‘There’s nowhere to go, but we’ve got to go.’ Housing authority shuts down Hilltop homeless camp

Michael Mirra hoped he could work something out when Tacoma’s homelessness crisis literally showed up at his doorstep this summer.

But the executive director of the Tacoma Housing Authority found himself at a loss.

For the past two months, a homeless encampment chased off People’s Park relocated on THA property on South L Street.

Soon, it will be gone.

On Friday, Mirra reluctantly signed a trespassing order, ensuring that the dozens of people experiencing homelessness who had been living in tents and other structures on THA’s property since June soon would be forced to move on.

“The experience, I think, was not new in that we know Tacoma’s got an emergency on its hands,” Mirra said Monday morning as he watched people pack up outside his office window. “When (the homeless emergency) laps at your door, it presents a different challenge, calling for skills and resources that in the end we did not have.”

Now, he’s hoping to write an epilogue.

For Tacoma, the episode served as merely another chapter in the city’s ongoing homelessness crisis — one that shows few signs of improving.

In the days and weeks that preceded the trespassing order, Mirra and THA had worked to find a different solution.

The housing agency was trying to balance its responsibility to employees, clients, the park and the surrounding community with its social justice objectives, Mirra said. It had floated the idea of allowing an encampment to exist on part of its property.

Ultimately, it didn’t work. The encampment presented too many legal and logistical problems, Mirra said, and grew too large, from 15 individuals in June to between 40 and 60 today.

It started, Mirra said, with individuals experiencing homelessness camping at the neighboring People’s Park during the spring. When they were forced to move, because of laws that prevent camping in public places, many sought refuge on THA property.

The development put THA in a tricky situation.

The housing authority’s “primary mission,” according to a message from Mirra on its website, is to “to provide high quality, affordable housing and supportive services to persons and families in need.” As has been well documented, the need in Tacoma greatly exceeds the resources THA has at its disposal.

Still, simply putting the kibosh on the encampment felt wrong, Mirra said.

While some of the housing authority’s neighbors expressed understandable concerns — perhaps most pointedly, Centro Latino, with executive director Kate Smith calling it “an absolute public health issue” — Mirra was reluctant to sign what amounted to eviction papers before exploring every option.

THA now will turn its attention toward the future, Mirra said. It is hoping to work with the city and local service providers to identify a new location for a sanctioned encampment.

“If we could find a site, and, with the help of others, manage it well and make clear that it’s temporary, and in that way model the use of the city’s ordinance, we would hope that would encourage others with land to try the same thing,” Mirra said. “It’s plausible enough for us to take it on.”

I wish THA luck. If we’ve learned anything over the past few years, it’s that such an endeavor won’t be easy.

Meanwhile last weekend, individuals who had been calling THA’s property home got what, for many, was a familiar visit from Tacoma’s police department, informing them that time was up.

“They’re putting up no-trespassing signs. We’ve got to move,” Randy Peterson, one of the individuals who had been staying on THA property, told The News Tribune. “There’s nowhere to go, but we’ve got to go. I’m staying in my vehicle right now, and my goal is to get off the street before winter.

“I don’t want to do another winter out here.”

Nina Roi, who had been living on THA property with her adult son, echoed the frustration.

“Where’s everyone supposed to go? We don’t have nowhere to go. It’s hard. I mean, I have an income, me and my son get $1,520 a month, and no one will rent to us. So … I just don’t know what to do,” Roi said. “We didn’t choose to be homeless. It just happened.

“Where’s everyone supposed to go?”

That is the question that underscores this story, and so many others.

Unfortunately, it remains unanswered.

“It’s a complicated topic. Homeless is what happens when so many other civic systems fail,” Mirra said as he watched people packing up outise his window. “The result that we then see is hard to fix on its own.”

“The law of gravity says they’re going to be somewhere.”