Written by Nina Riggio
Pee bottles, bags of needles, palettes, blankets of all colors, bottles of homemade weed stem tea, peoples’ lives spread out on the asphalt like a junkyard. On Tuesday, Oct. 11, the City of Colorado Springs sent Springs Rescue Mission (SRM) a notice to evacuate so-called “Tent City” by 3 p.m. the following day, based on various code violations.
Tent City has been in existence for a couple months now and has been a transitionary system for cities like Portland and Seattle to eventually lead to a tiny house movement for the houseless, which is the preferred term. Tent City popped up in the SRM parking lot because the current shelter is under renovation until mid-November. The new facility will cost over $13.8 million.
Happy Pappy, one of the community members, said, “They just started knocking on our tents at 4 a.m. this morning telling us to get out. I’m a 75-year-old veteran, I can’t deal with this shit no mo’. I suppose I’ll just head back to my old bridge.” Pappy spent many hours cleaning up his tent spot knowing that “they just gonna run you outta the next spot you occupy.”
The HOT team, or the Colorado Springs Homeless Outreach team, will be arresting anyone that is occupying flood plains by the rivers and creeks and imprisoning them for over 10 days.
Ed, a man who has experienced houselessness since he was 13 years old, said, “at least that’s a place to sleep, you know? I call the suicide hotline once a week just so I gotta warm place to lay my head.” Ed has lived off Little Debbie Cakes his whole life and has been off his schizophrenia and bipolar medication for over a week because someone stole his Medicaid card. “I tried to OD on meth last week…but ain’t nobody tell me you can’t OD on meth.”
The community of Tent City was a family. There were street fathers, mothers, sisters, and brothers. Raven, the community voice, said, “We all looked out for one another. The only problems came from outside forces, outside people. That’s when and where all the drugs started coming from.” Raven has participated in tent cities in the past and has seen this model work in favor for the houseless community.
Raven said, “I feel like I’ve failed… but I gave it my best. Not many homeless people can say they walk into city hall and the council members recognize them and fear them. I’m proud that I can say that.” Raven expressed the needs and concerns on behalf of the Tent City members to the Colorado Springs city council on Tuesday.
“I may have failed this community, but I bought us a week, and I’m proud of that,” said Raven. The day consisted of people scrounging for canned products, making carts out of palettes and stolen bike parts, loading up grocery carts and trying to get as far as they could.
Old veterans dealing with agent orange, multiple sclerosis, degenerative bone diseases, and even lugging oxygen tanks grabbed as many clothes, blankets, and tents as they could, and they ‘hit the trail,’ as they called it.
Members of Tent City pray for the mission to open before it gets too cold, and in the meantime, people walk in all directions, even into the woods, to try and hide from the HOT team. Despite there being 182 new shelter beds, there are over 700 more houseless people in the greater Colorado Springs area.
In an official statement, the city announced that there are over “306 high-barrier shelter beds” ready, which require sober living and more, but a high percentage of the street people cannot access these. The 306 beds are almost always full, and it is only autumn. There are zero emergency high-barrier shelter beds in our city, as of today. People will die again this winter if nothing is done.