Smokey Jordan organizes his belongings as the city of Bend conducts a sweep of residents living on Hunnell Road in Bend Tuesday. 

1. ODOT removing homeless encampments from 5 locations this week, marking the start of a summer of sweeps
2. Bend homeless shelter, sitting empty for months, gets funding
3. Deschutes County Commission approves plan to remove homeless people from Juniper Ridge
4. Bend’s second legal challenge from homeless residents questions city’s policies

The Bulletin has been tracking homeless encampment sweeps since June of 2020, and coverage has only grown since then.

Recent estimates put the number of people experiencing homelessness in Central Oregon at 1,286 people, which is a 28% increase from 2022, according to an annual estimate. Roughly 1,012 of those people are in Bend. Local and state agencies have conducted homeless encampment sweeps in roughly 15 locations in Bend in 2023, and more are on the way.

What is a homeless encampment sweep?

Sometimes called removals, cleanups or closures, homeless encampment sweeps are the colloquial term for evicting homeless people who are living on property that isn’t sanctioned for long-term living.

Where do people go? Where can they go?

In Central Oregon, rates of unsheltered homelessness are high. The majority of people who are homeless in Central Oregon aren’t living in shelters — that’s 1,189 people who are living outside or in their vehicles, according to 2023 estimates — which means they are living on city streets or on public land outside the cities.

However, shelters and alternatives to living outside do exist. The city of Bend has two shelter operators, Shepherd’s House Ministries and Bethlehem Inn. Shepherd’s House continues to increase its capacity in both Bend and Redmond.

What happens to peoples’ belongings and vehicles?

Under state law, Oregon governments must store peoples’ personal property for up to 30 days in a facility within their community. The city of Bend uses its police department’s building to store belongings and a county facility on 27th Street to store vehicles.

“Property unclaimed after 30 days will be destroyed or donated,” city policy says.

Why do public agencies remove encampments?

In Bend, public agencies give a litany of reasons for removing homeless encampments. The city of Bend often cites health and safety, like in the instances of Second Street in 2022, and more recently, the Hunnell Road area. Deschutes County recently used the same reason to remove people from county- and city-owned land in Juniper Ridge in northeast Bend.

State transportation officials have said they conduct what they call property restorations to prevent clusters of homeless encampments from becoming too large. Safety and proximity to vehicle traffic play a major role in the Oregon Department of Transportation’s reasoning, too.

Often, homeless encampments violate public policy. The city of Bend’s camping code allows sheltering, or camping, on city rights of way, but it regulates when, where and how people can do that. Those regulations are currently under fire after the Oregon Justice Resource Center, a Portland-based legal nonprofit specializing in civil and human rights, notified the city on July 14 that it intends to sue. The notice alleged the city’s camping code is cruel and unusual punishment under the U.S. and Oregon constitutions.

The Bulletin created an interactive online map that not only tracks the locations of where homeless encampment sweeps have occurred since 2020, but it also details the impact of those sweeps.