Camden's Tent City gets a reprieve

The deadline to close Camden's Tent City homeless encampment and move residents to permanent housing came and went Thursday without any governmental action to clear the property.

Instead, assorted volunteers, a county official and a dozen representatives from the Camden Homeless Outreach Team met with residents of Tent City in the hopes of finding them housing. The Homeless Outreach Team workers, who represent a variety of non-profit agencies, helped residents fill out assessment forms to link them with housing and other services.

On Wednesday, nearly 50 public officials, leaders of nonprofits, community volunteers, and homeless advocates met in the basement of a Collingswood church for 90 minutes. Two realities emerged:

Nobody wants to be responsible for forcibly removing about 35 homeless people, including some with mental-health problems and drug addictions, while news cameras roll.

Despite months of meetings by the so-called Tent City Task Force, there is still no coordinated plan or timetable to depopulate the little village next to the I-676 exit ramp and place everyone in housing.

That all seems to mean - although no one would say for sure - that Tent City could live to see many more days.

"Whether Tent City is there tomorrow or the next day is not at my level, not at my pay grade," said Charles Steinmetz, leader of the Tent City Task Force, which had set today's evacuation deadline.

Steinmetz, the chief operating officer of a Pennsauken nonprofit called Community Planning and Advocacy Council, said he was instead looking long-term, helping to coordinate the gradual placement of people in housing.

But he said he alone could not solve the problem. And every other entity involved basically said the same thing. Another task-force meeting was set for two weeks.

"There's no specific policy or strategy that's been determined by the state as to what to do," said Jennifer Fradel, an attorney for the state Department of Transportation, which owns much of the land. "But continued occupation of that area can't continue."

Still, Fradel, who works in the Attorney General's Office, indicated afterward that the state would not remove anyone by force just yet. Such force would be complicated by the fact that Gov. Christie visited Tent City while campaigning to demonstrate his support for impoverished communities.

"I'll be back," he said at the time.

The DOT is not a social-service agency and, therefore, cannot provide homes for these people, Fradel said.

But the man who handles such social services for Camden County, Gino Lewis, said that "our efforts are being refused" by Tent City residents.

In response, an attorney from South Jersey Legal Services, Lee Ginsburg, who represents 20 people at Tent City, said the county had rejected his clients' applications for rental assistance. He said the residents had been asked if they really were from Camden County, which Ginsburg said was irrelevant.

"Frankly, we were getting some real push-back about whether they would get social services in Camden County," he said.

Ginsburg then turned to an aide to Camden Mayor Dana L. Redd and asked if the city, which owns a piece of the Tent City land, had any money available for housing. The aide said he did not know.

Redd did not return a request for comment.

The task force's Tent City representatives did not escape blame, either.

Lewis argued that Lorenzo "Jamaica" Banks, the "mayor" of Tent City, had come up with the April 15 deadline but violated the agreement by allowing more people to move into Tent City. He also said Tent City residents had burned notices about the closure and available services.

"This process only works as good as the people there allow it to work," Lewis said. "It wasn't the county's goal to force anyone out. Our goal was to transfer people out to affordable housing."

James Boggs, the spokesman and top aide to the Tent City mayor, rejected the idea that the settlement's leadership was responsible.

"What are you going to do when someone comes to you and says, 'I need a place to stay?' " Boggs asked.

The downtown Tent City, which has been around since at least 2007, is the most prominent of at least four homeless encampments in one of America's poorest cities. One woman at Wednesday's meeting at Collingswood Presbyterian Church suggested that the residents be moved to some of the other, less noticeable tent cities.

Indeed, the notoriety, including international media attention, has been cited as a primary reason to close Tent City. It is down the road from the city's business, college, and hospital district.

Tent City is also considered unsanitary, county officials say, as the residents dispose of their urine and feces on the property. They also say several are hard-core drug addicts.

Police had not called Tent City a safety issue until last week, when the department released a police report in which a woman said at least one man had raped her after her return from a trip to buy crack and heroin.

Yet Tent City, also known as Transitional Park, is unquestionably a community, with people who share food, tents, and companionship. Outsiders drop off meals and other provisions daily.

Some residents say they're there because they don't like living inside; others say they haven't been able to find another place to stay.

No one at Wednesday's meeting could say for exactly how many people the Tent City Task Force members had been able to find housing since the process began last year.

For now, assessments - in which the homeless are questioned and linked with social services - will continue twice a week in the hope of steadily reducing the population.

The deadline "is tomorrow. Now what are you going to do tomorrow?" Boggs asked the assembled group.

"As the lady says from the Attorney General's Office, 'I don't know.' That seems to be a major statement: 'I don't know.' "