The City of Bloomington says it will clear a homeless camp behind the Wheeler Mission on the city’s west side Thursday after a notice of criminal trespass was posted there.
Police posted the notice Jan. 19, according to Angela Van Rooy, the city’s communications director.
The order says people staying at the camp have 72 hours to comply or they will be arrested and have their property seized. But the camp was still there Wednesday, five days after the fact.
Tents and cardboard structures lined both sides of a gravel road cutting through the camp. Only a few people were visible.
Van Rooy said the city planned to clear the camp earlier but waited due to recent weather patterns.
The trespass order follows two recent homicides at the camp: one in which a man was attacked with a machete, and another in which a man was shot to death.
Van Rooy cited both instances, writing in an email, “the encampment behind Wheeler Mission has posed significant safety concerns for some time.”
She also said city staff and community partners have been in conversations for months with people staying at the camp.
This move comes after the officials vacated a different homeless camp on the city’s southwest the first week of January.
In that case, people at the camp were given 48 hours to comply with the notice. Mayor Kerry Thomson joined city staff and social workers as people’s belongings were removed.
Thomson was not available for an interview with WFIU/WTIU News.
