In another month or so, push will come to shove, and Nickelsville will move. That’s how it is.
Maybe, as some on the city council have argued, existing law will have to do. The camp can go “somewhere” with a temporary-use permit for as long as six months at a time.
Or, maybe it won’t go, and the city will send in the police. I wouldn’t recommend that to anyone.
I’ve been thinking lately about another encampment, in Boston, 25 years ago. Much is different now and much is the same, some things worse and some better.
Homefront began in the late spring of 1988. There was a candlelight vigil and a protest march around Boston Common to honor homeless people who had died the previous year. We ended with a spontaneous encampment on the statehouse steps. We were homeless people, advocates and college students, acting together. The next night, homeless people didn’t want to leave.
What became known as Homefront ’88 went from symbolic protest camp to self-managed survival strategy. The campers — many of whom were military vets — organized their own security and food. The students and advocates fell away, and the homeless took over.
I was the editor then of something called “Street Magazine.” We published when we could and, for a while, operated out of a squat in Allston-Brighton. I stuck to that camp like glue. I guess I came for the story and stayed for the people.
The state troopers evicted us from the capitol steps and, after much drama in front of TV cameras, we moved across the street to the Boston Common. This was out of their jurisdiction and good enough. It took a few days for the next eviction to come, and when it did, we marched the three blocks to Boston City Hall. And there we stayed. For nearly three months.
This was where I became a homeless organizer. There were inspiring moments of community, and there was brutal factionalism. Some people had high ideals, and some merely wanted a place to drink and crash. The people there were new to organizing, but if they knew how to do anything, it was to endure, and endure they did.
I remember when the squad cars finally arrived. As night fell, the campers were told to leave. Hurried negotiations ensued as Boston cops put on their latex gloves. A friendly city councilor begged the campers to disband and avoid arrest.
The campers stood their ground, and at the last moment, a compromise was reached. If they moved to the Federal Building, just 200 yards across the plaza, no arrests would be made.
The next day, we went right back to city hall. Bluff called. Crisis over. City officials, it seemed, were as desperate to avoid making arrests as the homeless were to stay.
Eventually, diplomacy won the day, and officials negotiated the camp away. It all ended as a qualified win for the worn-out people of Homefront. If the city had understood how close the camp was to dissolving itself, they’d have just waited them out.
During the ’80s, emergency shelter expanded to meet the growing need, and the number of beds in most cities tripled or quadrupled. In 2013, cities have held the line against new shelter — something that’s gone on for nearly a decade — and about one in three homeless people in Seattle now live outside. Back in the ’80s, homeless activists were inexperienced and isolated. The self-managed camps of today have long histories and come with allies.
This isn’t a fight the city can win through either force or neglect. There has to be a better way.