August 14th, 2024

​Closure of the Castro RV Encampment, 2020-2023:  A Perspective

Author: Daniel Barth, Executive Director

On June 30th, the last residents of the Castro RV Encampment moved into housing. Finally cleared, the paved city lot was fenced in with new gates arriving, and security still patrolling it. On Monday July 2nd, a 10-member SOS Streets Team removed the last 12,000 pounds of encampment debris, working against the clock before barricades sealed it shut.

But Castro is really about its survivors. Three of the four young men in the photo below lived and survived in the Castro RV encampment. Each has moved to permanent housing, and their lives continue to unfold with new, greater possibilities. They can now sustain their housing in part because of their employment with SOS. These three young people are enrolling in the YouthWORKS work experience program and have begun this journey. They are being prepared to provide security for the upcoming Richmond Tiny House Pilot project next to RPAL and GRIP, breaking ground in July. ​

Rising Stars: Outreach team member and youth ambassador Mernard Washington, with Joel (age 29), Salvador (age 20), and Michael (age 22) taking time away from their homes at Castro to prepare for their presentation to the Richmond Reimagining Public Safety Community Task Force in May 2023.

But what was Castro? For three years the encampment was Richmond’s largest. It quickly grew in 2020 as a place of last resort. In time, the encampment became too large, unwieldy and unsafe, and the City of Richmond raised $4.8M of State funds to “resolve” it. Most of the funding was dedicated to transitioning residents into housing (paid for one year) and to provide for security until the encampment’s closure. The encampment was never secure. The housing is only temporary. 

​In 2020, following a neighborhood outcry about RVs parked on residential streets, a local elected official sought answers and asked SOS to intervene. Within 72 hours, SOS convinced a half dozen RVs to move from the curbside. A few RV households were already situated underneath Richmond Parkway, and it soon became the location for the future Castro RV encampment. 
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This site had already been a safe haven for a group of car thieves who stole cars and brought them here, “chopped them up” for parts and left the carcasses. City agencies removed 13 abandoned vehicles, making space for RVs to get off the streets and into an informal but nonetheless dedicated area. SOS cleaned the mess and surrounding area of intense illegal dumping.

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The lifeblood of this encampment was a community culture that persevered through the violence, fires, and criminal activity and found a safe haven.

We Are Family: Castro residents in 2022 – people who called this home and their community. 

Castro became a home for more than 100 people at one time. Castro was a community – rife with risk – but still a place where people could find something that bonded them together. 

Neighborhood: Castro in 2022, straddling the SF Bay Trail.

As with the Rydin RV Encampment, SOS first attempted community organizing to facilitate the establishment of “community agreements” for maintaining order and safety and improving living conditions in the growing encampment. But the encampment as a whole was not receptive.

Instead SOS took a 1:1 approach to improve lives, employing 17 Castro residents over the three year period to invest in a process that could model for others and deliver resources essential for survival, such as drinking water, handwashing stations, showers, toilets, trash removal, laundry, food, clothing, fire extinguishers, and RV weatherproofing.

​Health Ambassador outreach services in partnership with LifeLong Medical Care have been engaged since January 2023 with great impact on building trusted relationships. Care management support will next keep connections with households now in housing. A “Personal Vision” 8-week curriculum will engage housed and unhoused residents in personal goal setting, a partnership with Community Housing Development Corporation. Richmond WORKS will provide work experience and career opportunities for housed and unhoused residents.

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​Over time the RVs became unsuitable for habitation, and the households experienced similar traumatic symptoms: RV degradation (rats eating vehicle wires, fires, forced entry, overuse, weathering) and the loss of control over the environment became indicative of the unsustainability of living without the protections of a stable, safe, and secure community.

​To curb the critical safety issues at Castro, some 25 city-led cleanups were conducted with police, fire, public works, code enforcement and traffic enforcement all present to move the dial toward safety. Agencies met with community partners several times each week to move Castro toward resolution.

SOS staff planning a clean-up event.

​Castro's resolution began in the second half of 2022, and it was led by city agencies and community-based partners. The former residents of Castro were helped – household by household – into housing. RVs were bought back by the City of Richmond and towed away to be destroyed.

Every day in 2023, culminating in the large-scale effort through June, the partners focused on each household’s transition into housing. One by one, residents packed their belongings and moved.

Home Removed: On June 29th, Mario moved from his truck into housing in Richmond.

It is not enough to achieve dignified, stable, safe and sustainable permanent housing. People need inclusion and belonging in a peer community. Castro residents “belonged” and have shown their pride in this sense of belonging. As a dispersed community, where is the belonging? SOS’s ongoing outreach will try to keep tabs and understand this question for each household. 

Access to even temporary housing is difficult in West County, where SOS has identified 89 encampment areas of significance (encampments of larger numbers in a stable location). When SOS recently counted the people in El Sobrante, for example, it roughly counted 150. All in need of housing support. Meanwhile, the County published a total count of 5 people in El Sobrante in 2023’s Point In Time encampment assessment. No wonder people feel neglected and tossed away. They are literally not even counted.

SOS currently conducts an Encampment Mapping project to identify these key encampment areas, the number of inhabitants in each location, and a Fire Safety Risk Rating for each locale’s conditions. SOS will eventually establish a connection with many or most of these residents and will supportively track their residency locations, and stay connected even after they secure housing. 

Recognizing people for who they are is the only way to create and maintain ongoing, trusted relationships. It’s possible by the plain act of Peers Helping Peers. Regardless of where people live, in a tent or in housing, ongoing connection is essential for supporting a sense of belonging and deepening a Community of Care approach. We cannot wait for institutions to show up. As neighbors across the housing line, we all – housed and unhoused neighbors alike – have responsibility to work together to address homelessness. ​

Peers Helping Peers: SOS passed out tarps donated by the city during the heavy rains. As a result of making consistent contact, Joel (center; 2nd in intro photo) connected with SOS so he can support his wife and newborn. 

​Former residents of Castro must adjust to new conditions of housing and improve their long-deferred health, incomes, and build a sense of purpose beyond day-to-day survival. The real test of time, and the most important challenge, is for each former resident of Castro to live in a community of connections and trusting relationships. 

This is still a struggle for former Rydin residents whose encampment was resolved 10 months ago. Whether former Castro residents live tonight in housing, or they are dispersed to other encampments due to being ineligible for city support, the Castro diaspora will need new ways to feel a sense of belonging among peers and neighbors. An encampment’s resolution is only a beginning.

We are not only survivors, we are Stewards for Change.