No Moratorium; Skid Row Sweeps On Again

City officials announced Wednesday that sweeps of the Skid Row area will resume today after Mayor Tom Bradley turned down a request for a six-month moratorium on the sweeps.

Public Works Commissioner Ed Avila said city crews will begin dismantling work at 6th Street and Stanford Avenue and adjacent streets sometime after noon, removing sidewalk encampments in the area and cleaning streets and sidewalks.

As required by a Superior Court order mandating a 12-hour notice before the dump trucks roll, signs warning of the sweep will be posted in the area just after midnight, Avila said, and city workers will pass the word in person an hour before the action begins.

Bradley’s decision came as a disappointment to advocates for the Skid Row poor who had asked the mayor for a six-month moratorium on what they termed “sidewalk sweeps” of the homeless encampments.

Robert Wycoff, president and chief operating officer of Arco, who is active in trying to improve Skid Row services and housing, said the mayor backed most of what the group sought but “we were a little disappointed about the sweeps.”

Bradley agreed to back efforts to improve and increase permanent housing on Skid Row by boosting the supply of single-room occupancy hotel rooms. Bradley said he would ask the Community Redevelopment Agency, the city agency with prime responsibility for Skid Row housing, to provide $11.5 million to upgrade hotels that do not meet current earthquake safety requirements.

“The mayor is our best friend on the issue,” said Wycoff.

Nevertheless, the press conference after the meeting between Wycoff and heads of Skid Row service agencies and Bradley and other city officials pointed up differences between the advocates of increased housing and the city.

Bradley, under pressure from business interests in the area to clean out the homeless encampments, said of the operations, “I don’t call them sweeps.” He said “we cannot suspend” cleaning up “serious health problems” or conditions that cause crime.

And he said he did not know whether the CRA would be able to provide the $11.5 million for upgrading hotels.

“I don’t know how much money they are prepared to commit,” said the mayor of the CRA, whose board he appoints.

Bradley reiterated that the county government, controlled by a Board of Supervisors more conservative than he, has failed to live up to its responsibilities for the homeless on Skid Row.

He made that point again later in the day in a letter to County Administrative Officer Richard Dixon in which he objected to several conditions sought by the county last month before it increased help for homeless left without overnight shelter in the cold.

Among the conditions were a formal city request for help, a predicted weather forecast of 40 degrees or lower, and a city guarantee of law enforcement protection for county workers.

“I regard the county’s letter as a gratuitous insult and a blatant effort by the county to shirk its legal responsibilities,” Bradley said.

A spokesman for Dixon said he had not yet received the letter and could not comment on it.