Neighbors of the Meadowbrook Neighborhood failed to stop Tent City 3 from moving in to Maple Leaf Lutheran Church, so instead, they tried another tactic: Catch them on camera.
In November 2010, shortly after the encampment moved in to the parking lot of the church, at 10005 32nd Ave. N.E., owners of two neighboring homes just across the fence from the parking lot put up video cameras and trained them into the camp.
One camera points directly into the camp from atop nailed-together boards. From that height, it can capture what residents do inside an eight-foot-tall partition erected around the perimeter. (Tent City residents usually put up a partition to increase their privacy.) Going in and out of the camp's Honey Buckets, eating, talking, playing games -- all is within view of the camera's lens.
Tent City residents say they've asked for the cameras to be taken down, to no avail. Now, after three months of living their lives on candid camera, they're seeking legal recourse.
Is it legal?
Seattle attorney Marcus Lang came into the North Seattle camp in December 2010 and volunteered to represent them. He said the camera-pointers could face a lawsuit if they share any of the campers' private details or post their images on the Internet.
Lang plans to write the homeowners a cease-and-desist letter pointing out their potential liability. For example, some Tent City 3 residents are homeless because they have left domestic violence situations and have taken out restraining orders against their abusers. If the abuser were to see their image on the Internet, come to Tent City 3 and hurt or kill the resident, Meadowbrook Neighbors could be held liable, Lang said.
Not everyone agrees that, given their outdoor abodes, Tent City residents have a legal claim to privacy.
Doug Honig, a spokesperson for the American Civil Liberties of Washington, said as long as the cameras don't record what they say, it's legal to point them any place within public view.
Behind the cameras
Rick and Susan Luebbe, homeowners who put a camera on a pole in the backyard of their four-bedroom home, did not return phone calls or e-mails from Real Change seeking comment, but a group that calls itself Meadowbrook Neighbors touts the cameras, encouraging other residents to follow suit. Most of the group's members live in homes that border the fence to the church's parking lot along Northeast 100th Street.
Meadowbrook Neighbors acknowledge that the position of the homes would enable the cameras to capture what transpires inside the camp.
"Some of these homes have outstanding high floor vantage points which will ensure complete coverage of any activity inside and surrounding TC3," the group's website says. "We also have a few neighbors who are in the security industry and we have learned that we can install systems which are easily available, cheap and provide excellent picture quality even in low light conditions."
Tent City residents want the cameras to be taken down, restoring what little privacy they have in the camp. Roger Countryman, who lives at the camp, said if the cameras were pointed in the bedroom of a home next door, the cops would put a stop to it.
Tent City 3 residents and their supporters complained about the cameras to neighbors at a November 2010 community meeting.
Opponents of the encampment told them they needed the cameras because the church did not require background checks, according to Maple Leaf Lutheran Pastor Julie Blum.
Blum disagrees. She said the neighbors are punishing Tent City residents for the church's decision.
"It's harassment," Blum said of the cameras. "It's not for their safety and protection. It's another way they're harassing us and Tent City."
Since the fall, opponents have also continued to confront church members each Sunday prior to services, Blum said.
She added that the presence of the cameras kept about 20 Tent City 3 residents from making the move from the previous camp location, at St. Mark's Cathedral on Capitol Hill, to Maple Leaf Lutheran. Some are domestic violence victims and feared for their safety, Blum said.
On the fence
Ron Whitener, a University of Washington law professor who lives across the street from the Luebbes, didn't want to weigh in on the legality of the cameras, but said he understands the Luebbes' concerns.
Whitener said he's served as a public defender for the homeless and knows it's a population with a higher percentage of mental illness and substance abuse. A lot of sex offenders also end up homeless, he said.
Whitener said he'd like to see more screening, and more services and housing from the city. He said the camp has had no effect on his life, but he said his house isn't up against the fence.
Countryman said Tent City 3 does screen for sex offenses. From his home directly across the fence, Countryman has a different view of what privacy means.
"When someone takes a pole and erects a camera in order to point it straight down into our camp that's a blatant, intentional violation of our privacy."