When compassion gives way to frustration

When the residents of the City Place Lofts condominium complex in downtown Long Beach talk about the dozens of homeless people who congregate daily– and nightly– around their building, they do so with a mix of compassion and frustration.
Among those homeowners are a medical professional and an employee of a local women’s shelter; they’re individuals who have dedicated their careers to helping others. So, when they describe the throng of people who roam Elm Avenue and 4th Street, looking for a safe place to sleep or something to eat, they make it clear that they do sympathize with those who are coping with mental illness and struggling to survive.
However, when the City Place Lofts residents speak about people urinating, defecating, screaming at 2am, smoking crack in stairwells, tossing trash onto the street and engaging in sexual activity atop a mattress on the sidewalk– directly outside the homes with an average listing price of $572,000– the tone changes a bit. Indeed, they acknowledge the difficulties facing those experiencing homelessness, but they are fed up. And they want something done about it.
George Anaya is one of those residents. He also serves as the president of the homeowners association. He and his husband have lived in the condo building for a decade, having moved in shortly after it was constructed.
“We were the second residents moving into the building when the building was brand-new. We knew we were buying in downtown Long Beach and that it was a transition community, but it wasn’t as bad as it is now,” Anaya said. “I mean […] you’re talking about an increase in homeless problems of like 40 to 50 percent [compared] to what it was 10 years ago.”
Anaya described the scene as one in which people climb onto residents’ balconies to urinate and defecate in their planters or just inside the entrance to the underground parking area, in plain view, day and night. He said some are even doing drugs out in the open. It’s also not uncommon to see people lying facedown in the street or on the sidewalk.
“Even if you call the police, there’s nothing they can do,” he said, citing Proposition 47, which, when approved by voters in 2014, reduced non-violent, non-serious crimes to misdemeanors.
Anaya said the condo association’s board has contacted 1st District Councilmember Lena Gonzalez’s office, which did send a representative to meet with them, but that individual advised them to call the police.
“We do, but it is a never-ending game,” Anaya said. “It goes in circles and circles and circles.”
Like Anaya, Rob Ripley has lived in City Place Lofts since it was completed. When asked about what he has observed, Ripley mentioned many of the same issues.
“The main problems that I have witnessed are trash and defecation, not only around the building, but they’ve come into the building, and I’ve run across them sleeping in stairwells,” Ripley said. “They’ve defecated in stairwells.”
One person even broke into one of the condos while then 1st District Councilmember Robert Garcia and then Police Chief Jim McDonnell were in the building for a meeting with residents about such concerns, Ripley said.
“During the meeting, somebody broke into the unit, and they went and took a shower, made dinner and were sitting in the lounge chair, petting [the resident’s] dog, when they came back from the meeting,” Ripley said.
However, he indicated that what seems to be the main ongoing problem is trash, the amount of which he described as “immense,” just after one night.
Then there are the noise disturbances.
“A lot of times, they yell and scream,” he said. “For some reason, 2am seems to be their calling time to do that.”
Ray Holdgrafer, another homeowner in the building, mentioned that same problem– being awakened sometime between 2am and 2:30am by the yelling.
Additionally, Holdgrafer said the cypress tree outside his unit caught fire after someone had tossed a lit cigarette into it.
“They hang out there, smoking,” he said. “And then the [cinder] had gotten into the inside of the cypress tree, and it was like a rocket going off, because of all the dead leaves and branches and everything. That set the alarm off on my patio, and then the whole building was alarmed, and the [residents of the] whole building [were] outside, with four firetrucks.”
What attracts homeless individuals to their block, according to the City Lofts residents, is The MHA Village, a homeless-assistance program of Mental Health America (MHA) of Los Angeles that provides individualized services to persons who are homeless and have mental illness. The facility, which is directly across the street from the condos, specializes in helping individuals who don’t have access to other services. The goal is to connect them to longer-term homeless and mental-health services, according to the Village’s website.
Although the condo building’s residents who spoke to the Signal Tribune this week all expressed compassion for those struggling with homelessness, drug issues and mental-health problems, they also seem to be at a loss for a solution.

A representative from The MHA Village this week, however, said Mayor Robert Garcia’s “Building a Better Long Beach” presentation Tuesday, plus The Village’s plans to relocate its homeless services to a better equipped facility in another neighborhood, are signs of hope in addressing the problems in that area, as well as throughout the city.
Luther Richert, the south-county chief services officer for Mental Health America of Los Angeles, said that all The Village’s services will be moving to 1955 Long Beach Blvd. in May 2019, into a new facility that will have a high-end café that employs formerly homeless people, a garden area, laundry machines, showers and lockers.
In the meantime, many homeless individuals have migrated to the area around The Village because they have been displaced by new developments, Richert said.
“There are a lot of changes going on in Long Beach,” Richert said. “The area around the civic center and Lincoln Park are being renovated. So, a lot of areas where most people used to congregate, right now they can’t go there.”
Richert said, because of new construction, many times homeless people will move to another area, only to be told they cannot stay there either.

“At the real heart of the problem is there’s a housing crisis in all of California, but definitely Long Beach is impacted,” he said. “Our services do house people– we have a great track record of it– but it’s more difficult now than it’s ever been.”
In a phone interview Thursday, Councilmember Gonzalez said that, because she herself lives nearby, she is tied in to what is happening there and can empathize with the discontented homeowners.
“I completely understand where they’re coming from,” she said. “And I would say that this is not just an issue in the East Village, where they live. It’s obviously a citywide issue.”
Nevertheless, the area near The Village is one on which Gonzalez’s office has been working significantly, from various angles, she said, from enlisting the help of the Long Beach Clean Team to remove any garbage or debris from the streets and sidewalks, to working closely with MHA to facilitate its transfer of services as soon as possible to the new facility.
“The City has not only invested $14 million per year,” she said, “but we’re looking at creative options like lockers, where people can leave their belongings, maybe while they’re getting services.”
She also cited the many city programs already in place to assist those experiencing homelessness, such as the Homeless Education And Response Team, as well as faith-based organizations that help.
However, Gonzalez explained, sometimes those individuals do not want help, or they do accept assistance but nevertheless end up back on the street.
“In the 1st District, my district, fortunately or unfortunately– however you look at it– we are the core of social services,” she said. “Just in that small radius alone, we have MHA, Christian Outreach […], Second Samoan Church, Long Beach Rescue Mission, the First Congregational Church– and they’re all providing homeless services. So, I know, in a larger context, people don’t want to hear it, but [those] experiencing homelessness, oftentimes they’re going to be in these areas.”
Regarding drug use or robberies, despite a perception that such crimes are trivial to police, Gonzalez indicated that residents should indeed contact law-enforcement any time they encounter such acts, whether the individuals are homeless or not. She also said city officials have been working with the police department to develop methods of addressing trespassing problems associated with homelessness, but property owners need to get involved too, rather than “turning a blind eye.”
Gonzalez also mentioned that the City is implementing two additional bike-riding police officers, who can easily maneuver in and out of alleys, as well as more officers on the Quality of Life Team. In spite of all the aforementioned programs and services, Gonzalez noted one key area that she sees as problematic.
“I think a big disconnect that the City has […] is a lot of the social-services providers do not talk to each other, unfortunately, and so there’s a lot of overlap of services, where you see a lot of people in one certain area, which happens to be my district,” Gonzalez said. “So, it would be nice for them to be able to have different services on different days, or maybe be a little bit more efficient in the ways they’re providing services to our residents that are most needy. […] Cover more ground and find out a long-term plan, because just feeding them every day, although that is very kind, is not really the end solution to homelessness, as we know. So… more work to be done there.”