Officers evict people from state-owned homes in Los Angeles

LOS ANGELES – The California Highway Patrol clashed with protesters the day before Thanksgiving as officers forcibly evicted people who had taken over vacant state-owned homes in a Los Angeles neighborhood.

The Reclaim and Rebuild Our Community group said its members were occupying El Sereno’s homes on Wednesday and the so-called “reclaimers” included families with children who previously lived in cars and camps.

Around 100 CHP agents who had gathered nearby to evacuate the occupants were greeted by activists who aligned to try to prevent the police from leaving with their members.

The California Department of Transportation, or Caltrans, has 163 vacant homes in eastern Los Angeles County, according to the Southern California News Group. The properties mostly consist of single-family homes and were obtained by the state decades ago for use as part of a since-abandoned plan to expand a freeway.

Matt Rocco, a spokesperson for Caltrans, said the agency had asked the CHP “to remove intruders so that the properties can be re-secured and barricaded” as they “are dangerous and uninhabitable for the occupants.”

Videos posted on social media showed agents using rams to knock down the doors of houses and carry people in the courtyard, where a person seemed to be attached. Social media activist posts said the dismissals continued on Thursday afternoon.

“I am disturbed, distraught and shaken watching a video of a 17-year-old tied up the night before Thanksgiving for nothing other than being homeless,” tweeted Sasha Renée Pérez, elected mayor of the Alhambra, a small neighboring town.

The CHP did not respond to requests for comment, but NBC Los Angeles observed at least three people being held Wednesday night.

Los Angeles City Councilor Kevin de León, who represents El Sereno, criticized the use of “physical methods of execution” in a statement and called Wednesday’s dismissals “heartbreaking and unacceptable.”

Homelessness in Los Angeles had increased even before the coronavirus pandemic, thanks to rising rents and a housing shortage. There are at least 66,433 homeless people in Los Angeles, according to a spring count.

Activists occupying homes belonging to the Caltrans said they wanted Governor Gavin Newsom to step in and allow homeless families to stay in homes to comply with state and city guidelines to stay in their homes during the pandemic.

Newsom’s office did not respond to a request for comment on Thursday.

In January, a group of Oakland women calling themselves Moms 4 Housing were evicted from a vacant house they occupied to draw attention to homelessness in the Bay Area. They were allowed to return after the owners agreed to sell the house to the Oakland Community Land Trust, a non-profit organization that purchases and renovates property for affordable housing.

Reclaim and Rebuild our Community wants to see a similar arrangement in Los Angeles with Caltrans-owned housing in the hands of the El Sereno Community Land Trust.