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Enterprise Services director Joyce Turner signed an order Thursday morning asking campers to “remove tents, shelters, structures and other personal effects.” Items that are left will be seized, and campers will have 15 days to pick them up, the order states. It wasn't clear early this morning when the items will be seized.
The move came more than a month after campers were asked Nov. 11 to leave voluntarily.
Public-safety and sanitary concerns are driving the state to act now, General Administration spokesman Steve Valandra said. He cited more incidents of drug use, confrontations and police responses. People have been urinating and defecating on the park, and there are “needles strewn about,” Valandra said.
“What originally started out as a free-speech activity has turned into something else,” he said.
It is a coincidence that campers were asked to leave after the special legislative session ended, he said.
He couldn’t say exactly what will happen, or when, if the campers don’t leave by the deadline. But he added later that “there’ll be some leeway” to the 12:01 deadline, and a staffer indicated there might be nothing left to remove.
“People are packing stuff up and moving on,” he said.
Demonstrators said in a statement that they planned to meet two hours before the deadline “for camp defense and witness.”
“Occupy Olympia did not create the problems faced at camp,” it said. “These are the same problems faced in communities around the country.”
About 60 tents remained at the camp Thursday afternoon, but that number dwindled as the day wore on. Camper Jc Romero vowed to stay.
“They can come arrest me,” said Romero, 36, who is homeless. He said that if he’s arrested, he’ll come right back to Heritage Park once he gets out of jail.
“You can’t be afraid to be arrested for what you believe in,” he said.
Romero said “it seems to be kind of split” as to who’s staying and who’s going.
Gov. Chris Gregoire vowed “to clear the park out” in a news conference Thursday afternoon.
“It’s time,” she said. “… I can’t sit where I live and look out and worry about whether those people (at Heritage Park) are going to freeze to death down there, to be perfectly blunt with you.”
Gregoire said she wanted people to feel comfortable walking along Capitol Lake and let businesses know people can visit them without concern.
Occupy Olympia participant Kyle Tanner said people were cleaning up the camp Thursday afternoon. Some were packing up their belongings – in some cases, everything they have – so it wouldn’t be seized.
Danny Kadden, executive director of Interfaith Works, helped conduct a census of residents about two weeks ago and estimated that 60 to 65 campers didn’t have a home.
Kadden’s organization includes more than a dozen faith communities that who help provide emergency shelter for homeless people, and it runs a new intake center aimed at housing people. He was scrambling to come up with a plan to find homes and social services for the campers.
The “main concern of the faith communities is the safety and health and social-service needs of the large number of homeless folks who are living there right now,” he said.
Valandra said that, last he heard, about 20 people were staying in the camp overnight.
“There are more tents than there are people,” he said.
Kadden said he was frustrated about the state’s deadline because it doesn’t provide enough time for homeless people to find another place to go.
“We need time to create a dialogue,” he said.
One possibility discussed would be to create a temporary homeless encampment elsewhere.
“The state is trying to pawn this situation off on the faith communities,” said Robert Whitlock, another Occupy Olympia participant, who said he’s not sure if he’s going to move. “A forcible eviction will look really bad.”
Occupy Olympia began Oct. 15 in Sylvester Park, but most campers agreed a day later to move to Heritage Park because it has restrooms and the grass is hardier. The camp is in solidarity with the original Occupy Wall Street movement in New York, which began in September and since has sparked similar protests worldwide. The movement highlights the growing income disparity between the richest 1 percent and the other 99 percent.
Bruce Wilkinson, another Occupy participant, pointed out the camp has offered a number of services – including three meals a day.
“It’s outrageous,” he said of the request to leave.
Dean Hobbs, who was arrested after attempting to camp on the Capitol hill in November, said the protest movement will continue even if it has to move.
Tanner said the group will continue to hold general assemblies in the Rotunda of the state Legislative Building at 1 p.m. every Sunday.
“You can’t evict an idea,” Tanner said.
Staff writer Brad Shannon contributed to this report.
Matt Batcheldor: 360-704-6869
mbatcheldor@theolympian.com
