Homeless in Venice pose problems for businesses

Eveline Popp lives in a battered recreational vehicle on the streets of Venice.  The 76-year-old woman is at the center of a controversy in the upscale beachside community.

In a non-binding neighborhood election, Venice residents recently voted to restrict overnight parking because the Westside district had become a magnet for people who live in their cars and campers. The plan must be approved by the California Coastal Commission, which has jurisdiction over areas near the beach.

But opponents of the plan say it will punish people such as Popp simply for being homeless. Popp, who lives in her cramped vehicle with her prized puppet collection, said she understands the concerns of residents and business owners. But she said that people living in their vehicles need a place to sleep and that the city has a responsibility to set up special areas for homeless people and their vehicles.

“I think there’s places where we can go,” Popp said.

Venice business owner Paige Clay agrees, saying the city needs to help solve the issue. Clay’s business, Flake restaurant, sits near a hot spot of homelessness and RV parking.  Homeless people  frequently drink on the streets near her business, she said, and gather near several recreational vehicles parked  across the street.

“It’s a safety issue mostly for us and a quality of life issue,” Clay said.

-- Robert J. Lopez

Click here for more coverage of the communities of Los Angeles' Westside, including Westwood, Century City, Bel-Air, Brentwood and Pacific Palisades and the incorporated cities of Santa Monica, Culver City, Beverly Hills and West Hollywood.

Comments

[JimBob]

Right there in the article is the crux of the problem. Ms. Popp sees herself as a homeless person with an RV and puppets. She doesn't mention that she and her fellow HP's engage in public drinking and all that goes with public drinking. If they lived quietly in their RV's, there wouldn't be a problem. Until HP's acknowledge that there's more to their presence in Venice than just unfortunate folks with nowhere else to go, there will be friction.

[FreshMeatz]

Paige Clay needs to get off her ass like 100's of thousand other well off Americans and lend a helping hand, not brush people off like a stray animal. Amazing the people in California are so stuck up with "THEIR" lifestyle they cannot see past the blinding greed.
We are all born "NEEDY"

[geraldine]

Yes, something must be done about the homeless in Venice, while visiting my daughter from the UK, I was appalled with the amount of homeless you have there. I feel sorry for these people, but found it quite frightening to be aproached by them mostly for money, sometimes 6 times a day, it doesn't give a very good impression to the town as especially as a tourist. I believe it is illegal in London to keep on begging, Police there move them on. People do give money however if they are busking(playing music) on the Underground in London. In Venice I found the homeless very well fed, so they must want money for either drugs or drink. I know venice is kind of a crazy place which is quite endearing, but when you want to put trash in a bin it is still quite shocking to find a Homeless person sleeping in a bin, especially in this day and age!

[JS]

Not to be mean, but how is it the "city has a responsibility to set up special areas for homeless people and their vehicles"? Should Venice automatically set aside the concerns of the tax-paying residents for transient homeless simply because they decide to park there? What if they decided to park in Malibu? How about Pomona?

You cannot have rights without responsabilities, and these campers are interfering with residents quality of life, and a business owner's rights to conduct business without undue interference. Call it what you will, but being homeless isn't justification for abrogating your responsability to your fellow man.

The "right thing to do" is to institute parking regulations, and actually enforce them.

[Monkus]

I think it is very disturbing that they urinate and defecate right ouside their RVs right on the sidewalk. It's a health and safety issue. You cannot live in an RV without RV hookups, and there are NO RV hookups on Rose Ave. Most of the RVs run noisy, polluting generators at all hours of the day and night. I think they need to be moved to somewhere where the RVs have access to proper equipment, and not a street where they interfere with business and residents.

[Ben]

It's illegal to sleep in an automobile on a public street in Los Angeles.

No mention of this?

[Bonnie L.]

I could not agree more with JS. I think this business owner was just trying to be politically correct; I don't think any law-abiding taxpaying capitalist American can say that the government should help these people. These people can get jobs, ok? If she has money to buy puppets, shouldn't she have money to pay rent? Or pay rent in a freakin RV park? There's one down the road in Manhattan Beach, just drive your little RV over there and park it in a designated parking place. Sorry grandma, your time in Venice is up.

[Gary McLarty]

We shouldn't punish people for being poor and homeless. Now if you are drinking and drugging in public, than you deserve what you get. Some of you people who look down on these people right now, might one day be in their place. So be careful what you wish on people, because Karma is funny, and one day it can be you. And then you'll be crying and whining. I've talked to these people, and some of them had good lives, but a string of misfortunes put them in their predicament.

