By Neita Cecil
Columbia Gorge News
THE DALLES — When she drove to Hood River, she’d always look for the homeless camp where she knew her son and his girlfriend were living.
But the woman could never see it, since it was hidden by trees on private property near the I-84 Exit 82 fish overpass, at the end of West Second Street.
When the longstanding camp was removed late last year and trees were taken down, she was stunned by the huge berm of debris left after trailers, tents and hand-made wood-pallet homes like the one her son had built were taken down.
The debris pile drew significant interest on local Facebook pages. She said, “It’s not just something happening in my town … it’s my son.”
The woman, who asked that her name not be used, said the huge pile wasn’t just garbage, “It was possessions too.” Her son and his girlfriend left most of theirs behind after getting a 72-hour notice to vacate, she said.
She could understand why they were removed off private property, but cannot fathom why it was done “in the freaking winter, over the holidays. That’s where my heart is absolutely broken.
“When it’s 40 degrees and it’s raining and you’re wet and you can’t get out of the wet, you can’t ever warm up,” she said. “The winter was the worst time to do that.”
She’s tried to get her son into housing or treatment, to no avail. She’s come to believe that, in active addiction, he doesn’t have the ability to maintain a stable, housed life.
She’s very proud that her son used “skill and ingenuity” to build a home with a bedroom, kitchen and living room. But “for God’s sake,” she said, “put that drive into doing something that’s not at the homeless camp.”
She’s never sure if her son is being truthful. But he told her he’d sourced the freight pallets for his home from a local store, with their permission.
Her son had left town for a while and she didn’t even know he was back until she saw him a few years ago at the homeless camp that grew up around St. Vincent de Paul.
When that was closed down, he moved to the homeless encampment at the end of West Second Street. She wondered who owned the land, and whether it was ok for him to be there. He made it sound like it was permissible.
She only learned the camp was gone when a woman posted on a community Facebook page asking for a place to move her trailer to.
“My heart just stopped,” she recounted.
Since the camp was taken down, her son and his girlfriend are “on the street and it’s been really hectic.”
She misses the detailed city police reports that used to be published. She could learn when her son had police contact, or if something had happened in the homeless camp.
He messaged her on Facebook in early January, their only way of communicating. He was by McDonald’s, he said, “cold and hungry and tired and trying not to get arrested for being on the sidewalk.”
Seeing him and his girlfriend cold and drenched, “That’s why I instantly feel so angry. Where’s the help? Where’s the resources? But on the flip side, you’ve got to take care of yourself too. You’ve got to help yourself.”
Her son and his girlfriend got money from recycling cans, and picking up dropped change at fast food drive-throughs.
Because they had stayed at the encampment a long time without being told to leave, “I feel they gained a false sense of security.”
She understands how Facebook commenters “get flared out” about the homeless camp, “I get it too, but at least when they were out there they were out of the way, but now they’re everywhere.”
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