PUEBLO — Crews are cleaning up homeless encampments along Fountain Creek in Pueblo this week. Mayor Heather Graham said it is not safe for anyone to live in the area. But there is controversy over the city's actions. Local nonprofits who help the homeless said this clean up isn't the answer.
Clean up or sweep? Mayor Graham is calling this move a clean up of the area between Fountain Creek and I-25 in Pueblo.
“It's really just leftover trash and encampments from people who have moved probably somewhere else in the city or moved on and maybe got some housing that they've just left their stuff down here,” Graham said.
Bulldozers, city trucks, police and public works line up early Tuesday morning. Crews with the City of Pueblo went through the area clearing out trash and the homeless encampments with bulldozers. They are clearing out and cleaning up the area along the railroad tracks between the 4th and 8th Street bridges.
Blankets, tarps and bikes were scooped up by bulldozers and added to larger piles. City employees raked up trash and volunteers helped a woman with a walker come out of the brush near the creek. Other displaced people pull carts with the few items they have left.
“Those are the kinds of things that are heartbreaking,” Tom Carrigan, a volunteer said.
“We have too many homeless people. We all know that they're clearing everybody out, unfortunately, with no place for them to go,” Carrigan said.
Carrigan said this clean up is not the solution.
“These people are going to go to another place. They're going to set up a camp in this area and in a month these people will have them back here. So, your situation didn't get solved. It didn't get resolved. All you did was move from one place to another, to another, to another, and you keep spending our tax dollars not doing anything,” Carrigan said.
Carrigan represented the VFW and helped assist some of the individuals who were displaced because of the clean up. Pueblo nonprofits set up a blue tent to provide resources. Organizations such as Access Point and Pueblo United gave out water, snacks, toilet paper and hygiene items.
“We're here to provide clothes and blankets and hygiene to help them as well with the stuff that they're losing in this sweep going on,” Kevin Howard said.
Kevin Howard is the co-founder of Pueblo United. He said he works with people experiencing homelessness on a daily basis.
“Everybody's gotta live somewhere, and everybody's gotta do and be able to survive where they're living,” Howard said. “Down there, they're out of the way down there, they're... not bothering anybody. They're not committing crimes. Up here they're trying to just hide and stay away from everybody.”
But Mayor Graham said it's not safe for people to live in this area.
“First of all, it's not a place to reside. This is city property. This is railroad property. This is not safe for anybody to be living, you know, not even staying for one night. It's a very dangerous area down here,” Graham said
She said the people who are displaced can go to the Pueblo Rescue Mission.
“When you hear people talk about there aren't resources, there's nowhere else to go. I know that the rescue mission has bed space open first hand, because I get the numbers every day,” Graham said.
Mayor Graham said the rescue mission has at least 30 open beds a night.
“So it's very frustrating that people think that they have to resort to living on the river bottom instead of going to a shelter,” Mayor Graham said.
The city said the clean up will continue throughout Thursday.
“These people are their best friends, their neighbors, just like my neighbors in the house next to me are, and they're just being torn apart,” Carrigan said.
The Aftermath of Homeless Camp Cleanups In Pueblo
The City of Pueblo and the mayor have received both support and pushback about the way they are trying to clean up the steel city. Last week, the city cleared out trash and homeless camps along Fountain Creek.
