SMART cleaning up tracks ahead of train service

Concealed by a railroad overcrossing in west Petaluma, a small makeshift camp cluttered with the charred remains of a cooking fire, sleeping bags, a deteriorating boom box and discarded Christmas lights sat empty on an early spring afternoon. Accessible by a steep grade, the space is one of the last holdouts for a transient population that had long called the land along the tracks home, transit officials say.

As Sonoma-Marin Area Rail Transit officials gear up for the spring launch of the North Bay’s first commuter rail service in decades, the agency’s Code Compliance Officer Samuel Castillo patrols the tracks daily in search of homeless people seeking refuge along the right-of-way or locals flouting the rules to cross the tracks as a shortcut.

When Castillo joined SMART in September with the launch of the code compliance department, he said he’d frequently encounter shelters or residents trespassing while walking their dogs. Walking along the empty tracks Monday, he pointed to sturdy chain link fencing erected by the rail agency and a proactive approach in conjunction with local homeless service providers and law enforcement as deterrents. As many as three people live in the camp under the railroad, but he said regular patrol keeps numbers down.

Testing of the trains is ongoing, and though the conductor can sound the horn and apply a brake, he said it’s difficult to hear the train that travels at speeds of up to 79 miles an hour, prompting an enforcement approach centered on education.

“The code enforcement officers have been pretty proactive in getting people off of the tracks and educating people about the danger,” he said.

Castillo opts first for verbal warnings about safety and trespassing before turning to citations and, ultimately, arrests, he said. SMART works with officers from Petaluma Police Department’s Homeless Outreach Service Team, known as HOST, who make arrests and log camps into tracking software. Castillo said he’s only issued one citation, while police made three arrests in the Petaluma area in the past three months, primarily for outstanding warrants, he said.

Farther along the track from the first encampment sits an abandoned and heavily vandalized SUV situated near another camp he said is just outside of SMART’s jurisdiction and is a magnet for nefarious activity. Responsibility for areas outside of the rail service’s right-of-way falls in the hands of other agencies or private property owners, and SMART works with those agencies for cleanups, he said.

“Most of the work is done,” he said, adding that this stretch of tracks is the “last headache.”

However, HOST officer Ryan DeBaeke, who also frequently works in the area by the tracks, said a handful of troublesome camps remain despite his department’s requests for SMART to clean them up. He’s built relationships with the homeless population he encounters across the city and often enlists their help to clean up, but at least five camps of the dozens that once dotted the tracks still remain, he said. He plans to document the leftover camps in the right-of-way and present the findings in a meeting with his department and SMART, he said.

“I think we have a decent handle on it. I know 99 percent of the homeless people in this town. I know where they live, I know where they hang out and I’ve gotten it to a manageable point. The issue is getting rid of those camps and getting that cleaned up,” he said.

DeBaeke also focuses on connecting the homeless population with services, including COTS’ Mary Isaak Center. Castillo said he also attends a monthly HOST meeting with homeless service providers and law enforcement agencies to identify long-term solutions.

COTS’ CEO Mike Johnson said SMART has reached out about identifying ways to divert more people from the tracks and into the service net, including the shelter or a sobriety program. He said those partnerships help his agency to connect with a population that might otherwise be difficult to reach, and the efforts come at a time when homelessnesses in the county and Petaluma are declining. In 2016, 2,906 homeless individuals were counted in the county.

“Homelessness is down by 30 or 35 percent in the county overall, and we’ve had more than twice that decline locally, mostly due to the partnerships we have and engaging people out there and the software that tracks them,” he said.

Jennifer Welch, SMART’s chief of police, said the agency “has a good handle” on the process of clearing debris from around the tracks while combating trespassing issues, and she’s also seeking to hire another code compliance officer.

“Homelessness and trespassing will be ongoing issues. It’s a matter of being diligent and ensuring that we’re getting the safety message out there,” she said.