How the city’s changing homelessness strategy is on display at Lake Merritt
City workers and crews spent the month of April working to close homeless encampments in “all parks, city assets, and walkways” around Lake Merritt. At press time on April 28, some lakeside encampments remained intact, with city-posted operations continuing through May 2.
“I just was taken from another encampment off of Northgate…So we came over here. Now we’re moving again,” said Michelle, a resident of the encampment along the Oakland Estuary in Peralta Park. “ I’m going on faith. I mean, that’s all I can do…Just praying to God that he’ll open up a door somewhere.”
Some of these closures were scheduled to make way for a fencing and tree-planting project, the city told The Oaklandside. However, the large-scale operation also provides a window into Oakland’s changing homelessness strategy, which is increasingly oriented toward encampment closures.
According to the city’s open data platform—which tracks encampment management operations from 2021 to 2025—the number of encampment closures in Oakland has steadily increased since the Supreme Court’s ruling in Grants Pass v. Johnson last summer.
The Supreme Court’s decision, announced in June 2024, concluded that cities and states can criminalize people for sleeping outside without offers of alternative shelter, which quickly ushered in a nationwide wave of updated encampment enforcement policies. In July, Governor Gavin Newsom announced that California cities would risk losing state funding if they did not develop new strategies for encampment removal.
Before Grants Pass, Oakland’s encampment interventions varied between “deep cleanings”—in which residents temporarily vacate an encampment site for city-scheduled trash removal—and full or partial closures, which stipulated that the city would offer alternative shelter for displaced residents. But in September 2024, three months after the Grants Pass ruling, former mayor Sheng Thao’s issued an executive order which directed city workers to “implement a plan to close all encampments” deemed an “emergency,” and stated, “in no case, will emergency or urgent closures be delayed for shelter unavailability.”
While city data shows a total of 34 encampment closures between September and December 2023, that number jumped to 154 closures during the same four-month period in 2024—immediately following Thao’s order. In comparison, the city has focused entirely on full closures this year. There were 96 closures in January and February combined, the only two months for which data is currently available.
The City of Oakland did not respond to multiple requests for comment by email or phone. Street Spirit will update the web version of this story if we receive a response.
Michelle’s experience of undergoing two recent encampment sweeps mirrors Oakland’s new closure strategy. After spending a year and a half living in the Community Cabins—a city-sponsored transitional housing program—Michelle told Street Spirit she was exited after not finding a job or housing match during her allotted time within the program.
“I was document-ready, but they only gave me one housing match,” Michelle said. She explained that did not qualify for this housing because her income was too low. “You have to always navigate for your own housing. And a lot of people don’t know that. But you have to always look for additional housing besides [what] the program [offers].”
After being exited from the cabins, she moved to a large encampment near 23rd Street and Martin Luther King Jr. Way. That encampment was closed last September in a multi-day operation that coincided with Thao’s executive order.
The city had planned to offer its residents placements in a new transitional housing program at the Jack London Inn, using funding from a state-funded Encampment Resolution Fund grant. However, the city withdrew their plans for the Jack London Inn due to complaints from neighbors in the area. As a result, many residents—like Michelle—simply moved to other encampments.
Though the frequency of encampment closures is steadily increasing, the number of homeless people in Oakland continues to outpace the amount of available shelter. According to Thao’s executive order in September of last year, the city has developed and funded approximately 1,200 emergency shelter and transitional housing beds, 280 Safe RV Parking spaces, and 600 permanent homeless housing units since 2020. In turn, the 2024 Alameda County Point-in-Time count shows that there are at least 5,490 unhoused people living within Oakland city limits.
Encampments residents around Lake Merritt are aware of these discrepancies, and remain concerned about the lack of shelter available to them once they are displaced. Advocates estimate that there are about 50 people living in various encampment communities around the lake. During the sweeps in April, many of these residents expressed their desire to move indoors.
“As far as I know, all they’re really [offering] now is the tiny homes…But that’s limited because there’s only so many of them,” said James, who lives on the east side of the Oakland Estuary.
In the middle of April, James said he put his name on a list so the city would know he was interested in moving to a Community Cabin site, but worried he would not be selected. The city spent the first week of April closing the encampment on the west side of the Estuary, and James and others felt that by the time they reached the east side, there would be no more cabins available.
Other residents mentioned that they had lost trust in the city’s transitional housing programs after having bad experiences in the past.
“I’ve been through the sheds [Community Cabins] a couple times. It leads nowhere,” said Aidan Wells, who lived on the west side of the Estuary. “ When you in the sheds, they’re very selective of who gets resources,” he said, noting that it can be difficult to get things like food, water, and blankets, let alone to connect with housing navigators that can help you move into permanent housing. “It’s always better out here versus being promised something that you don’t get,” he explained. “Can’t nobody take outside from you.”
At press time, Michelle was one of at least four Lake Merritt encampment residents who were offered shelter in the city’s Community Cabin program.
“ It’s pretty much they give you a six month program, you know, help you find a job, stuff like that,” she explained. “We’ll take a chance with that to see how it works this time. ‘Cause I’ve been through this before, so hopefully I’ll go more for the win this time, to [get into] permanent housing.”
Others, like Aidan, simply moved to other parts of the lake. Uncertain about whether or not the city would complete its closure of the lakeside encampments, he expressed anxiety and concern.
“I’ve been through damn near a lot of these sweeps,” he says.“ We just asking that they try to come compromise instead of just like, [throwing] us to the wayside. Because it’s hard for us to find a place.”
Alastair Boone is the Director of Street Spirit and a beat reporting fellow for KALW covering homelessness.