A dozen west Vancouver residents pleaded with the city council on Monday to clear a homeless encampment along West Mill Plain Boulevard.
The camp along the road’s sound wall has grown from a few tents to about 50 within the past year. Some parents said their children are afraid to go outside their homes in the Hough neighborhood.
“I have an 8-year-old child who has nightmares … about strangers breaking into our home while she sleeps,” said Rachel Trevino, a single mother of three children.
Trevino said her daughter is experiencing symptoms akin to post-traumatic stress disorder from the camp. She hears people screaming and sees people under the influence of drugs, “walking around like zombies, neither dead or alive,” Trevino said.
“If that doesn’t scare you, it scares my children. Men walking around with axes, shovels, pipes for no reason. Suddenly, they’re there. And then suddenly, they’re gone,” Trevino said. “My children … wonder where they went and when they’re coming back.”
Lila Harlan, 15, said she’s been struggling to sleep at night because of the screaming. She missed her first-period math class recently when she and her mother discovered a woman who had seemingly overdosed and passed out, blocking their car.
“When the paramedics arrived, she continued to vomit in our front yard. I’ll never forget the image of when I walked outside and saw a woman shriveled up, laying on the wet cement road,” Lila said.
Her favorite activity used to be running around the neighborhood, but she stopped out of fear, she said.
Other neighbors described people sleeping on their porches, engaging in oral sex in front of their houses, defecating in their yards and smoking fentanyl from foil next to them.
Mary Cray, 73, said she and her husband, who both survived a house fire in the past, are terrified their house might be burned down by a fire in the camp. She’s reported fires in tents three times, she said.
“We’re now begging you for help. We’re frightened on so many levels. Fire dangers. The homeless men beating girlfriends. Wondering if this violence will be directed at us,” Cray said. “I could go on and on.”
The Columbian previously reported on problems at the camp. In September, the city council discussed closing the camp.
Vancouver’s Homeless Response Manager Jamie Spinelli said the city has a plan for clearing the encampment and prohibiting camping along Mill Plain but gave no firm timeline.
