Pittsburgh closing Downtown homeless encampment

Pittsburgh officials are tearing down a Downtown homeless encampment amid concerns that the people living there are living in dangerous conditions.

People living at the homeless camp along Fort Pitt Boulevard near Grant Street will have to leave by 5 p.m. Wednesday, said Emily Bourne, a spokeswoman for the city’s Department of Public Safety. Officials began warning people of the impending closure at the start of the month, she said.

There were 18 people living at the camp at the beginning of this week, she said. All were offered an indoor shelter bed, though many declined those offers.

One person opted to move into a shelter, Assistant Public Safety Director Camila Alarcon-Chelecki said. Three more were moved into some type of transitional housing, and another three went into a rehab program, she said.

The city’s homeless outreach team helped nine other people move to other outdoor homeless camps, Alarcon-Chelecki said. They turned down offers for inside shelter, though several are on wait lists for more permanent housing options.

“We’re finding more and more people that don’t want to go into congregate shelters,” she said.

Officials and outreach workers have acknowledged that many homeless people are wary of group shelters where they lack privacy and fear falling victim to theft. Alarcon-Chelecki said this highlights the need for more transitional housing where people could have their own space.

Officials are tearing down the Fort Pitt Boulevard camp based on concerns for the safety of the homeless people living there, Alarcon-Chelecki said. There have been reports of sexual assaults and assaults against people living there, she said.

The proximity to a busy roadway also made the area unsafe, she said, and outreach workers have seen people nearly stepping out into traffic.

Alarcon Chelecki said outreach workers were hearing “a lot of concerns” from residents living in the encampment as it was becoming a “dangerous place” for them to stay.

Officials in January tore down a homeless camp at the Mon Wharf area after it was flooded and one homeless man had to be rescued from rising waters. Crews late last year cleared out a Downtown camp on First Avenue amid an uptick of sexual assaults reported against people living there.