POTD: Cleaning up the mess

Metro Wire Staff

A city streets employee clears out one of two homeless encampments in the downtown Market Square on the morning of Aug. 12.

Among the personal items left behind in the flower beds were clothing, blankets, snacks, feminine hygiene supplies, postal supplies that appeared to be used as bedding, and various liter. A city employee used a trash picker to remove the items and place them into trash receptacles.

City police have taken numerous complaints in recent months about discarded personal items in wooded areas, city parks, and other public spaces, likely left behind by area homeless.

Police Chief Bob Kussow said the department has an officer who works with area homeless people to help connect them with local resources, but he added, “Some of them don’t want any help.”

“Being homeless is not a crime,” Kussow told the Metro Wire in July. “And it seems like everybody’s kind of leaning on law enforcement to do something about it. But it’s not illegal to be down there. We don’t have an ordinance that says no camping in the city. We have an ordinance that says no camping in the city parks, but not in the not within the city limits. And so what they’re doing isn’t illegal, not leaving a mess like some of them do, that’s littering. Again, it’s not a crime. It’s an ordinance violation, but again, people are reaching out to us to try to do something about it. It’s not a police problem; it’s a city problem. A lot of other cities have an ordinance where there’s no camping within the city, and I’d have no problem with that.”