Crews unloaded barricades early Tuesday, as the monthslong saga involving the encampments on Bend’s Hunnell, Clausen and Loco roads — and the people living there — appeared to be coming to an end.
City leaders plan to clear the roads starting Tuesday, a process that could last up to six days and includes removing tents, garbage and some of the many vehicles that people use as homes in the area.
Workers from the city of Bend place barriers in front of Hunnell Road, where crews will begin removing the city's largest homeless encampment.
Joni Land / OPB
The work comes a day after a judge denied a lawsuit by the residents, removing the last barrier for the sweeps to begin. The suit was a last-ditch effort for the more than 60 residents of these encampments, who have lobbied the city for months to suspend or cancel plans to clear the road.
Three residents brought the lawsuit last week, accusing the city of failing to follow their procedure when removing the camps. They also said the camp removal would cause the people living there “irreparable harm.”
Deschutes County Circuit Court Judge Wells Ashby denied their claim entirely, explaining that the city had a right and an obligation to maintain its streets. He also said he wasn’t sure extending the date of the closures would help.
“I don’t think there would be a good date and time,” Ashby said.
Not everyone will have to leave right away. The city granted seven-day extensions to 24 residents, City Attorney Mary Winters said, nearly all of whom have disabilities and requested more time to move.
One of them is 62-year-old Cheryl “Shadow” Voneps, who has multiple sclerosis and needs a cane to walk. She’s lived on Hunnell Road for six years.
A day before crews closed down the road, she told OPB she still does not know where she will go.
“This whole thing is making me mad,” Voneps said. “What have I ever done to anybody?”
Cheryl "Shadow" Voneps sits in her RV on Hunnell Road in Bend, where she's lived for six years. In several days, she will have to find a new place, after the city of Bend closed the road.
Joni Land / OPB
On Monday, residents could be seen packing up their belongings and readying their vehicles to leave. Stacy Ray once lived on Hunnell Road and could be seen helping repair the many RVs that line the street.
Ray is a mechanic and said many of the RVs needed extensive repairs before they would be able to leave. She now lives in a shelter program run by St. Vincent de Paul of Bend, but said she wanted to help her former neighbors.
“I’ve just been going around helping everybody to get them situated, because nobody’s helping them,” she said.
Tensions have grown in the lead up to the sweep. One of the plaintiffs, Nicholas Schindler, received a cease and desist order from the Bend city attorney’s office on July 13 after he posted pictures and livestreamed online outside Mayor Melanie Kebler’s home at night.
The city attorney’s office said his actions made Kebler “fear for her personal safety and that of her family.”
The city originally decided to close the camps along Hunnell Road last December, after Bend Police Chief Mike Krantz issued a memo detailing unsafe conditions and high levels of crime in the area. Residents of the camps have said Krantz’s figures are outdated and that they’ve worked to improve conditions.
