Detroit Mayor: Plan In Works To Clear Out Homeless' Tent City
DETROIT (WWJ) - Mayor Mike Duggan says the city will work to clear out a homeless encampment that's taken shape near downtown Detroit.
Talking to WWJ Newsradio 950's Vickie Thomas, Duggan says he's concerned about the welfare of the dozen or so people who've taken refuge in the makeshift tent city in a small park off E. Jefferson Ave., between Rivard and St. Aubin, just a couple of blocks east of the Renaissance Center.
The mayor said the city "at some point" will enforce laws that prohibit tents, campfires and park visitors after 10 p.m.,
"One way or another we're gonna move folks into the shelters pretty soon," Duggan said.
Charles Jones, better known as "C-J" told council that he and others who have set-up tents at a park off Jefferson near downtown don't want to live in temporary shelters.
"They don't want to go in shelters.You can't force anyone to go somewhere they don't want to go. They are willing to work, the only thing we want to ask the mayor is to give us the chance," said Jones.
"What I'm trying to do is not ask the city for anything," said Jones. "Just get a vacant property - we build something on it."
The camp has been slowly growing since it appeared several months ago. About a dozen tents were set up at the site Thursday morning — where the temperature gauge read 1 degree.
Wardel Camden said he's making it just fine.
"Yeah, I'm warm...I'm warm," he said, adding that he was wearing four layers of clothing."I stay all wrapped up."
But why doesn't he go to a shelter?
"I don't like doing that," Camden said. "It's infested with bugs; I can't be in there. They eat me up...There's so many nasty bugs, I can't deal with it. They ran me outta there."
One tent city resident told WWJ he's not in a homeless shelter because "they're all full," while others say they just prefer living outdoors.
Mayor Duggan said he'll investigate claims that the shelters are a bad scene.
"...I'm gonna spend some time in the shelters in the next couple of weeks," Duggan said. "But it's two degrees out there right now. You just can't pitch a tent, have open fires, have trash piling up, not bathroom facilities."
Duggan added that they're handing the situation "sensitively."
In the meantime, representatives with the Detroit Rescue Mission and other groups have been checking those living in the encampment to make sure they're OK, and that the city has been working with local agencies to find some of the residents more long-term shelter or housing situations.
"They've been successful with two, and I think they're working with three more," WWJ's Mike Campbell reported. "But we've done enough of these stories to know that you can't force homeless people in to a shelter, so all they can do is make it available to them."
MORE: Homeless Raise Tent City In Shadow Of Downtown Detroit