City officials fanned out across Oahu Wednesday, issuing 76 notices to protesters at Thomas Square and to homeless people, warning that their tents and personal items must be removed from sidewalks and other public property or be confiscated today.
Officials from the city Facility Maintenance and Parks and Recreation departments, backed up by police, issued 31 removal notices beginning at 9 a.m. to Occupy Honolulu protesters at Thomas Square. They planned to return today to remove any items left at Beretania Street and Ward Avenue, where more than a dozen protesters’ tents were set up.
The action follows the same procedures that workers from the two city agencies used last month in removing personal items belonging to homeless campers on King Street fronting Old Stadium Park and Moiliili Field and Iwilei.
In addition to the 31 notices issued at Thomas Square, three were issued to homeless people at Pawaa Park and Kaheka Street, five at Old Stadium Park, 17 at Aala Park and 20 at various other Oahu locations.
At Thomas Square, 10 to 30 Occupy Honolulu protesters have been camping on the sidewalk since Nov. 5 — part of a large-scale movement demonstrating against disparities in the nation’s economic system.
Jamie Baldwin, a social worker who was one of the eight protesters arrested Nov. 5 for being in the park past closing, said the group may move to another location.
"It is crucial to have a 24-hour presence somewhere," she said.
Baldwin said she is "not personally tied to this location," but that to others in the encampment "this space is crucial."
She said she would prefer a location near the state Capitol.
Brian Webb, a Hawaii Pacific University student, said he has sympathy for "homeless people who do not have a lot of places to go."
Webb, who said he is not part of the encampment but has frequently visited the Thomas Square site, said the new city ordinance, which forbids the storage of personal items on public property, should have focused on public sanitation rather than public safety.
As city officials put notices on protesters’ personal items on Beretania Street across from the Academy of Arts, a class from Jarrett Middle School played in the park and dogs lined up for obedience training.
The city’saction began last month in McCully near the Old Stadium Park.
Trish Morikawa, the city’s housing coordinator, said the city has received more than 30 complaints about the Thomas Square site.
Morikawa said the new sidewalk storage ordinance is not a free speech issue. She said private property cannot be stored on government property.
Enforcement of the ordinance is complaint-driven, Morikawa said, adding that the Iwilei and Old Stadium Park areas have received the most complaints and that was the reason city officials moved in those areas first.
Removal notices were taped on all items left on the sidewalk, such as tents, signs, furniture, books, chairs and other personal property.
As in the Iwilei and McCully operations, city officials photographed every item on Beretania Street and Ward Avenue.
Any items still on the sidewalk today will be bagged, placed in green garbage bins and trucked to thecity’s Halawa base yard, where they will be stored for 30 days or until the owners claim them. Unclaimed items would then be disposed of or auctioned off.
