Crime & Safety

Homeless in Strongsville: City Gets its Share of Vagrants

Police called to deal with people camping in woods, panhandling for money, but say it isn't an epidemic here

In May, Strongsville police flushed two different men out of the wooded area near the Ehrnfelt Recreation Center and Strongsville Library.

The first had erected a fort and seemed prepared to live there. Witnesses spotted him lying on a cot with his laundry hanging around him.

His campsite was found when his cooking fire spread. Police asked him to move on, but he returned a few days later.

A week after that, people started reporting another man hanging around the library and playground area, a pile of belongings stashed under a picnic table.

In the last year or two, people have also been found sleeping in a carport at an apartment, in a backyard shed and in an underground bunker.

Panhandlers have hung around Walmart with signs or pleas for gas money.

But Strongsville police say homelessness has not become a major problem here.

"Most (homeless) people we deal with are the same people we've had around for years," Detective Lt. John Janowski said. "None have really caused that much trouble."

Some of those drifting around town looking for a place to sleep are young adults tossed of out their parents' homes.

Others are passing through, looking for shelter for the night at one of the motels on the north end of Pearl Road.

"People like to come to Strongsville because we have vouchers," Janowski said. "The Salvation Army will pay for a night in a motel. Other cities don't have hotels that will take them."

Police Chief Jim Kobak said he hasn't seen an increase in homeless people around town lately.

"I think the motels at the north end of town tend to attract some people," Kobak said.

He said he heard of one man who saves his money for a motel in the winter. "As soon as the weather gets nice, he stays outside, moving from place to place," he said.

An while it's not legal to camp in a Strongsville park, there's nothing preventing someone from spending the day in one.

"If they're on public land, you can't just forbid them to be there," Kobak said. "You've got to be careful. They have rights, too."

And while the unsteady economy has caused people around the nation to lose their jobs and homes, that hasn't translated to homeless people in Strongsville.

"We haven't come across anybody who was a stockbroker who lost his job and is now homeless," Janowski said. "Most weren't really contributing members of society in the first place."


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