The Emeryville Tattler: Mohamed Alaoui

Police Rousts Homeless Camp

$13,000 Spent on Boulder Field

City Hall Refuses to Explain

Accountability and Transparency Vacates Emeryville With the Homeless People

Humane Policies Out, Boulders and Secrecy In

News Analysis

Late in April, Emeryville's police quietly rousted a small group of homeless people camped on a City owned piece of land on 40th Street behind City Hall so it could place $13,000 worth of boulders there. The uprooted homeless people have not returned, probably because the taxpayer funded boulders are so tightly spaced that a human body cannot recline between them. We say ‘probably’ because all we've been able to get by way of an explanation from officials at City Hall about this lavishly funded public work is a 'no comment'. Are the boulders just dumped there, waiting to be assembled in some way? They're not saying. Is this field of boulders indicative of a new policy about how the City deals with homeless people? Again, they're not saying.

Even though the City refuses to say anything about it, the barren, seemingly inconsequential triangular shaped plot of public land along 40th Street at Hollis Street has become emblematic and revelatory of Emeryville’s real policy about homeless people. The City has long downplayed implications about the lack of homeless encampments within its borders, especially when compared with neighboring cities and they've even gone as far as to claim the lack of encampments here proves the efficacy and humaneness of its homeless policy. However the April homeless clearance on 40th Street and the accompanying $13,000 boulder field raises questions not easily dismissed by a button lipped City Hall.

Mohamed Alaoui
Emeryville's Public Works Director
"No comment" he says about the boulder field.
The people don't have a right to know.

Through a State of California enforced public records request, the Tattler was able to find that the police department cleared out the homeless camp on the orders of City Hall. The clearing out of the undesirable people was the City’s part of a contract with Rubicon Landscaping of Richmond, a company the City regularly uses for its landscaping needs. For this project, Rubicon billed Emeryville $12,976 for the placement of 21 tons of gravel and 14 pallets of ‘double head’ boulders, the public records request revealed. Anything beyond that, the City of Emeryville has refused to account for. The lack of a chain of command paper trail hints the City Council was not likely a direct part in this decision. Rather, it was probably made administratively by the city manager or the director of the Public Works Department.

Still, the people have a right to know, especially because they paid for this. Why are these boulders needed? Who decided this? How long will the boulders be on the people's property? Was any consideration made to how the boulders look? What happened to the homeless people formerly camped there the public paid to roust? The City of Emeryville refuses to answer these or any questions about this other than the firm 'no comment' from Public Works Director Mohamed Alaoui.

Welcome to Emeryville: All are Welcome Here
*except homeless people

The stark difference between Oakland and Berkeley versus Emeryville has for years been expressed in the large number of homeless camps just outside the city's boundaries compared with the total lack of camps within Emeryville. Council members and staff until now, have been quick to explain the difference is that Emeryville’s homeless policies are good and effective at gently steering homeless people to government recourses including bed facilities. The police department here has always denied that homeless people are rousted. To those who have asked about it, the answer up until now has always been that Emeryville is good and humane, leaving that Berkeley and Oakland, with their homeless encampments, must be bad and inhumane. However, the April call to roust the homeless people at the 40th Street site and the new field of boulders placed there calls this longstanding explanation into question.

The questions persist. Why won’t the City be forthcoming about this? Is this reflective of a new anti-homeless policy or is it the City just got caught this time? Rubicon Landscaping charged Emeryville a lot of money for this. Were there other bids to supply the boulders? Did Rubicon get a sweetheart backroom deal? Is the City hiding something here? Where did the money to pay for this come from? Were federal Covid-19 funds or other such inappropriate funds used to purchase these boulders? How are these boulders placed on our land representative of Emeryville values? The answers to these questions about the people's business will not be answered by those doing the people’s business at City Hall. But the Tattler will keep trying to shed light into this and forcing them to account.