Posted: 12/04/2014 08:14:29 AM PST
Updated: 12/04/2014 08:22:44 AM PST
SAN JOSE -- Workers early Thursday morning began the long-awaited process of closing down the Bay Area's most notorious homeless encampment, 'the Jungle.'
The makeshift community alongside Coyote Creek is believed to have at least 200 inhabitants living in unsanitary conditions. For more than a year, the city and nonprofit partners have been trying to house residents of the Jungle, which is located near the intersections of Story and Senter roads. But Thursday was eviction day for holdouts, and there was a strong police presence as the closure began.
The city and the Santa Clara Valley Water District is expecting to spend between $400,000 and $500,000 cleaning up the site. The work is expected to be completed by Dec. 19.
Santa Clara County has one of the country's most acute homeless problems. An estimated 5,000 people are on San Jose streets on any given night. The Jungle, because of its size and proximity to wealthy Silicon Valley, has become a symbol of the issue.
Officials have been under mounting pressure from neighborhood and environmental groups to take decisive action with the Jungle. Earlier this year, the state Department of Fish and Wildlife filed a complaint against the city, claiming it had failed to adequately clean up encampments along Coyote Creek. Last month, the environmental group San Francisco Baykeeper announced that it will file a broader lawsuit under the Clean Water Act, charging that the city has failed to stop pollution from flowing into creeks and the San Francisco Bay.
The cleanup phase at the Jungle will include workers collecting personal possessions that appear to have value. By law, the city must store those items for 90 days to give their owners time to retrieve them.
Bulldozers will be tearing down flimsy structures, collecting mounds of garbage and start restoring the site to its natural state. An environmental company has been contracted to deal with bio-waste and hazardous materials.
After the cleanup, park rangers and San Jose police working overtime will patrol the site to prevent re-encampment.
Check back for updates to this breaking story.
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Posted by Unknown on Thursday, December 4, 2014 - Rating: 4.5
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