Updated Aug. 2
Last Thursday, Sharon Brown, director of homeless services for Harbor Homes, received a call from a member of the Island’s unhoused community that their tent was gone from an undisclosed wooded area.
One tent might’ve been able to be explained away by numerous reasons. But by Monday, Brown had received many calls that two large encampments of about 20 people were removed from the Manuel F. Correllus State Forest, Meghan Burke, director of community engagement for Harbor Homes, said.
Local officials and the non-profit say that the removal was contracted by the state Department of Conservation and Recreation, or DCR, which monitors the State Forest.
Items like medications, identification cards, clothing, and other personal belongings, were all removed when the unhoused individuals were not there, according to Burke.
“The loss of personal items is so heartbreaking,” Burke, who said this is detrimental to both their physical and mental wellbeing, told The Times. “Anything and everything they ever had with them is now gone.”
Staff from Harbor Homes, a local nonprofit that runs the winter shelter and provides solutions to homelessness on the Island, reached out to local and state police, who were both unaware of any clearings nor had any of the belongings in their possession, Burke said.
They’ve learned that “trucks with dumpsters were brought to the Island, items were collected, and brought back off-Island,” Burke said.
While Harbor Homes has maintained that individuals sheltered in the State Forest were not warned beforehand, state officials say that they provided warning.
Over the past month, the state said that staff has made direct in-person to notify them of the scheduled clean up and asked that they remove their belongings ahead of the clearing.
Additionally, DCR posted signs in advance of the scheduled clean up, notifying the individuals that any items that remained at the site at the time of the scheduled clean up would be disposed of.
A statement from the department said that no more than three individuals were in the encampments as of a week ago and that a maximum of approximately five individuals were there in June.
They also said that site clearing has been conducted annually for the past four years.
“In coordination with state and local law enforcement, DCR routinely clears encampments in state parks to protect the environment, the safety of the public and to maintain our public lands. These actions help reduce risks from uncontrolled fires and hazardous conditions; prevent damage and contamination to natural habitats; address unsanitary conditions; and are part of our ongoing work to maintain our public assets and ensure they are safe spaces for all,” a statement reads. “DCR continues to work closely with our municipal and public safety partners as well as local agencies and organizations that assist and provide resources to individuals affected by these clearings.”
The Times previously visited some of these encampments in June and returning on Thursday saw that, in fact, all traces of the Island’s unhoused were removed. Items including clothes that hung on branches to dry, cans of cooking oil that surrounded one tent to drown ants as well as the only shelter that some people had were all gone.
DCR had previously told The Times that they are aware of and regularly monitor the State Forest encampments and that they do cleanups by a hazmat team to “remove accumulated hazardous materials including propane tanks, lithium batteries, needles, and sharps, among other items.”
The state department also said in a statement to The Times on June 26 that they work with partner agencies and municipalities to “find solutions that ensure the safety of all.”
Harbor Homes wasn’t warned, and action was taken without local police collaboration.
Local police say that they’d also planned to do a clean-up of homeless encampments on town properties that would focus on the removal of hazardous and dangerous materials that could attract rodents or pose a hazard to anyone in that area. They plan to provide notice to individuals unsheltered on the properties and have contacted local social service entities. Once cleaned up, they would allow the unhoused to go back. They haven’t set a date yet for this clean-up.
There’s been swift criticism of the state’s response from Island officials.
“It’s disappointing that local authorities, local offices, local anyone [weren’t] contacted to see if there was some way to save their items,” Arielle Faria, Island housing advocate and state representative candidate, told The Times. “To save them having to go through the heartache of losing everything they have when they have very little to start with.”
Faria said the Island is a tight-knit community, and that these people are community members, they’re just unhoused. “You don’t do this,” she said.
They already try to stay out of harm’s way, out of public spaces, and the State Forest seems like a viable option, even if it’s not the right one, she said.
The clear-out comes weeks after the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that cities can ban people from sleeping and camping in public places on June 28. In probably the largest reaction to the ruling, news reports say that the California Gov. Gavin Newsom issued an executive order that told state officials to remove homeless encampments.
Dr. Brian Morris, a mental health specialist and substance use disorder access coordinator at Island Health Care, said that what’s happened in California has now happened here.
