SAN FRANCISCO (KRON) — The city is removing the boulders used to deter homeless camps from a San Francisco sidewalk Monday.
Two dozen large rocks appeared along the sidewalk of Clinton Park earlier this month.
Neighbors frustrated with homeless encampments and drug dealing chipped in to buy the boulders, according to Hoodline.
“From everything I’ve learned about these neighbors, you know, I stand with them,” Director of Public Works Mohammed Nuru said.
However, this controversial move had been met with backlash.
Over the weekend, the boulders had been pushed from the sidewalk to the street.
Apparently, this has happened a few times recently forcing the city to use their resources to put the rocks back on the sidewalk.
While some residents say it has reduced the number of homeless people and tents in the area, others say this is not a solution.
“The answer is to fight for housing,” Robin Baskin said. “And to provide as many public services as possible for the homeless people, not just hide it. Hiding problems doesn’t solve problems, it just displaces them to another block.”
Now it appears the city is removing the boulders altogether.
San Francisco Public Works was seen Monday morning taking the boulders and putting them into a truck.
San Francisco’s Coalition on homelessness says affordable housing and more shelter beds are the answer not bigger boulders.
“We have a shelter waitlist with over 1,000 people on it just waiting for shelter, and as long as the waitlist is that high and as long as housing is this un-affordable, no amount of boulders or landscaping is going to make people go away,” Armando Garcia said.
For now, the boulders are gone, we will just have to wait and see what the city and residents come up with next.