This is just really beyond belief. We apologize.”
<snip>
“There is a protocol to be followed when things are left in parks,” Siedhoff said, “We have a protocol that clearly was not followed in this case. All I can say is, we screwed up.”

This should be an interesting case to follow and I would welcome your updates and peoples take on the situation....

Btw: Can I suggest in future persistentchickainti that instead of cut and posting the whole articles in full, you pick and quote the important points and leave a link to the source or original articles, quite often I am guilty of this as well... I have learned though that making the posts more concise is the better way so people arent overwhelmed by the volume of information....
Im also gonna move this to the new Tent City Forum, where I believe it is better suited...

Once again, thanks for alerting us to this travesty...
Solidarity and best wishes to the Knoxville crew!

[beatonthestreet]

Some hopeful positive developments...
Wouldnt like to be the person who they scapegoat for this terrible action!

St. Louis officials are still trying to determine who ordered city employees to destroy the belonging of two homeless men Thursday morning.
The individuals had been camping in Interco Plaza near Tucker and King Drive. Parks employees reportedly crushed their possessions in a garbage truck.
Human Services Director Bill Siedhoff says he met with both men Friday morning.
"We're trying to make this right in terms of providing whatever resources are needed in order to return all or replace all the possessions." said Siedhoff.
Siedhoff says his department has also secured housing for the individuals

source

[JohnClark]

I just wanted to let everyone know. The park rangers in St. Louis were directed by none other than Bill Siedhoff to discard the items of the homeless at Interco Plaza. He repeatedly called the rangers for a week until they finally relented and asked park maintenance to remove the items. Rangers regularly ignore the 10pm curfew for homeless in areas such as Downtown, Soulard market, Benton Park, Forest Park and many other areas. Bill Siedhoff earlier in the year asked the park division if it would be possible to turn on the irrigation system in several downtown parks in the middle of the night to inconvenience the homeless to get them to move on. Of course the parks dept. did NOT comply because of the obvious callousness of this request.
Siedhoff has always been pressured by downtown residents to 'clean up' the homelss problem in the Downtown area and since the Police do not listen to him, he hounds the rangers to do it. They have largely ignored his requests until this unfortunate incident. Rangers would NEVER discard items that were obviously personal possessions. and by the way, there was never any procedure as he claimed for this type of situation until after the incident happened. Bill Siedhoff should be held responsible, not just the public face of it. Bill Siedhoff is the public two faced side of this debacle.

[Jeremy1982]

Maybe this is why the city isn't doing anything(or doesn't seem to be doing anything) about Hopeville. From what I gather, they didn't force everyone out of the tunnel just because they wanted to remove the homeless, they are trying something in order to fill the tunnell in and stabalize the road that runs above it. I also believe they are building a new highway. They gave plenty of notice and even though they did threaten arrest for trespassing (or at minimum citations) that was in order to be able to get crews in there to block off access to the tunnell so they can start doing work. Although the tunnell would be good to be in during this time of year due to the heat, it was apparently very dangerous and old/abandoned. As much as I hate homeless sweeps, I think this was neccessary.

[Jeremy1982]

I would like to get a copy of that court order and post it down at Hopeville. I think it would be good for all residents to know their rights.