EW and the Catalyst Journalism Project examined
more than 8,800 work orders from Eugene Public Works
that document each time city workers force unhoused
people to take down their camps and move. The city
released the records in response to a request by EW
under the Oregon public records law.
Dan Bryant, executive director at SquareOne Villages,
which provides cost-effective housing to those in need,
says he had not been aware of the two-hour eviction
notices before being asked about them by EW. Bryant
says such a short warning time is unreasonable, given
that many unhoused people leave their camps for the
day and might not see the notices before city workers
take away their possessions.
“If they're putting that notice with no confirmation that
the person has received it, that's a problem and should
be stopped,” Bryant says “It's one of the biggest issues
that unhoused people face — losing their belongings.”
The revelations come as the Eugene City Council con-
siders changes to city camping policies in light of a 2021
state law that requires local ordinances to be “objectively
reasonable as to time, place and manner with regards to
persons experiencing homelessness.”
At Nightingale Hosted Shelters, Conestoga-style
huts for unhoused people located near East 34th and
Hilyard, Nathan Showers says he’s been hearing about
the two-hour notices for several months. Showers, a
camp manager at the site, says the city’s ramped-up
evictions are inhumane.
“The whole issue here,” Showers says, “is our city poli-
cies and our government need to figure out a solution not
just move us around and try to hide us in deeper spots.”
BREAKING A PRECEDENT
Former state Sen. Frank Shields, D-Portland, says
giving unhoused people only two hours is unreasonable.
“Government has to inject a certain amount of human-
E U G E N E W E E K LY . C O M
DANIEL FISHER
Photo by Caleb Barber
ity into its decision-making,” he says. “And sometimes
bureaucrats don’t understand that.”
Shields should know. In 1995, he introduced the first
law requiring that cities provide a 24-hour notice before
forcing unhoused people to move from their encamp-
ments on public property. At the time, police and city
officials were not required to give any warning before
confiscating unhoused people’s tents, sleeping bags
and other belongings.
“Generally, my feeling was anytime you’re going to
disrupt somebody's life, whether there’s an individual
family or a whole community, you need to give them a
heads up, you know, like a 24-hour notice,” Shields says.
The 1995 law exempted cities from issuing 24-hour
notices if the prohibited camping was taking place in
a “day use recreational area,” such as parks or open
spaces. The law also said the 24-hour notice applied only
to “established camping sites,” even though lawmakers
never defined what “established” meant.
Nonetheless, documents show, the city of Eugene for
years routinely extended the 24-hour notices to unhoused
people camping in city parks.
In 2021, lawmakers extended the notice time to 72
hours after concerns about how some cities swept large
homeless encampments during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Homeless advocates said 24 hours didn’t give many
unhoused people enough time to find a place to stay
or attend to their health needs. At the time, Eugene’s
forced clearance of large homeless encampments drew
protests.
State Rep. John Lively, D-Springfield, introduced
House Bill 3124, which made the change.
“Part of the goal of this was to give time for the non-
profits to go out and work with these people to help find
another location to protect their belongings, to set up a
process to help them,” Lively says now. “And they thought
that the 72 hours provided enough time to do that.”
The bill made no change in the law when it came to
established camping sites.
Kelly Shadwick, a spokesperson for Eugene Parks
and Open Space, said city officials in 2021 looked more
closely at the law.
“It does not define the word ‘established,’” Shadwick
says in a prepared statement in response to EW’s ques-
tions. “The city of Eugene’s interpretation is [that] a site
set up for less than 24 hours is not established.”
Without public discussion, city officials invented a new
kind of eviction for unhoused people: a “non-established
camp” notice. The notices ordered that people take down
tents or other structures immediately and that they
remove their possessions within two hours.
Shadwick did not answer EW’s question about when
the decision to start using two-hour notices was made.
City Manager Medary declined to answer questions about
how the decision was made, or why city officials came
up with a two-hour notice after having allowed 24-hour
notices in parks for years.
Documents show the first “non-established camp”
two-hour notice was delivered on Oct. 28, 2021, to the
owner of a camouflaged tent and shopping cart in Wash-
ington Jefferson Park. After that, the number of two-hour
notices grew rapidly.
Meanwhile, Eugene officials were telling a very differ-
A P R I L
1 3 ,
2 0 2 3
13