Photo by PHILIP B. POSTON/Sentinel Colorado
AURORA | Aurora’s City Council finalized a new policy on Monday for storing some of the belongings of those displaced by homeless encampment sweeps.
The policy promises that people working on behalf of the city to abate encampments will “recover personal documents and identifications observed in the trash and debris and turn this property over to the Aurora Day Resource Center.”
“City staff and City agents will not sort through the trash and debris to look for personal documents or identifications,” the policy reads.
A spokesperson did not immediately respond Monday night regarding when the city would begin enforcing the ban.
Council members finalized a ban on unauthorized camping earlier this year, which included an amendment initially proposed by Councilmember Crystal Murillo that directed the city manager’s office to come up with a policy for storing leftover personal property.
On Monday, Murillo said she believed more work was needed to treat homeless campers humanely in light of the new camping ban, but that she was comfortable voting on the policy as it was.
“This is not the most comprehensive way to address storage, but given the conversation at the last meeting, I think that a policy is better than no policy,” she said.
Council members voted unanimously to introduce the policy. Items will be stored for up to a year at the Aurora Day Resource Center, which the city is also considering turning into a 24/7 shelter.
On May 2, Assistant City Attorney Tim Joyce told the group that the policy was the last thing standing in the way of stepping up enforcement to align with the goals of the camping ban, though the city is still in the process of creating more shelter space. Based on local and federal estimates, there may be hundreds more homeless people than shelter beds.
City spokesman Michael Brannen later said that the ban “will be enforced when (the) city manager signs new policy documents, and we anticipate that happening as soon as possible.”
I applauded the clean up of Aurora of banning outdoor tent living. I hope Denver will follow in Auroras foot steps. I recently went to Portland Oregon and what was once a beautiful downtown area is now blocks among blocks of tents and graffiti filled buildings. Trash on the streets and dirty sidewalks and deserted buildings. Please do not let Denver become a scene like I saw in Portland. Thank you Aurora for cleaning up and making an impact on the beauty of the city.
https://www.foxla.com/news/san-fernando-valley-residents-feel-under-siege-as-rvs-park-in-their-neighborhood-at-night
https://www.foxla.com/news/la-will-resume-ticketing-towing-vehicle-dwellings-in-may
A couple of council members are doing all they can to turn Aurora into a total trashed city like Denver has become. In LA, it is not unlike the Portland streets and sidewalks. But the LA residents have a say in what they want, and they’ve had enough, they’re fighting back. Bringing the city council that continues to sabotage the cleanup efforts accountable is what they are after.
It’s no different here, we just haven’t had enough….
There will be no clean-up. Just moving people to other locations.
So ashamed of Aurora, not asking for or heeding the experts on how bad this criminalizing of homelessness will be with real information and data, and how badly it has impacted homeless in Denver, how much it sets back the people experiencing homelessness, how traumatizing it is, how poorly their possessions are handled and how lack of transportation makes it impossible for them to retrieve their few precious belongings, and how unprepared Aurora is to help them in any way after putting them in worse unsafe scary position. This is the essence of Coffman and new GOP majority on Council, and trying to blame our problems and issues on the most vulnerable population in our community which has no voice.
Your identity politics are tired, worn out, overused and accomplish nothing
As are yours. See how this works?
When the conservative denizens think they have a novel idea and get their minds made up, they don’t relent.
How many homeless are you housing? None. Got you. Sit down with your wokeness. If you’re housing anyone you got no skin in the game. We are tired of seeing the trash the stolen items. Etc. There’s like one encampment that has 100+ bicycles piled up. You think they got it all legally yea right.
https://denver.granicus.com/player/clip/14836?view_id=180&redirect=true
For some reason you keep insisting that more experts be involved and then we will all see the light. Debra, perhaps you would like to view the 30 plus minutes of Denver’s city council Monday night it’s 30 minutes of the homeless and their testimony. They- many, talk of Denver’s “Homeless Industrial Complex” run by your experts. This is the newest public funded scam out there,according to the speakers. Some of them seem to know how much of the cities budget is spent on the problem. It’s never going to be enough, is the simple answer. And having government involved there is no true incentive to fix it.You ever watch a Aurora city council meeting? Always some handout of some fashion for some new non-profit breaking into the biz. Hire more experts from us…. And lets not forget, Aurora is seeing more invasion on Colo State right of way and Cherry Creek state Park, its a sanctioned take-over. The Mayor, recently made a big deal and said he and the Governor had created some hot-off-the-table agreement with the state to handle the overflow on to ROW. Great, time now for state vetted experts to handle folks on state property.
The only thing that’s going to change is that the taxpayers will incur increased costs.
All these homeless folks circumventing the ban by getting on cdot property aka under the bridge on the on ramps etc.
If Aurora can’t enforce things. They need to get troopers to manage calls for service on these highways.
Good idea, perhaps that will be part of the new Aurora/ Colo DOT agreement that was made last week that we have been told about.
Aurora needs to bring back the panhandling ban…when they can’t get money by begging on corners, they will find somewhere else to go!