Plack: Shelter worsened problem

Overnight facility homeless magnet, says police chief

Don Simpson looks for handouts near Walmart earlier this week. Bryant Anderson/The Daily Triplicate

“It created havoc for us,” Plack said, adding that the shelter attracted more homeless people to Crescent City, some of whom are still here weeks after it was closed down.

Plack said he has ordered his officers to crack down on aggressive panhandling, and he plans to clear out a homeless camp on the east side of town.

The chief said he feared the panhandling could affect the tourism industry that is vital to the local economy.

“If you’re living in a community such as this one, then you want to present the best image you can,” Plack said.

Crescent City would be better off without opening another overnight shelter, he said.

The shelter at the fairgrounds was closed down in mid-January after fairgrounds officials became concerned about the number of disturbances inside and outside the building.

Homeless advocates said this week that while they agree that the community should avoid encouraging the homeless lifestyle, they disagree with the chief’s opposition to an overnight shelter.

“There’s going to be a homeless shelter regardless,” said Mike Justice of Our Daily Bread Ministries, which ran the fairgrounds shelter. “We have enough people here that know that there is a need for a shelter — there are more and more homeless every day.”

The growth in the homeless population is more a reflection of the economy than the fact that the fairgrounds shelter served as a magnet, Justice said, adding he’s aware of only six homeless people who came to Crescent City from out of the area to stay at the shelter.

Police monitor panhandlers

The homeless may need a place to stay, but it shouldn’t be here, Plack said.

“We respond to the community’s complaints,” he said, “and homelessness is definitely a problem up here.”

He said he’s having officers focus on panhandlers in the Safeway and Ray’s Food Place shopping centers, because the transient population has become more aggressive with its panhandling.

Plack said he sent off-duty officers to the shopping centers to see if there was a problem with in-your-face panhandling.

“Officers went down off duty and they were basically asked to spare change in a way that would have intimidated them if they weren’t officers,” he said.

Plack said tourists spend a lot of money at the Ray’s and Safeway shopping centers, which are in front of a  homeless encampment to the east.

“They tend to stay closer to where they live when they go out to panhandle,” said Plack.

The homeless camps behind the supermarkets are an ongoing issue said the chief, but they have not been officially raided or “cleaned out” recently.

Plack said the camps are on California Department of Fish and Game land, so police would have to work with them to clean out the camps, as well as with the city to budget for any possible overtime.

He said he is planning to clean the area out, it’s just a question of when.

“We will be going there in the future to make very clear that this kind of activity will not be tolerated,” said Plack.

The chief said during the raid, any property found in the camps would  most likely be confiscated.

He said the crackdown on the transient population involves stepped up patrols in known homeless camps, a zero-tolerance policy on aggressive panhandling (physical touching, yelling or persistent following), zero tolerance for disorderly conduct under the influence, and quicker officer response to local businesses that call to have panhandlers removed.

Plack said the organizations helping the homeless need to be more proactive to making them become more self-sufficient.

He said programs offered by Rural Human Services, Our Daily Bread Ministries, Community Assistance Network and St. Vincent  de Paul and other local homeless advocates may provide temporary services to the homeless, but that is not enough to keep them “off the streets.”

“A more concentrated effort is needed to curtail this type of activity,” said Plack.

Plack said the non-profits that help the homeless need to discern “between those who want to collect from the state and be homeless and those that don’t want to be homeless.”

Plack lauded Our Daily Bread Ministries for starting a temporary homeless shelter at the fairgrounds, but was displeased with the end result. The shelter was shut down in January because of numerous crimes in the area and safety issues.

He said after the overnight shelter closed, some people who had been staying there ended up camping closer to where they panhandle.

The chief said the creation of the shelter brought “homeless here from all over.”

“By having a temporary shelter a lot more people that were in that situation  came up here,” said Plack. “But then it closed — and those people were left out in the cold.”

The chief said he opposes the concept of a permanent homeless shelter in Crescent City.

Advocates want a shelter

Mike Justice of Our Daily Bread Ministries said if Plack thinks the overnight shelter was responsible for the homeless population’s growth, “then he needs to do more research.”

Teri McCune-Oostra, executive director of RHS, said the homeless do need proactive help as opposed to handouts, but opposing a homeless shelter is not the answer.

“It’s easy to say there’s no place for a homeless shelter, but what would we do with all of the homeless that are already here?” said Oostra.

“What are you going to do? They’re not going anywhere,” she said.

Oostra said Plack seems to think “the only way to get rid of the homeless is to move them somewhere else.”

She said the answer lies in management of the current homeless population, not in cracking down on the homeless or barring a shelter.

“What we need to do is we need to figure out how to manage our homeless,” said Oostra.

She said finding a way to prod  homeless people into helping themselves is the answer, but that can’t be done without a location for them to meet with counselors and stay until they can get out on their own.

As of now, no permanent structure is in the process of being built, but a few non-profits have plans.

Justice said he will pursue a temporary shelter to be open for the two coldest months of the year.

He said that only six people came to the fairgrounds shelter from out of town, and that the homeless population did not “create havoc” for the police because the problems that occurred were in the California Highway Patrol’s jurisdiction.

Doug Morgan, executive director of CAN, said he agreed with some of the chief’s policies on cracking down on the homeless — but disagreed with Plack’s stance on a shelter.

“I am in agreement with a large portion of the law enforcement response, in that there is a percentage of the homeless population which are a law enforcement issue,” said Morgan.

“On the other end, I don’t agree with Chief Plack that there should be no homeless shelter in the area.”

“CAN’s take is because our community has limited resources, it is incumbent of us to use those resources” for a shelter, he said.

A shelter should have strict guidelines and a screening process, and should serve only single  parents and families that are trying to become self-reliant. He said the CAN version of the shelter would not cater to adults without children.

“Best use does not equal supporting the willfully homeless,” he said.

“In pursuing a shelter we could direct our resources to those who become homeless, so they can become stable and housed citizens,” said Morgan.

“But it’s extremely difficult without a shelter,” he said.