The railroad company that owns some of the land where a homeless encampment is located near the Penobscot River is sticking to a Dec. 19 deadline to clear the camp, despite Bangor city councilors’ decision Friday that they wanted to set a later deadline.
The railroad company, CSX, plans to request that encampment residents be moved starting Friday, and to send in a cleanup crew Dec. 22, City Manager Carollynn Lear relayed to councilors at a committee meeting Monday.
The city initially set the Dec. 19 deadline in late November. Councilors said Friday they would delay removing anyone and set a new deadline after community members protested the council’s decision to close the camp, saying the city did not have an adequate plan for where people could go.
The planned closure is the latest example of Bangor’s failure to create a long-term strategy to solve the city’s homelessness crisis. While some encampment residents may find housing or shelter by next week, some will likely continue living on the streets.
More than 40 people were living at the site in November, but the encampment has shrunk in recent weeks. There are now about twelve occupied tents, according to Jennifer Gunderman, the city’s public health director.
The encampment is spread out along the railroad tracks beside the Penobscot River. About half of the occupied tents sit on railroad property and the other half sit on city property, Gunderman said.
Although the railroad company does not have jurisdiction over the city-owned portions of land, people camping on those areas still may be forced to move.
“Council has not directed us to remove those people,” Lear told the Bangor Daily News.
However, people typically cross through the Penobscot Plaza shopping center to get to the encampment, which is not easily accessible any other way because it is bounded by a large wall and the river. Anyone doing this could be reported for trespassing — and the business owners nearby have expressed that they will no longer tolerate that movement, Lear said.
Councilors had initially directed city staff Friday to explore whether some people could temporarily remain on the city-owned part of the site, but Lear told them Monday that was not a feasible option given the feedback from business owners.
One business owner expressed frustration with the encampment and the city’s handling of it at Monday’s committee meeting.
“We’re constantly making calls for disruptions,” said Christina Paradis, co-owner of Hero’s Sports Grill, noting trash and needle waste and reports from customers who say they feel unsafe in the area.
“I feel for these people [living there], I just think there’s a way we need to go about it that maybe we aren’t the driveway,” she said.
City staff said they would do what they can to help encampment residents leading up to the closure. Gunderman said her team would offer to store residents’ belongings, direct people to warming centers and distribute naloxone and supplies for them to clean up the space.
“This date is no longer in our hands. This is the railroad’s date,” City Councilor Michael Beck said. “The goal here is to mitigate chaos.”
Beck said he planned to meet with encampment residents Tuesday to identify other things they may need help with. “And then we are all keeping our foot on the gas to now talk about long-term strategies, and can we make this the last encampment like this?” he said.
Shelter options are limited for people leaving the encampment. Fewer than half of the people living there as of Friday had housing vouchers, and it can be difficult to find landlords who are willing to rent to people with a history of homelessness. Hope House, Bangor’s only low-barrier homeless shelter, is currently full. Bangor Area Homeless Shelter may have up to two beds available, according to Gunderman.
Councilors have weighed the idea of establishing a sanctioned encampment space somewhere in the city, although those discussions took a backseat as the encampment closure deadline neared and they have not made any decisions on the matter.
The agenda for Monday’s committee meeting included plans to discuss a long-term strategy for responding to homelessness and creating an advisory committee on the issue, but at the end of a long meeting, councilors decided to hold off on those discussions until a later date.