OAKLAND — The waterfront view was sufficient by itself for Duvoy Melbourne to arrange his tent at Peralta Park, the place a breezy Wednesday afternoon saved him and different homeless residents there cool below the timber hanging overhead.
Beginning subsequent Tuesday, metropolis officers stated, efforts to “replant trees and other plants” on the park will make them clear the encampment there, together with all the opposite tents round Lake Merritt’s 3.4-mile perimeter.
Metropolis staff have posted notices of the clearings to quite a few phone poles alongside the lake’s footpaths.
“I suppose I have to figure out another safe space to go live,” Melbourne, who arrange his tent three weeks in the past on the park, stated in an interview. The native of Jamaica moved to Oakland 10 years in the past, and as soon as attended Laney Faculty, a brief stroll from the park the place he now lives.
The big encampment-clearing is funded by the town’s Measure DD, a bond initiative accepted by voters in 2002 to enhance parks, shield wildlife habitat and shield water high quality within the metropolis’s quite a few watersheds.
Officers estimate the park is house to between 15 and 20 full-time residents, specifically on the grassy patch simply above the the channel that flows from Lake Merritt to the Oakland Estuary.
Encampments are a staple of the lake, only one flashpoint of the town’s entrenched struggles to sustainably tackle a homeless inhabitants estimated to whole practically 5,500 folks.
The upcoming tent clearings, which had been first reported by The Oaklandside, observe a revelation earlier this week that metropolis officers plan to shutter two native homeless shelters, doubtless displacing dozens of residents staying there.
The nonprofit working the shelters cited missed funds by the town that might lead the closures to happen as early as subsequent week.
A discover for homeless to vacate is posted alongside Lakeshore Avenue close to Lake Merritt in Oakland, Calif., on Wednesday, March 26, 2025. (Jane Tyska/Bay Space Information Group)
Metropolis officers, who stated Peralta Park will likely be surrounded by fencing to guard the newly planted timber, plan to supply residents sheltering alternatives at St. Vincent de Paul at San Pablo and Grand avenues, together with “community cabin” packages and different providers.
However homeless advocates stated St. Vincent de Paul presents solely nighttime stays and doesn’t permit residents to deliver lots of their belongings inside with them. Church leaders didn’t instantly reply to an interview request.
“Shelters do not offer a realistic, long-term answer,” Melbourne stated. “It’s better than nothing in some sense. But there are people getting into all kinds of conflicts down there. I like to live as drama-free as possible.”
One other resident of the Peralta Park encampment web site, who requested to be recognized solely as George, stated he can’t beat his drug dependancy quick sufficient to final in 90-day rehabilitation packages, not to mention a longer-term shelter.
“Getting to live in those places for a year would be phenomenal,” George stated. “I can’t really expect to get my life together in three months before I need to start paying rent.”
Cement blocks and planter pots put in by metropolis officers in prime tent areas have made them unlivable for homeless residents, corresponding to Wooden Avenue, which previously was house to Northern California’s largest encampment web site.
Practically six many years in the past, Peralta Park was house to a group amusement park with circus-like sights, however on Wednesday there have been few strollers round and solely a smattering of tents on the footpath above the channel.
“It’s peaceful here,” Melbourne stated. “Not a lot of traffic, as it relates to people.”
