Homeowners in Northern California were charged for the cost of clearing a homeless camp after Alameda County revealed that the mess had crossed onto their property lines.
Walsh Property Management, which oversees the homeowners association near the homeless camp in Lakewood, a small subdivision of 75 houses in Castro Valley, was forced to charge each homeowner in the association $300 to cover the bill for the cleanup of trash and waste from a former homeless camp.
The camp had been reported to Alameda County in October 2017. The government cleared out the encampment but notified the residents in August 2019 that they would be responsible for the expense because part of the camp was on Walsh’s property line.
“There are no fences and such that would mark where the property line ended, so we were kind of hoping that it was someone else’s responsibility,” Ed Walsh, the owner of Walsh Property Management told KPIX. “Unfortunately, this one happened to be on the association’s property.”
Cece Adams, a homeowner in the association, argued that either the county or the homeowners association should have to foot the bill for the cleanup, saying the association should have known the property lines and the county should have alerted the property of the problem at the time before more trash piled up, making the cleanup process more expensive.
“They should have known that this was our property, and they should have taken care of it a long time ago,” Adams said.
Homelessness in the San Francisco area has been a growing problem in recent years. The city had to deploy a “poop patrol” to remove mounds of human feces that have layered the streets of San Francisco. More than 25,000 reports of feces were filed in 2019.
