After Gov. Gavin Newsom advocated for the closure of a homeless encampment on the Berkeley-Emeryville border, a federal choose on Wednesday gave camp occupants three weeks to maneuver out.
Prior court docket orders for the previous 9 months had prohibited Caltrans from clearing an encampment of a couple of dozen folks alongside the Interstate 80 offramp close to Shellmound Road and Ashby Avenue. These protections expired in March, and the residents requested the court docket for a four-month extension to present them time to seek out alternate housing.
However the encampment on a busy offramp can't keep there perpetually, because it creates hazardous situations each for occupants and for folks driving by, U.S. District Choose Edward Chen dominated.
“Bearing in mind the above issues, given the distinctive nature of the freeway situs and the size of time already afforded to the plaintiffs, the Court docket finds that the 6 particular person plaintiffs haven't proven they're entitled to a four-month extension of the preliminary injunction,” he wrote. “To afford the person plaintiffs an inexpensive period of time to make alternate preparations and to keep away from imminent hardships, the plaintiffs have till April 30, 2022, earlier than the preliminary injunction is terminated.”
The order impacts six named plaintiffs, in addition to one other roughly six individuals who stay on the camp however aren’t named within the lawsuit.
Newsom, who has undertaken a latest push to rid California of the huge homeless camps sprawling throughout streets, sidewalks and different public areas, known as for the Berkeley-Emeryville camp’s closure final month.
“This litigation has considerably slowed our progress in Berkeley by stopping Caltrans from delivering on essential efforts aimed toward revitalizing California’s streets and public areas via litter abatement and native beautification tasks,” he wrote in an announcement.
The place Do We Go Berkeley, the activist group that filed the lawsuit on behalf of the homeless plaintiffs, was disenchanted by Wednesday’s ruling. They wanted the additional 4 months to seek out housing, stated lead advocate Ian Cordova Morales. Camp residents must get substitute identification playing cards, join Social Safety advantages and be evaluated by the county earlier than they will qualify for low-income housing. And as soon as these situations are met, residents possible shall be positioned on a prolonged waitlist, he stated.
“Three weeks just isn't almost sufficient time,” Morales stated. “We’re going to should spend that complete three weeks simply getting them able to be evicted.”
However Caltrans, which owns the land, argues the encampment has posed a monetary burden and security hazard. The company has spent greater than $250,000 to take away greater than 500 tons of particles and dangerous materials from the positioning, based on Caltrans’ court docket filings.
Caltrans didn't instantly reply to a request to touch upon the choice.
A number of individuals who had been dwelling on the encampment already had discovered shelter on the Rodeway Inn in Berkeley, which was being utilized by Alameda County as a respite for unhoused folks liable to contracting COVID-19. However the lodge is now not an possibility for residents of the Berkeley-Emeryville camp. As of the top of this month, will probably be reserved to deal with folks who had been dwelling at Individuals’s Park in Berkeley.
Instead, plaintiffs requested the choose to permit them to return to an encampment on the Sea Breeze Market & Deli in Berkeley — an space the place dozens of individuals camped till Caltrans closed that encampment final yr. Lots of the folks displaced from that encampment arrange the brand new camp on the Berkeley-Emeryville border, activists stated.
However Chen denied the request to reopen the Sea Breeze camp.
On the finish of the month, when the court-ordered safety ends and Caltrans is allowed to clear the encampment, Morales doesn’t know the place the residents will go.
“There’s nowhere for them to go,” he stated. “They’re simply going to enter the streets of Berkeley, I assume.”