All stakeholders wonder what is the plan for those displaced by this week’s removals. Harbor Homes is actively working to ensure that people have a safe place to go. To Burke’s knowledge, all shelters on Cape Cod, and even state-wide, she said, are full.
The non-profit staff is currently meeting with the unhoused community members to take account of what was lost and figure out a way to help them. They do not currently know where they’re staying, Burke said.
“This is not a problem going away anytime soon,” Morris said, who also runs a group that makes a concerted effort to solve Island issues like homelessness called HUB MV. HUB MV was also not warned.
This is heartbreaking and reprehensible. I am curious who sent DCR down here given that they are a state agency. There were a lot of state politicians down here not too long ago claiming to be concerned about the current housing crisis. Those in the Forrest that were displaced are some of the first casualties of that housing crisis
They were living on property which didn’t belong to them. Without proper sanitation – don’t get me started on that. ( you live next door to a small 3 brm home which has 20 no related adults living in it, with a 3 brm septic system – and then we can talk). That is the bottom line. If they could not afford housing there, then why didn’t they move elsewhere where there was housing and jobs? This is what so many Americans did over the years if they could not afford to live near family or friends.
You are extremely judgmental. You don’t know what happened to cause their homeless status…Pray it doesn’t happen to you.
This is so shameful and cruel to do to these people…..WE NEED TO DO BETTER!!
WOW. It is certainly reasonable not to allow camping in our state forest, but the nastiness of punishing a person with no place to live by stealing and destroying their personal belongings is wholly unnecessary, and shameful.
We can still have a human heart even when applying rules – compassion & understanding are completely lacking here. People who have homes are not “better people” who deserve respect, whereas those who don’t somehow deserve to be treated like prisoners under military rule.
yikes. Let’s all be a bit kinder.
This is so sad. What I don’t understand is why the homeless shelters here are seasonal? How can we help the people who have lost everything in this removal of shelter in the state forest?
Good work by the DCR to protect the lives and properties of thousands of Islanders! Thank you!
Like everywhere, MV has a population of homeless islanders. They are “islanders” they are your neighbors, your friends, your relatives, etc. the only difference is that that are not as strong as you. Their safety is more at risk than yours. It’s common to be threatened by those weaker than you, so let’s help them be stronger.
John– how is this protecting the lives and property of
thousands of islanders ?
Try to explain it without sounding too racist.
How on earth do you equate protecting islanders from unregulated cooking fires to somehow being racist? Your ignorance is beyond the pale. I was referring to actual fires which the DCR is protecting us against. Here’s just a little bit of history on such fires. Fire doesn’t care what race you are. Apparently you do.
https://www.mvtimes.com/2020/02/05/fire-on-the-island/
This is a disgusting development! Where are these unfortunate people to go from here? How about a little compassion you state bureaucratic dips!
Where is the outrage?
This seems so disrespectful, not only to the persons who were not allowed to retrieve their personal property before the sites were cleared, but also to our local law enforcement, and the many people doing such good work to support our homeless population. Kindness and understanding go a long way in this world, and this action demonstrates neither.
Horrific on the part of the State to carry out this travesty. Stealing is bad enough but robbing people of everything they have, even medication and identification is unconscionable. Shame on those who carried it out and authorized it.
Whoever in state government ordered this awful, heavy-handed, cruel, action without any notice/warning to anyone affected needs to be fired immediately. Governor Healy should see to it. This is inexcusable. We have to be better than this especially on Martha’s Vineyard.
I’ve been given to understand that State DCR had provided warnings in advance of the imminent removal of the encampments in the state forest to the occupants, as they have in the past. The Times editor did not do the proper legwork before publishing the story as it was outlined. However, confiscating all the personal effects, including medications and personal identifications, from essentially helpless people, and taking them off-Island is unconscionable. Yes, DCR has the responsibility and authority to prevent camping, campfires, and cooking equipment that can easily start a wildfire, but the values they bring to that work in the face of a homeless population is crucial. The Vineyard’s amazing response to 50 hapless asylum seekers dumped here two years ago in a cruel political stunt was its finest hour. One would think we can muster the human and financial resources to confront a chronic homelessness problem that would eliminate the need for living in the State Forest, and the need for heavy-handed government intervention like DCR’s. We can do better.
