Tent city to pull up stakes

It’s time for James Coltson and his wife, Brandee, to move on again.

The tent city they have called home for the past month is shutting down by Saturday. A property owner had been allowing them and many other homeless people to camp on his vacant lot in northeast Spokane. Now he has asked them to leave.

It won’t be the first time James, 19, and Brandee, 23, have been forced to pull up stakes since they came to the Northwest from Florida months ago. First they camped out on a bit of land owned by Coltson’s mother and stepfather near Tonasket until they were asked to leave.

Then the couple slept under a bridge in Oroville until the Okanogan County sheriff put them up in a motel and finally bought them a bus ticket to Spokane, Coltson said.

“When this place closes, we’ll be back on the street or in the woods,” Coltson said.

Since coming to Spokane, they have been living on the money Brandee makes selling plasma twice a week and the generosity of others. Coltson said he can’t work because his personal effects, including all his identification, were stolen at the bus station when he arrived.

Randy Somerville, who has emerged as a leader of the tent city residents, said he hopes the city will step forward to accommodate James and Brandee and 25 to 30 others.

“They need to come out of the cold,” Somerville said.

Many in Spokane have done much to help. Food, clothes, lantern and heater fuel, tents and sleeping bags – the donations might still be pouring in had Somerville not asked them on Wednesday to stop giving.

What remains in a supply tent now must be redistributed to charities throughout the city.

Spokane Realtor Robert Gilles offered his vacant lot on the southeast corner of Sinto Avenue and Napa Street to homeless advocates after they were forced from their previous campsite on a grassy median downtown. Gilles has declined to be interviewed.

The city met with Gilles after a Spokane police neighborhood resource officer issued him a chronic nuisance notice because of multiple police calls to the tent city. Gilles’ deadline for responding to the notice was extended to Dec. 6, according to city spokeswoman Marlene Feist.

A few weeks ago, a level 3 sex offender was asked to leave the camp, which is one block away from Stevens Elementary School, after Officer Shaney Redmon identified him.

Somerville said Gilles told him this week that the tent city must be closed by Saturday. Now Somerville, homeless himself at 58 years old, is desperately trying to find accommodation for the campers – single men and women, as well as couples who are more difficult to place.

The Salvation Army Family Emergency Shelter, which will take couples in long-term relationships, has a waiting list for its 18 rooms.

The House of Charity, with 108 beds for single men, is full.

Hope House, which accepts single women without children, had four beds available Wednesday night, while Truth Ministries had only two beds open for single men.

Thursday night, the Union Gospel Mission had 31 beds available for single men, and the mission’s Crisis Shelter for Women and Children had four beds available for single women.

Mission development director David Wall said he would visit the tent city today to explain to campers what services are available. On Thursday, Somerville helped four campers find places to stay. One entered in-patient drug and alcohol rehabilitation. Three others were able to find apartments with the help of Terri Mayer at Spokane Low-Income Housing Consortium.

Mayer was able to put one couple in contact with a landlady who would forgo a cash deposit provided the tenants participate in Responsible Renters, a six-month training program.

The woman, who is four months’ pregnant, and her boyfriend have been living in the tent city for three weeks after spending their last $60 on a tent. They came to Spokane after losing their apartment in Olympia. First they stayed at a motel here until their money began to run out, she said.

While living at the tent city, both found jobs with a telemarketer, working for $7.93 an hour. They were grateful for their new landlady.

“She wanted us to get off the streets. She wanted me off the streets,” said the young woman, who asked not to be identified.