Homeless leave Pawaa as city closes down park

A man and his teenage son who had been living in a tent on a King Street sidewalk packed their possessions in four duffel bags Wednesday to be ready when the city shuts down the Pawaa In-Ha Park sometime today.

Except they have nowhere to go.

The city said it is closing the small park today through Oct. 9 for routine maintenance, such as trimming trees and grass. It posted signs on the King Street side of the park that said the park will be closed 24 hours a day, seven days a week beginning today.

The city has received numerous complaints about homeless people at the park and the amount of property regularly stored there, a city official said.

The city is also sprucing up the grounds and closing it, in part, because two delegations from South Korea will visit Tuesday and Oct. 9 to see sculptures they donated. This year marks the 110th anniversary of Korean immigration to the United States.

"We would like them to see them (the sculptures) in their grandeur, and not see them to dry laundry and things like that," said city spokesman Jesse Broder Van Dyke.

The city spends $7,500 each day, two to three times a week, to enforce the sidewalk nuisance law and close parks, he said. At Pawaa, the city removed property on Tuesday, and on Sept. 3 and 19.

While no laundry was hanging from the artworks Wednesday, seven tents lined King Street near Sanders Piano and a few were on the Young Street side of the park.

The man, 55, who asked that his name not be used, said he and his 14-year-old had been living at the park since earlier this year. His son was once "the kid who had everything." But when the father lost his job in May 2012 and couldn’t pay the $1,100 monthly rent, they lost their apartment and almost everything else, he said.

The city used to give 24 hours’ notice, but now workers come in the middle of the night, making random sweeps, disturbing his 10th-grade son’s sleep and giving 15 minutes’ notice.The homeless people areallowed one trip to pick up everything and move it.

Lea Hamakua, 62, a former schoolteacher and cancer patient who lives on the Young Street side, said she had about $1,000 in medical supplies when the city removed property on Tuesday.

Hamakua, who has an artificial bladder and requires urostomy bags that cost $353.61 for a 30-day supply, said the city disposed of them because she doesn’t have the $200 to retrieve them.

The city had 16 vehicles, six workers and six police officers Tuesday night to clear out the homeless campers, she said.

"Why is the state allowing them to rape poor people of the little they got?" she said.

The new sidewalk nuisance ordinance does not require 24 hours’ notice to oust the sidewalk campers, although the park closing law does. The new law also allows the city to collect a $200 fee for retrieval of stored items, but the park law has no such fee.

Six part-time workers have been hired to enforce the ordinance with various start times, so no overtime is paid, at locations including Pawaa, Ala Moana Beach Park, Thomas Square, Aala Park, Ala Moana, Waikiki, Kakaako, Iwilei, Chinatown/downtown, Kapalama, Moiliili/University and Kuliouou Beach Park, Broder Van Dyke said.

Hamakua said it would make more sense for the city to use enforcement money to instead build low-rent apartments.

On Tuesday just under half a ton of items from 31 encampments at Thomas Square, Pawaa, Aala Park and Ala Wai were disposed, the city said.

A 53-year-old Pawaa resident who identified himself only as Clinton said, "It’s kind of strange they pick on people who have no food, no money. We’re trying to survive and they make us look like animals."

"If they can build a rail with $5.5 billion, why they cannot build a facility (to house the homeless?" he asked.

Charade Keane, 41, who is homeless and usually lives at Ala Moana Beach Park, said, "What they tell us is, we’re an eyesore. We all may have problems, but people just need help. … I’d rather work than be homeless."

A Sanders Piano assistant manager, who asked that his name not be used, said the store "loses customers and students whose parents don’t bring them anymore" because of the homeless.

He cites the trash, accumulated stuff, occasional fights and drug overdoses.

"These people know how to leave the area and come back in an hour," he said. "It’s just a nice dog-and-pony show that the city puts on just to make everybody think that something’s being done."