To bad they were home grown USA homless if they had been illegals from over the border Govener Healy would have put them up in a hotel in Boston. Guess its not WOK to take of our own.
I completely agree that this encampment clean-up should have been handled as a compassionate and understanding encampment relocation – perhaps even to privately-owned open land or an unused barn-type building with electric, water and porta-potty service available and funded through donations to Harbor Homes.
From the campfire’s charred remains shown in the fourth photo, however, I can also understand the alarming concern about the elevated possibility of an out-of-control forest fire in the Manuel F. Correllus State Forest, especially during an extended dry period, which would be catastrophic to the island.
I heard a great quote many years ago which I always think about when helping those in need – “Remember, it is just as easy to go from being a giver to being a receiver….”
Has our Mass. Senate representative Julian Cyr made any comment, does anyone know? Has the Times asked him for comment?
You think Julian cyr is going to suit up like iron man and fix this?
Homeless people are NOT criminals – they are people who are homeless as a result of any number of reasons. Some were born and raised here, some have mental illnesses and many DO work but can’t even find a place to live never mind afford one. To treat them as nothing more than a pile of garbage to be carted away in dumpsters with NO warning (in spite of the lies reported in another paper) is inhumane and the cruelest of punishments. I volunteer for Harbor Homes and know many of these individuals. They are people, they don’t want to be homeless and the idea that they should go somewhere where there are places to stay is just plain ignorant.
Mary Ellen McElroy
My heart aches for all the people who were desperately trying to survive, one day at a time. If it is true that their few belongings, including vital medications were all taken away from them, we need to somehow help them get back what they had and need.
If they were vital why were they left unattended?
I’m sure that each of the commenters here that are upset by the DCR’s action have enough space for at least a tent or two on their properties. I encourage them to post their address so we can solve the problem promptly!
I have mixed feelings about this. They should have given some advance time. That said, having the homeless in the State Forest is not a good thing. You don’t have to be a researcher on homelessness to know it.
Common sense from Jennifer.
This is state property—I have no idea what the protocol would be toward local law enforcement but surely the state authorities get to decide what happens on that property.
“Wild” camping cannot be allowed in the State Forest, for a number of reasons.
So I believe this action was called for.
But not in the way it was carried out.
The State should have done something like assemble a small team of social workers to notify all of the campers of the law under which they could not live there, and inform them that they would have to leave by a certain date. For those who cannot find alternative housing on the Island arrangements should have been made to mve them and their belongings to a shate shelter. this team should have and that housing would be arranged for them in a state shelter. With all the taxpayers’ money being spent on housing for immigrants there must be a state shelter somewhere in Mass. for homeless who are US citizens (of course maybe some of the campers are not US citizens).
Their belongings should never have been taken from them with no notice. That is just mean.
While we all know living in the state forest isn’t safe for human habitat, there are also risks to the environment. HOWEVER, that does not mean the state/DCR should abruptly (and inhumanely) clear the area where people were residing. Article states they informed this population of 20 people but they certainly were surprised. This was not necessary and if DCR (and other politicians) communicated effectively and in a timely manner with law enforcement, shelter staff and other advocates, perhaps a considerate (humane) transitional plan could have been initiated, avoiding unnecessary disruption and stress for these folks to have to find shelter elsewhere…I’m also disappointed in the Supreme Court’s determination to clear these encampments as homeless populations increase across this country as does the cost of living…As for the extremely judgmental folks commenting on this unfortunate situation, I hope you never find yourself in such a challenging situation. Try empathy. We can and should do better….
They were given adequate notice. These people were offered help and simply did not accept. It’s a state forest not a home. Loosing anything important is awful but these items were left unattended in a public space that is subject to maintenance.
They should have allowed someone to gather the personal items and medications to be held aside.
It looks like many of the commenters on this article Do not know how to read. It clearly states that they were notified in advance that This was going to happen. Which is why there was only a few people left in the camp. All you do gooders out there open up your homes to these people, I’m happy to have seen it cleaned up.
The closer human waste gets to someone’s property, the less progressive they become. It was only a matter of time once it hit the news paper.
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