SAN DIEGO — Thursday morning around 9:00, the sidewalk near the Petco Park tailgating parking lot was lined with tents for those among us who are unsheltered. Those makeshift shelters were short-lived because just a few hours later, around noon, city crews came and swept the area, giving the people who live on the streets options and notices that they have 24 hours to take advantage of programs to help.
People who live in East Village talked to CBS 8 about the City of San Diego's homeless encampment ban and said the tent city that was cleaned up Thursday morning will be back.
"Something has to change, and it has to change soon. [The encampment ban] was a halfhearted measure that we thought would create some progress," said Giorgio Kirylo who lives in the East Village. "They do these sweeps, but the reality is we're completely overwhelmed and for some reason the East Village became the government’s dumping ground."
John Brady works with Lived Experience Advisers. He said he used to call the streets of San Diego home and now that he's back on his feet he works to help others. But he says the encampment ban isn't working, because the problem is bigger than what the encampment ban can fix.
"We are more than 60% of the way through most of our goals for a 10-year plan on homelessness that the city established on homelessness just four years ago," said Brady.
"So, we're ahead of the game according to plan, but we didn't predict that there would be 35,000 who became homeless or impacted our system just this year alone. We don't have anywhere for people to be. I don't care how many safe sleeping sites we open up. Unless we open up 3,000 tomorrow, we're not going to be able to resolve this," Brady continued.
Brady explained that by the end of the year there will be 35,000 unhoused individuals in San Diego. As of October 2023, San Diego's Regional Task Force on Homelessness counted more than 28,000 active clients. The safe sleeping sites can only hold a fraction of that number.
"Those of us that live down here see horrible things. We see people dying. We see people overdosing. We see people being hauled away by cops," said Cookie Serrano who lives in East Village.
"We see cops chasing people. But I do feel like with the encampment ban and the safe sleeping sites, we have seen some improvement in the number of tents downtown. I think they've also moved some of the tents away to various areas, especially down here in the south part of East Village which is hit harder than other places," continued Serrano.
CBS 8 reached out to the City of San Diego and the San Diego Police Department, since police enforce the encampment ban. SDPD told CBS 8:
"Quality of life crime enforcement occurs in the downtown area seven days a week by NPD officers. Although we are utilizing the "unsafe camping ordinance" in a limited capacity in the downtown area (only around certain schools), we have continuously enforced other violations such as encroachment to address tent and other encampments established on the public right of way."
Watch Related: City of San Diego passes homeless encampment ban (Jun 27, 2023)