People living homeless in Norristown Peco encampment have until Sept. 21 to move out

Anyone living homeless on a stretch of land owned by Peco near the Schuylkill River Trail in Norristown will have until Sept. 21 to leave, according to notices placed near a longtime encampment.

“You are not permitted to enter or use this property ... to erect a tent, encampment, or other structure, or to ... live, sleep, or stay on this property after September 21, 2023,” read the 20 notices, which were posted on Aug. 7. The utility wants to cut down vegetation in the area and remove waste.

While as many as 15 to 20 people were living on the site through the summer, “I think the property is clear now,” a Peco spokesperson said Tuesday. Advocates said two people might still be sleeping in tents there, although it’s difficult to know for certain.

The energy utility’s process for conducting the clear-out “set a positive example” for how encampments should be handled, according to Eric Tars, senior policy director of the National Homelessness Law Center in Washington.

He pointed out that Peco has provided 45 days of written notice before the planned closure, as well as financial support to local nonprofit Access Services to assist residents in finding new places to live, and storage and transportation costs for residents who can’t move their belongings.

The utility consulted with experts on homelessness “to develop a thoughtful approach, and to treat people with dignity and respect,” a Peco spokesperson said.

Tars and other advocates were not as flattering to Montgomery County officials.

Several county guidelines for dealing with encampments appear to be “unconstitutional,” according to the Community Justice Project, a Harrisburg-based nonprofit legal aid program that represents low-income Pennsylvanians.

Last month, the CJP wrote a letter to Maureen E. Calder, an assistant solicitor for the county, saying guidelines appeared to violate the Fourth Amendment to the Constitution because they seem to allow for the seizure of most encampment residents’ possessions without storing and returning them.

Further, the letter said, the guidelines may violate the Fourteenth Amendment for sanctioning moving people out of an encampment if they have no place to go. “At present, there are no shelter beds available anywhere in Montgomery County,” the letter said.

Marielle Macher, the CJP executive director and a signatory of the letter, said in an interview she’s concerned that municipalities following county guidelines on how to handle encampments “will think it’s OK to go against settled law and possibly violate people’s constitutional rights. And that’s not the reality of the legal requirements.”

The letter also stated that the lack of affordable housing in Montgomery County “has brought homelessness to a crisis point.”

If the county were to put more resources into expanding affordable housing as well as emergency shelters, the letter went on to say, “there would almost certainly be far fewer county residents needing to reside in homeless encampments.”

A county spokesperson said officials “intend to send a formal reply” to the CJP letter, but did not indicate when.

In addition, the spokesperson provided two statements from county officials, one of which said, “Our guidelines are written with residents’ rights and well-being in mind.”

Further, it said, “We are proud of our record on combatting homelessness and will continue our commitment, working with all of our municipalities toward the day when as few people as possible remain unhoused.”

Neither statement directly addressed the CJP’s criticism of county guidelines that potentially violate the Constitution.

One statement said that the county has been directing $32.4 million in federal funds toward construction of 325 affordable housing units, among other projects. Saying county government can’t fix the “tragedy” of homelessness alone, officials concluded that local, state, and federal intervention is also needed.

Some key factors have exacerbated homelessness in Norristown, where 21% of the population of about 35,000 people lives in poverty. About 160 people are considered to be living homeless, though the number isn’t exact.

In 2021, flooding from the remnants of Hurricane Ida damaged a low-income Norristown apartment complex with about 100 units, forcing tenants to evacuate.

Last year, a 50-bed homeless shelter in Norristown was closed after the state conferred to the borough the land on which the facility sat. County social services agencies petitioned to extend the lease of what had been the only local shelter, but Norristown officials declined.

“It’s a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity” for Norristown to build something that generates tax revenue, said Borough Council President Tom Lepera in late May.

Peco’s announcement in May of its intention to clear the encampment sparked a series of events that involved Lepera suggesting he would bus unhoused people to Villanova, where homeless advocate Stephanie Sena works, according to Sena and other advocates.

Lepera, a Democrat who was first elected to the council in 2019 and took over the presidency in January 2022, denied suggesting he would do so.