City Clears Blankets, Clothes from Downtown St. Louis Homeless Encampment

City workers on Wednesday hauled away blankets and clothing from a homeless encampment in downtown.

Wet and food-spoiled items lining the sidewalk west of the New Life Evangelistic Center homeless shelter on Locust Street have become a public health concern, says Department of Human Services Director Eddie Roth.

Wearing rubber gloves, he helped sort through the piles, leaving luggage and other belongings as he separated out comforters, sheets and blankets soaked by recently melted snow. Workers packed those items in clear plastic bags bound for a city storage facility. Roth says people will have 30 days to call Human Services at 314-657-1704 and claim any of the seized belongings.

The encampments, long a point of contention between New Life and neighbors, were the epicenter of a recent rash of synthetic marijuana or K2 overdoses, authorities say. The center's founder, the Rev. Larry Rice, has said the city unfairly linked the encampments and the overdoses to New Life as a way to push his organization out of the gentrifying neighborhood.

Read more: http://www.riverfronttimes.com/newsblog/2016/12/22/city-clears-blankets-clothes-from-homeless-encampment