Honolulu Homeless Frustrated as Belongings Taken
UPDATED 6:15 p.m.
One by one, Honolulu’s homeless took down their tents Tuesday.
Some packed their worldly possessions into the beds of pickup trucks, planning to move them elsewhere. Others watched as about 15 city workers packed the belongings into green recycling bins, to be stored in Halawa. Some gave permission to have their items head straight to the landfill. And some just abandoned things on the sidewalk, feeling like they had no options left.
“Why don’t they do something to try to help us instead of trying to hurt us?” Jared Castro told Civil Beat. “All they’re doing is pushing us back. They tell us to move forward and they push us back.
“We can’t go in the streets, we can’t go on the sidewalks, we can’t go in the parks, we can’t go on the beaches, we can’t go in the mountains. Where are we going?”
Castro wasn’t alone with his feelings of frustration and despair as the city government enforced what it’s termed the “stored property ordinance.” Passed last month by the Honolulu City Council and signed by Mayor Peter Carlisle, the law allows the city to impound any personal items kept on city sidewalks or in city parks after 24 hours.
The law closes a loophole that allowed homeless people to move back and forth between parks during the day and sidewalks at night. Supporters have insisted the law doesn’t target the homeless. But the presence of Department of Facility Maintenance Director Westley Chun and leaders from Carlisle’s office both yesterday, when notices were posted on tents and shopping carts, as well as today shows that the city knows its handling of the homeless issue is high profile.
Large green plastic bins — the same ones used for green waste by the Department of Environmental Services — were filled with items by workers and taken to the city’s yard in Halawa. They also used a backhoe to place refuse — old newspapers, any liquids and perishables — into a utility truck.
The city posted 44 removal notices Monday, according to city spokeswoman Louise Kim McCoy: 22 by the Department of Parks and Recreation and 22 by the Department of Facility Maintenance. On Tuesday, the city issued 11 storage and disposal notices — five by DPR and six by DFM. City workers filled 20 plastic bins with belongings that had been kept by homeless people at or near the two parks in Moiliili and Pawaa In-Ha Park.
Notices were posted on traffic barriers and will stay there for three days, informing those persons whose items were taken how they can make arrangements to get their stuff back. People will need to make an appointment and then identify their belongings when picking them up.
Chun said the ordinance allows the administration to set fees to make up for the cost of enforcing the law, but that those items impounded Tuesday will be stored without cost. After 30 days, any unclaimed items will be disposed of.
The city has yet to estimate the total cost of the program. Council member Romy Cachola, who cast the lone “no” vote when Bill 54 passed Dec. 7, has repeatedly pressed for details. He reiterated his request in to Carlisle last week.
Chun said the workers who were assisting with the stored property ordinance enforcement Monday and Tuesday were laborers, equipment specialists and truck drivers who worked on programs like pothole patching, storm drainage maintenance and stream cleaning.
The workers, all wearing orange vests and rubber gloves and handling items carefully, seemed to alternate between disgust and amusement at what they found in the abandoned belongings. There was a small bottle of hard alcohol, drug paraphernalia, adult magazines and a sex toy. But there were also clothes, food, blankets and personal paperwork. What couldn’t be carried away was either stored or put in the waste pile. They documented, in detail, the items that were stored. City workers took photos and videos as they went from site to site.
Chun said that more than 10 employees from his department — plus others from the Department of Parks and Recreation and the Honolulu Police Department — were needed to get enforcement off the ground, but that the impact to city services would wane over time, down to a crew of two.
“As the public sees that we’re really taking the stored property ordinance seriously and enforcing it diligently, hopefully we’ll see more voluntary compliance,” Chun said. “We’re going to keep on doing what we need to enforce it.”
He said he was taught the old adage that if a habit takes 90 days to make, it’ll take 90 days to break. He said he hopes to change public habits, and said he’ll consider the program a success when the city stops receiving complaints to enforce the ordinance. Kim McCoy said some neighbors and business owners thanked Chun for finally addressing their concerns.
But beyond the items, other city agencies and their partners are trying to make it a soft landing for displaced homeless people. November Morris from the Institute for Human Services was on hand to provide outreach, and city Housing Coordinator Trish Morikawa was running the show.
“I say a prayer that one or two guys go” to a shelter, Keith Ishida, executive director of the Office of Housing, which sets city policy for the homeless, told Civil Beat.
Castro, sitting with his dog Peanut, said he’d been at Old Stadium Park for about three years and still does some plumbing and construction work. He said he’d consider going to a shelter — if they got rid of the bed bugs.
A woman named Aka who declined to provide her last name said she also had problems with bugs at the shelters.
“We’ve been there before. Been there, done that,” she said. “We’re kind of used to this, them taking our stuff. And then rebuilding it again, and then they’re taking it again, and then rebuilding it again. It’s a never-ending story.”
Across Isenberg Street from the Moiliili baseball field, Jeanette Novak tried to pack what seemed an entire life’s collection into the bed of a pickup truck. Strollers, bikes, coolers and clothes lined the sidewalk, and city workers cajoled her to hurry up the process.
“I didn’t know we wouldn’t be able to stay around here and just live,” she said. “I still don’t understand that.”
The city posted no new removal notices Tuesday, according to Kim McCoy, so won’t be impounding belongings at any new sites Wednesday. The city will continue to assess the situation and review complaints to come up with priorities for where to enforce next.
Here are Civil Beat’s photos from the Tuesday sweep:
