Voice of OC (https://voiceofoc.org/tag/santa-ana-civic-center-homeless/)
In a move lauded by public health advocates, organizers of the county’s only needle exchange program, which was shut down in January, are working to reopen it and take it on the road.
Unsatisfied with secondhand information about living conditions at the riverbed, 74-year-old Judge David O. Carter, dressed in jeans and a blue sweater bearing the federal court’s seal, went to see for himself, talking to dozens of homeless people, picking up trash and recruiting volunteers.
The homeless people who slept in the Santa Ana Civic Center for years were cleared out by Thursday afternoon and people can’t sleep there anymore after much of the area was blocked off by chain link fences.
Judge David O. Carter said OC cities need to take care of their “proportional” share of the county’s homeless population, and warned that without action, the court could invalidate anti-camping laws.
“We don’t have sufficient capacity,” said the supervisors’ chairman, Andrew Do. The issue is scheduled to be discussed Tuesday at a federal court hearing with U.S. District Judge David O. Carter, county officials, and city officials from across Orange County.
County workers, along with the Santa Ana Police Department, began clearing out segments of the Civic Center homeless camp Monday as healthcare workers and city contractors started health and other assessments of roughly 200 people living there.
“What we saw with…the hysteria from Irvine, is this: It’s simply a class-based argument that if ‘I pay enough for where I live, I shouldn’t have to deal with my homeless problem. I should shift it to some other city,’ ” said county Supervisor Andrew Do.
“This county has been in a crisis situation from the time the court got this case. This county’s structure has been deplete, and I think only recently has there been a concerted and good faith effort to catch up with decades of neglect,” said federal Judge David O. Carter at a court conference Friday morning.
The Costa Mesa City Council Wednesday unanimously adopted a resolution against turning the Fairview Developmental Center into a homeless shelter.
Answers about where shelters might be placed, and how they would be operated, could come at an April 3 court meeting.