Alaska News

City begins cleanup of homeless camps after 15-day wait

The outlaw campers left behind dirty blankets and a picture album. Beer cans and a Bible. All collected Saturday in growing piles along a wooded area east of downtown Anchorage by workers tasked with cleaning up and closing down some of the city's more notorious illegal campsites.

Officers looking to displace homeless squatters from parks and greenbelts had come through the makeshift campgrounds about two weeks earlier posting notices: Time to move.

By Friday and Saturday, the deadline was up. Clean-up crews and police gathered at two sites popular among illegal campers -- Reeve Boulevard and Commercial Drive, plus Third Avenue and Ingra Street -- to haul away the tents and trash.

The crackdown comes on the heels of new city law that regulates the closure of homeless camps, and police are reporting few problems so far. But at Reeve Boulevard on Saturday, one man wasn't ready to go. On a hill covered in blue and purple flowers, back in the trees, Bronson Birdsell was worrying about his four missing kittens.

"We've been looking for 'em for three days," he said.

The kittens' mottled mother, Charlene, had stashed the 5-week-olds somewhere in the woods. When police began posting notices warning campers to leave the area, a group of loud, drunken neighbors switched locations, scaring Charlene in the process. Birdsell was delaying his own move from the site, still hoping Charlene would lead him to the kittens.

"Maybe on our way out," he said. "Either that, or we'll have to come back tonight."

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The summer police sweep follows a legal battle over just how aggressive the city can be when it comes to closing what police call illegal campsites. A 2009 city law allowed police to toss out campers and throw away their belongings with as little as 12 hours notice. But a lawsuit brought by the American Civil Liberties Union argued that the short time frame violated individual property rights.

A judge struck down the law, and the Assembly in April approved new rules that say police must give the illegal campers 15 days to clear out, or as few as three if the city stores their stuff.

Meantime, police say illegal campsites have proliferated in Anchorage.

More than 30 campsites had filled the woods near Reeve Boulevard and Commercial Drive when officers first posted the notices more than two weeks ago, said Lt. Garry Gilliam with the Anchorage Police Department.

The campers had been cordial, said Officer Mark Karstetter. By Saturday, almost all of them were gone.

All that was left at many of the sites was flattened grass, stray garbage, and empty booze bottles.

"It's been real positive," Karstetter said. "Give it a few weeks and we'll be finding them again."

WHAT'S LEFT BEHIND

A group of community service workers Saturday hauled loads of yellow bags and several mattresses and tents out of the woods and to the road at Reeve Boulevard and Commercial. One of the bigger piles grew to the size of a small bus.

A woman slept in a small ditch as the workers walked by. She poked her head out from under a pink blanket, then covered back up, avoiding the mosquitoes and glances from the cleaners. Her shoes and a case of Natural Ice beer sat beside her. Police soon asked her to leave, and she did.

At another site about 100 yards down the trail from Birdsell's camp, workers found a white-and-blue tent filled with trash. Human feces and a half-dozen piles of toilet paper dotted the ground nearby. Empty liquor bottles and food containers peppered the area.

Other sites held useful items, like camp chairs and a cooking pot hanging in a tree. But it appeared that most of the campers took their valuables with them when they left.

Down the trail, workers shoved soiled blankets into bags. One man picked up a moldy Bible and dropped it on top of a pile out by the road. Another, Phil Andrews, picked up a photo album lying in the dirt.

"Someone had a home at one time, and to have it wind up down here, that's just a shame," Andrews said. "That photo album just stuck with me." He threw the album in a bag and onto the pile.

'A LITTLE MORE TIME'

Back at Birdsell's camp, boxes had been piled around the tent, and a laptop sat on the ground. Birdsell's partner, Will Emry, explained that the their small clearing was usually much tidier.

"We threw everything out and started organizing. It just became a jumble," Emry said as the men prepared to leave. "If they want to clean, they can clean. If we'd had a little more time, this would have all been cleaned."

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Birdsell and Emry walked their bikes down the trail and let Charlene the cat out of her cage one last time to go look for the kittens. She scratched the ground, peed, then started sniffing around. Emry followed.

About 10 minutes later, he yelled back. "She found them!"

Emry walked out of the woods holding the four kittens. He and Birdsell put them in the cage with their parents.

Birdsell admitted he had a new camp already set up somewhere else in the city. The men took their cats and headed east.

Reach Casey Grove at casey.grove@adn.com or 257-4589.

Photos: Homeless camp removal

More on Anchorage's homeless

By CASEY GROVE

casey.grove@adn.com

Casey Grove

Casey Grove is a former reporter for the Anchorage Daily News. He left the ADN in 2014.

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