The homeless are no longer out of sight, out of mind in Cupertino. An estimated 20 homeless people are encamped in plain sight along two narrow roadside stretches of land on the east side of N. Wolfe Road, between Homestead Road and Stevens Creek Boulevard.
Beginning around late February, blue tarps, tents, overloaded grocery carts, suitcases, chairs, plastic water jugs, propane gas tanks, camp stoves, ice coolers, bicycles, stuffed animals and an American flag have lined the roadway near the on and off ramps of Highway 280.
The two homeless camps are in poignant contrast to Apple’s flagship headquarters just a stone’s throw away. The multi-story Hamptons Apartment Homes and luxury hotels are within close view.
“We understand that many city residents are concerned about this situation,” said Cupertino Mayor Steven Scharf. “We are as well and are focused on the safety of both the community and the unhoused people in the encampments.”
One encampment is on Caltrans property, under the jurisdiction of the California Department of Transportation. The other is on City of Cupertino property.
“It’s a complex situation that we’re trying to address to the satisfaction of all,” said Deborah L. Feng, the Cupertino native who has been City Manager since June of 2019.
The Center for Disease Control advises that clearing homeless encampments can increase the potential for infectious disease spread. Its guidelines state that if individual housing options are not available, people living unsheltered or in encampments on public property are to remain and shelter where they are.
People are thought to have migrated to Wolfe Road after being displaced from camps elsewhere that were disbanded before the shelter in place order.
In a legal show of compassion, in September of 2018, the U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, which governs West Coast states, ruled that people cannot be criminalized for sleeping outside on public property in the absence of adequate alternatives. It would violate the Eighth Amendment ban on cruel and unusual punishment.
“Our goal is still to get [the homeless] moved safely and to a safer place,” said Feng. Moving them to hotels, however, would be at the expense of the City.
In the meantime, to ensure sanitary conditions both for the health and well-being of the encampment members and of those living nearby, on June 11 the City of Cupertino placed a portable toilet and a handwashing station in each camp. The City covers the monthly rental and servicing fee of about $1,500, plus twice weekly trash removal by Recology.
This installation was not possible until a safe location was determined. Sufficient space is needed to allow waste and trash removal trucks to pull off Wolfe Road, out of the flow of traffic, to service the units.
Also, social organizations offer optional services, including COVID-19 testing. A Santa Clara County Sheriff’s Department officer checks daily on the camps.
Feng says that the City continues to work with CalTrans, the Santa Clara County Office of Supportive Housing and other organizations to find solutions to the complex situation.
“We know that we need to come up with a long term solution and are working toward that end,” said Sharf.
View Comments (31)
So many things in this article or not true. I live at this encampment. The comments from the mayor and city officials are a joke. You want the real story then actually come and talk to someone that lives here. We live next to one of the biggest company in the world! In a city that sits in the heart of a Trillion Dollar Economy! There is a total of 10 people among the 2 camps. So how is this an acceptable response?
(Our goal is still to get [the homeless] moved safely and to a safer place,” said Feng. Moving them to hotels, however, would be at the expense of the City.)
This city has never tried to work with us in any kind of meaningful way. Time and time again we have been brushed aside and attempted to be forced out of the city all together. Some of the people here were born and raised right here in this city, a few streets down to be exact. This situation isn't ideal for anyone including us. I would love nothing more than to be able to wake up in a home like a normal person, not because several cars decide to lean on there horns at the crack of dawn everyday.
I'm not some bum or vagrant. Or a drug addict committing crimes and breaking the law to get high. I attended DeAnza College right down the street. I have been a tax paying working member of Santa Clara County since I was 13 years old with a work permit. So please tell me. How am I any different than anyone else other than the fact that I fell hard times. Trying to get back is harder than you could ever imagine especially when no one cares about you.
"It's easy to look down on someone, but it takes hard work to help build someone up"
Also I am paid 600 dollars a day by developers but they told me not to say that
It’s a fact that there are 2 criminals and ones a sex offender
I am happy to give you $6000 if you pack up and move your fucking camps to outside of our mayor's home.
Hello Troy. I was born here and was homeless myself earlier this year, underage, and given little help from anyone other than my high school at the time. I want to write a paper to bring more awareness to the issues going on and I would like to interview you in order to do so. With Covid-19 being an issue right now, I would like to give you my email for you to write and tell me about your experience and story so I can include parts of it in my paper. Please respond to this message or email me at relgrand@gmail.com if you would be willing to do this interview, and if not I would totally understand.
Who do you think you are? Get a job like the rest of us. Do something to help yourself rather than live on the street & beg people for money. Go to the County office & ask for help! Lazy bums!!!
What a joke. They aren't bums, derelicts, unemployed, drug users ... they're "unhoused people".
The 9th Circuit says it would be cruel and inhumane to stop them from setting up tents wherever they want and poo and pee on the ground.
I say they should be allowed to camp. But only on the front yards of city officials who choose to do nothing.
This Is a manufactured homeless crisis. I’ve walked the block and there are shelters available yet they choose not to go to a shelter. There is no one at that camp that was from Cupertino prior to Feb 2020 or pre Covid. Some groups are trying to put their fascist Marxist points on good suburban communities. Cupertino does not have a homeless problem. The Homeless chose to camp there. Rich developers like Peter Pau, who drive up the price of housing, should help by putting the homeless safely on the Vallco site while he’s stuck diguring out how to build his office buildings will get bums for his Arab and Chinese money men.
This Is a manufactured homeless crisis. I’ve walked the block and there are shelters available yet they choose not to go to a shelter. There is no one at that camp that was from Cupertino prior to Feb 2020 or pre Covid. Some groups are trying to put their fascist Marxist points on good suburban communities. Cupertino does not have a homeless problem. The Homeless chose to camp there. Rich developers like Peter Pau, who drive up the price of housing, should help by putting the homeless safely on the Vallco site while he’s stuck diguring out how to build his office buildings will get bums for his Arab and Chinese money men.
The fault with the story is that makes it look like a Cupertino issue, but the encampment looks similar to ones I have seen in Santa Clara, Sunnyvale, and smaller than the ones in San Jose over my 40 years. No doubt that Cupertino residents care about their city and are relieved to know that the city is working on the issue. It is a difficult problem if you have empathy toward other human beings.
Apple should probably hire the unhoused people for cushy security job or janitors 24 hours 7 days a week provide them basic needs such as utilized huge useless parking space for shelter, empty fitness gym for body hygiene, food for no employees in use amid pandemic Mac Cafe, those of you would potentially have a good fortune, the world prestige Cupertino base company better take measure a humanized community service for the global heart warming by doing so. It’s all good luck.
I doubt "Troy" actually lives there, otherwise he wouldn't be posting a response right when the story was published! This story posts the morning of August 13, and he's the first to comment a few hours later. Probably someone trolling from his cushy home on his $2000 MacBook Pro.
Interesting, Cupertino has a handful of people living in a homeless camp, they set up sanitary facilities in a sign of compassion, and it makes the news. San Jose kicks them out along the same stretch of Hwy 280 a few minutes away, but that doesn't make the news.
Yes. Same individuals were living on the developers land just off 280 and Wolf. All they did was moved across the street. Developers put up lights in that corner as a deturent.
If you live in the area you also see men riding bikes late at night from the camps conducting strang activities. Many neighbors have on surveillance.