SANTA ANA : Homeless Have Plans for Their $3,308

When city workers twice confiscated and discarded Pat Ford’s clothes, bedrolls and other personal property two summers ago, they made life on the streets around the Santa Ana Civic Center even more difficult for the 46-year-old homeless man.

“I had to go for two weeks in the same clothes. I would take a shower but then dress in the same dirty clothes,” Ford said. “Then when I got some more, they wiped me out again. It was downright thievery.”

But Ford and 16 other homeless people refused to let the city’s action pass without a fight.

They sued Santa Ana, and on Thursday, many of them received a check for $3,308 as part of the $50,000 out-of-court settlement reached with the city earlier this year.

Each plaintiff had different plans for their chunk of the settlement.

Some said they would open savings accounts or attempt to buy a home, while others planned to take vacations or get medical treatment. One man said he would simply cash the check and carry the money with him, admitting that it may make him an easy target for robbers.

Most of them agreed that the money would help them build a better life for themselves.

“Oh, I can’t express my feelings. . . . It’s helping me live life again,” said Beulah Robison, a 58-year-old woman who now works as a live-in maid for an elderly man in Santa Ana.

Robison plans to open a savings account, get a new pair of glasses and buy her granddaughter a present with the money.

The lawsuit stemed from a Santa Ana policy begun in 1988 of discarding the possessions of homeless people during periodic citywide cleanup campaigns at parks and public places.

Santa Ana has since stopped throwing away the property and now keep all collected belongings in a storage facility at Eddy West Stadium.

Under the agreement, city workers will also give the estimated 1,500 homeless people who live in Santa Ana time to move their property before the cleanups begin.