Mayor seeks second crew to clean homeless camps in Colorado Springs
Creating a second crew to clean vacated homeless camps is one of the budget requests made this week by Colorado Springs Mayor John Suthers.
Currently, the city has a crew of up to six people cleaning camps, but Suthers wants a second crew because of the number of camps takes too much time for one crew to clean.
Suthers wants to allocate $171,000 for a second crew that would include three people.
“We want to clean these camps sooner,” he said. “One problem is we can’t use volunteers because (hypodermic) needles and sometimes weapons are found. There’s human waste at some of these camps. Trash and garbage. We need specially trained people.”
Perdo Laumbach, a former news photographer, is part of the city’s existing crew.
“We’re cleaning camps every day,” he said. “They tend to be hidden in brush and weeds along Fountain Creek. You may not see them, but they’re out there. A second crew would be a big help, and it would free up some of us for other duties.”
On Tuesday, KRDO NewsChannel 13 followed the crew for the first time as it headed to a camp near downtown.
The process is similar to that used by El Paso County and the litter control group Keep Colorado Springs Beautiful. Residents of illegal camps are given advance notice to leave and cleaning begins soon after.
A homeless man who declined to be identified said the cleanup is another example of homeless people being treated unfairly.
“There wouldn’t be a problem if we had dumpsters for our trash and restrooms to use,” he said. “Many businesses won’t allow us to use their restrooms. Sometimes we have dumpsters but then they fill up and no one comes to empty them.”
Several citizens said they support the mayor’s effort to add a second crew.
“I think we need to get rid of the trash,” one man said. “But I think we need to use other resources. I know that KCSB uses low-risk offenders who are working off community service time. Why can’t we also use jail inmates or people on probation?”
Another man agrees.
“We should have empathy for the homeless,” he said. “But there has to be a better solution that tent cities along public trails.”
The City Council begins considering the 2019 budget in two weeks.