[Bev]

As a resident of Venice, once the capital of left wing poets and bleeding heart liberals, I find it somewhat surprising and disappointing that our community can figure out ways to get the 'homeless eyesore" out of our community, yet doesn't provide adequate solutions for dealing with the problem. With the economic downturn only getting worse, many more individuals and families who are living on the edge may well find themselves without shelter. We have an obligation as a community to address the problem of housing and services. If each community would do its fare share, the problem could be significantly alleviated.

[Jason Z]

You have to provide a place for people to live rent free, to escape the 'rent trap' that hurts most people. Getting a job and having a decent place to live should be OPTIONAL in life. One should have the right to live a subsistence existence, in an RV, without hassle. And you're right: it shouldn't be a free place right next to people's houses. It has to be a free place to park away from people. You don't want to make it a DESIRABLE option for people... just an option they can use when they are down-and-out on their luck, or if they truly want to escape the rat race for good.

Let them live on a 'reservation', shanty town, trailer park, favela, whatever you want to call it. Brazil has allowed this for many years, and while its not an IDEAL situation, at least the poor have their own neighborhood (favela) that they can live in... and is governed by its own rules, etc etc

[STEPHANIE]

How about we dump them on skid row like before? Oh wait, thats illegal and no matter what they are not going away. The 'problem' will just get more intense with poor economy and slashed public funds for GR and food stamps. Judging others for their misfortune is sad. You do notknow why they are on the streets. Many have mental health problem.......and the drinking, using drugs, urinating and defecating are just the symptoms of the actual problem. We need to be more compassionate and help those that need it. YES there are some people that "work the system" and ruin it for everybody else. And YES it is hard to get a lot of homeless people to change their ways and get them housing, etc...but thats the hard thing with mental illness. Its just a part of their symptoms. FURTHER, many of these illnesses have gone untreated for yours, so their mental illness has progressed to something worse, more disabled, delusional, whatever. EDUCATE yourselves before you go out and talk about crap you don't understand. I know it's hard to not get caught up in the behaviors of these people, but a lot of them have problems and other issues that humanize them.

[SwankGirlVenice]

Sure... all of these people asking for 'compassion' for these homeless don't have to step over large piles of human feces in the morning.

All of you demanding compassion don't have to worry about drug-crazed homeless people chasing you and your young children around while you're just taking an evening walk.

To everyone who lives in suburbia and doesn't have to deal - on a day to day basis - with insane, drug addicted homeless people sleeping and turning tricks and hosting drug parties in RVs parked less than 100 feet from your sleeping children I say: STFU.

I live about 100 feet from the intersection of Bernard Avenue and Rose Avenue - around the corner from Flake restaurant highlighted in this blog.

Unless and until you have first-hand experience with the HAVOC that our neighborhood has to deal with, stop with your demands for compassion.

Better yet... why not invite these people to live in front of your house, dump their feces and urine in front of your house and discard their spent drug gear in front of your house.

Then we can see how COMPASSIONATE and EDUCATED you are.

Ugh.

[MS]

The homeless have caused enough problems in Venice. There are plenty of other places they could go park their RVs in L.A., such as the West Valley, or even better, on some street in Lancaster or Palmdale where all the houses are foreclosed anyways. I'm sick to death of having to deal with them leaving their feces and dirty needles on my street and it's time for them to get the hell out of Venice

[GG]

I've lived in Venice for 13 yrs and I live on a street that has dozens of of RV's and people living in their cars. The city has ignored this issue for years and it's just gotten worse. What I find most upsetting is the City of LA seem to be able to find the money to build a new skate park down on the boardwalk but do nothing about the homeless problem. I don't know what the answer is but I too am tired of the constant smell of urine and feces along with occasioan harassment from the homeless.

[showbiz1]

This whole thing is ridiculous. The problem in Venice and along Rose have been existing since the mid '80's when the term "Skid Rose" was coined.

These camper dwellers are no different than they were then; mostly bums and freeloaders, appealing to the soft side of the "limousine liberals" who populate Venice.

Also interesting is that the person profiled (Ms. Popp) is a direct relative of well known leftist and homeless lawyer, Elena Popp, who obviously planted this story with the Times to advance her agenda of having the homeless take over Venice.

Her next step is probably to get Venice returned to the indigenous peoples who lived here before the evil Europeans came.....

[stewart]

yikes! I drive a limo and own a motorhome that I stor in a storage yard...I am so confused now