Oceanside Cracks Down on Homeless : Warning: After merchants complain, the city tells dozens in the San Luis Rey River Valley to move by Aug. 20 or face the prospect of jail.

Oceanside has decided to play hardball with several dozen homeless people, ordering them to vacate their makeshift shelters in the San Luis Rey River Valley within 10 days or face arrest.

In an early-morning sweep Monday, city officials gave written notices to about two dozen people, informing them to move both themselves and their belongings before Aug. 20 or become subject to arrest for trespassing.

The move came in response to complaints from merchants that homeless people were breaking into cars and causing a nuisance on both public and private lands in the area, which stretches about 3 miles east of Interstate 5 along the river valley.

“We know that we’re not doing a thing to address the homeless problem--we’re not naive to think that,” Oceanside housing director Richard Goodman said. “But we are taking the heat off the merchants in this industrial area. We know that the homeless people are just going to locate someplace else.”

Goodman said the city was also motivated to do something to save its wetlands.

“Do you know how much a bunch of homeless people can impact a wetlands area?” he said. “They come in with their trash; they tramp down vegetation to build their houses.”

Area merchants said they were pleased with the city’s efforts and hope the homeless will stay away once moved out.

Goodman said the merchants in the Oceanside Industrial Park complained two months ago about crime rising in the area, but at first attributed it to Brother Benno’s Center, a soup kitchen moved from the downtown area to the industrial park last year.

“Eventually, the merchants and the people at Brother Benno’s came to terms--they made peace,” he said. “The businessmen realized that Brother Benno’s wasn’t the problem. It was this new flux of homeless people who had moved in to to take advantage of its services.”

Bud Ogle, acting director of Brother Benno’s, said he and other workers there feel torn by the city’s action.

“Anyone with any compassion can’t just stand by and let hundreds of people be moved on like animals,” he said. “But, on the other hand, I understand the manufacturers who want to run a business.”

Ogle said the estimates of the homeless living in the area varied from several dozen to more than 200.

“It’s a societal problem,” he said. “You can’t have hundreds of people in an area like this without problems. They’re human. They have addictions, mental problems and otherwise. They don’t act like you and I. If they want to go to the bathroom, they just go. And it causes some problems.”

The city of Oceanside recently formed a task force to examine the homeless problem, and Goodman said he has been to the area several times to issue verbal warnings.

“These people know that we mean business,” he said. “Many of the people to whom we issued the written warnings were the same ones we had run into during past visits.

“But, come Aug. 20, there won’t be any more warnings,” Goodman said. “People are going to jail.”