Summerland Beach Cleanup Raises Questions
After Homeless Camp Slid Downhill, Where Did Everyone Go?
Anyone who’s taken the southbound train has seen the dozens of tents set up along the railroad properties, temporary or permanent camps for homeless people, some of whom are employed nearby. In Summerland, community complaints reached a siren’s pitch when a fire broke out at one of the camps. Then, this winter’s rains apparently sent a camp on the cliff sliding to the beach, and Supervisor Das Williams’s office sent an email on Tuesday asking for the public’s help cleaning up the debris. Whether that’s a safe idea and what’s happened to the homeless people are questions Heal the Ocean’s Hillary Hauser has been asking.
Heal the Ocean became involved in the Summerland issue, donating $15,000 to the effort to relocate the people living on the cliff side, said Hauser, believing in a “humanitarian solution.” Distraught residents were calling, Hauser said, and a drone shot of the encampment in 2017 was convincing of a public nuisance and danger.
With Heal the Ocean’s seed money, staffers with the homeless aid group called Home for Good and AmeriCorps members began in August to survey the cliff dwellers, collecting information to get their paperwork organized for housing assistance. They found about seven people living in the camps, some intermittently as they traveled between Santa Barbara and Ventura, and another three to five living in vehicles. Travis Baxter, an outreach worker, noted that the camps included touches like closets for hanging clothes and lighting. Another worker wrote that one person said they’d lived in the area for 30 years.
