The Resident
News
City agrees to remove more litter at riverbanks
By Stephen Baxter
San Jose officials have agreed to take on more responsibility for cleaning up trash and debris from homeless encampments on the edges of the Guadalupe River and other rivers that run through the city.
The city council agreed on Feb. 12 to continue working with the Santa Clara Valley Water District to pick up garbage around the Guadalupe and Coyote rivers, including debris under highway bridges downtown and in the Willow Glen and Almaden Valley areas. The water district is working on other river projects, and San Jose officials said they would collect about 100 tons more garbage generated from homeless encampments in the next year.
"We're reworking the roles and responsibilities, but we're both putting more toward this," said Melody Tovar, San Jose's deputy director of environmental services.
Water district representatives said in February that they encountered 12 homeless encampments near Coleman Avenue and W. Taylor Street on the east bank of the Guadalupe River. From May 2006 to May 2007, water district and city crews collected about 268,000 pounds of trash along rivers in the city, said Susan Siravo, spokeswoman for Santa Clara Valley Water District.
In its new agreement, city officials will coordinate weekly and monthly cleanups with the San Jose Conservation Corps, Santa Clara County Department of Corrections, San Jose police and the city's Housing, Transportation and Environmental Services departments.
On Feb. 9, city workers removed more than 13 tons of garbage from near Brokaw Road at Ridder Park Drive and from Capitol Expressway at Tuers Road. Much of the trash was generated from homeless encampments, according to the San Jose city manager's office.
In the ongoing trash-removal program, city workers picked up trash from abandoned homeless camps, but dismantling active camps has been trickier. In fall 2007, police and aid workers helped homeless people find shelters and services.
Notices of river cleanups are typically posted 72 hours in advance, and police usually offer social services to the homeless and ask them to leave.
Rafael Gonzales, a specialist with the San Jose Conservation Corps, said crews from the corps are called in after police have swept the area.
Gonzales said corps crews have found less trash in the last few years, but the bulk of the garbage is found under highway bridges such as the Highway 87 downtown and around Bird Avenue and Interstate 280 in Willow Glen.
"What we find is mostly from the homeless guys--clothes, tarps and plywood," Gonzales said.
The conservation corps has 200 people who participate in cleanups, and it has collected trash for more than 12 years.
The next trash removal effort along the city's rivers is expected in March.
