City of Bellingham informs Camp 210 residents of Friday deadline for cleanup
The city of Bellingham has informed residents and advocates at the downtown tent encampment outside City Hall and the public library that they have until 4 p.m. Friday, Jan. 29, to remove their belongings.
The city announced in a Facebook post Tuesday morning, Jan. 26, that it has delivered legal notice of the deadline.
“This follows our intentions, stated repeatedly during the past month, that this illegal encampment must end in January,” the city’s statement read. “Please help us encourage campers to find shelter elsewhere. Space is available at the Base Camp shelter and at its overflow facility.”
In an online City Council meeting Monday, Jan. 25, Fleetwood condemned the “awful” and “deplorable” conditions at the protest site, which is called Camp 210, at City Hall, 210 Lottie St.
Fleetwood also decried the “heinous crimes” reported last weekend at the protest site, including a hatchet attack that seriously injured a man, and the demonstrators who breached City Hall, forcing employees to leave.
“There were increasingly dangerous conditions that were escalating,” Fleetwood said. “There were those who were well-intentioned and there were those who were clearly intent on provocation.”
Fox News reported that Fleetwood compared the incident to the Jan. 6 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol, and Fleetwood said Monday that “one could draw parallels, but (it was) nothing so dramatic.”
He said CNN and other major news organizations tried to reach him, but “I didn’t want to pour any more gas on that fire.”
Meanwhile, several speakers ridiculed Fleetwood during the public comment section of the meeting.
“The fact that some people care more about graffiti on buildings than they care about people is beyond me,” said Bodi Hallett.
But others said they were appalled that city officials have allowed the encampment, which began in November, to last for several weeks.
“We’ve succumbed to radical leftism,” Wesley Swanson said.
Others described nightly harassment from people driving past the encampment late at night and honking their horns in an apparent attempt to wake the campers.
A few speakers were silenced when they used vulgarities.
The encampment is a group of homeless campers and advocates living in tents on the lawns of City Hall and the public library (210 Central Ave.).
The city provided notice on Jan. 19 that people camping within 25 feet of City Hall would have to remove their belongings by Friday morning. In response, multiple people showed up to protest and protect the encampment. Protesters created a human barrier and later broke into City Hall, prompting city workers to leave, on Friday, Jan. 22, in order to stop city officials from attempting to clean up the encampment that day.
Later Friday, a confrontation between two groups of people at the encampment left two people injured in a hatchet attack, according to Bellingham police. There were no updates on the attack as of Monday morning, Lt. Claudia Murphy told The Bellingham Herald in an email.
City Hall will be closed this week and the library has suspended its curbside pickup service. The closure is for the health and safety for all, including the residents at Camp 210, the public, city staff and others doing essential work, Fleetwood said in an online meeting Monday, Jan. 25.
Fleetwood said he condemned the vandalism and assaults by protesters on Friday.
“There were a variety of serious things that happened, including some really horrible, deplorable crimes that evening. I just want to condemn all of that in the strongest terms,” Fleetwood said in the online meeting.
Tuesday’s statement by the city said all belongings must be removed, not just those within 25 feet of buildings.
The cleanup notice posted Tuesday called the camp “unlawful and prohibited under the Bellingham Municipal Code and is an immediate risk to the health and safety of the public.”
As part of the cleanup, the city’s notice said that remaining litter, garbage, refuse and waste will be collected and disposed of. Personal property that poses a health or safety risk also will be discarded, according to the notice, though all other property left behind will be collected by the city and stored at no cost to the residents for 60 days.
Tuesday’s Facebook statement said it supports the operation of Base Camp, a homeless shelter on Cornwall Avenue operated by Lighthouse Mission Ministries, and an overflow shelter at the former Drop-In Center on West Holly Street. It also supports the tiny home villages operated by HomesNow and that it is in the process of developing additional tiny home facilities with a “qualified operator.”
“We will continue to develop other options for low-barrier facilities to provide safe shelter for those in need, along with Whatcom County and the other partner organizations,” the city’s statement read.
Additionally, the city urged those who have been delivering donations outside City Hall to redirect their efforts, asking them to consider donating to local organizations the city has partnered with and other non-profit local housing and human services, including
▪ Lighthouse Mission Ministry’s Base Camp, thelighthousemission.org/.
▪ HomesNow, homesnow.org/.
▪ Road2Home, road2home.org/.
▪ Opportunity Council, oppco.org/.
▪ Lydia Place, lydiaplace.org/.
▪ Northwest Youth Services, nwys.org/.
▪ Sun Community Services, suncommunityservice.org/contact-us.html.
▪ Catholic Community Services.
▪ YWCA, ccsww.org/get-help/whatcom-county/.
▪ Interfaith Coalition, interfaith-coalition.org/.
▪ Mercy Housing Northwest, mercyhousing.org/northwest/.
▪ Sean Humphrey House, seanhumphreyhouse.org/.
Housing for All
The Herald has reached out to the organizers of BOP (Bellingham Occupied Protest) Mutual Aid Facebook page for comment about the city’s announcement on Tuesday.
In a statement Monday posted to their Facebook and Instagram pages, BOP Mutual Aid (Bellingham Occupied Protest), said Camp 210 is a group of community members who are housed and unhoused that are organizing to support homeless people who seek resources and encampment at City Hall and the library.
People gathered Friday to surround the perimeter of Camp 210 to stop city officials from entering the space and moving campers or their belongings after the city notified the encampment to remove belongings within 25 feet of City Hall, according to BOP Mutual Aid’s statement.
Campers did not remove their tents or belongings because moving 25 feet away from City Hall would remove over half of the lawn space, which would displace the campers living there or cause tents to be too close together, which is against health department guidelines, the statement said.
“We at Camp 210 saw this as an escalation towards a camp sweep that Mayor Seth Fleetwood has been alluding to since the end of December,” the statement read.
While there is space at Base Camp, BOP Mutual Aid’s statement said that is not an adequate alternative for some of the people residing at Camp 210. The shelter’s capacity is not large enough to house everyone staying at Camp 210, and some campers have been kicked out in the past or have had traumatic or disrespectful experiences and don’t feel safe to return, the statement said.
“The fact that the city repeatedly says to just ‘go to Base Camp’ shows that they don’t truly support shelter for all people, because they know that not everyone can go there,” the statement reads.
This story was originally published January 26, 2021 at 9:53 AM.
