PORTLAND, Ore. — When you step into Suzanne Rollins' backyard, it shelters you from one of Portland's largest homeless camps that surrounds it.
“It’s just a whole other world out here,” she said. She’s lived off Sunderland Street in Northeast Portland since 1990.
An empty ball field is all that separates her yard from a line of RVs along Northeast 33rd Drive.
“It’s discouraging. I see a lot more of the really sad part of life,” she said. “Trash is one thing — loud noises, exploding propane tanks, in the summer people staying up all night long, playing music, dogs.”
All her neighbors sold their homes to the Port of Portland. She’s the only one left.
"I don’t know where I could move and have this much land … I just try really hard not to be angry and not to be upset because they have to go somewhere,” Rollins said.
The mayor’s office told KGW that the camps along Northeast 33rd Drive are scheduled to be removed soon. Unlike other attempts at removing them, the city is planning to clear both sides of the street — in the past, they’ve only cleared one.
“By the first of February, everybody’s got to be gone; they’re going to tow both sides of the road what everybody owns or whatever will be gone,” said Michael Roach, who camps on Northeast 33rd Drive.
“I’ve been out here two years, and nobody’s ever came to my vehicle over there and asked me if I needed a place to go,” Roach said. When KGW was there Thursday, they saw two outreach workers talking with homeless people.
“All together, it’s all just stupid. It’s just stupid,” added TJ, who camps several RVs down. “Everybody will basically bounce from here — probably most likely to Delta Park [and] post up at Delta Park for a while, until they say you got to bounce and then right back over here,”
That routine is something everyone, including Rollins, knows as very familiar.
“They have to have some way of keeping them from returning,” Rollins said.
Also on Sunderland Street across from Rollins house is the city’s first Safe Rest Village for people who live in RVs. It opened about four months ago, and last checked, has some vacancies.
The city of Portland said they want to make it clear that Northeast 33rd Drive is not a waiting place for people to move into the site. Placement in the village requires a referral, which people on the streets say can be hard to come by.
The city's Safe Rest Village team added in a statement that the outreach teams are "working to identify people who had previously been referred to the Sunderland RV Safe Park site to help them fill these spaces first.
"They are working with everyone in this area on sheltering options, including Clinton Triangle (the Temporary Alternative Shelter Site) and other Safe Rest Villages, where space is available," they concluded.