Residents of homeless encampment along Joe Rodota Trail prepare to relocate

The voice came from inside a tent at the western edge of the latest encampment on Santa Rosa’s Joe Rodota Trail.

“They’re supposed to be here already,” a man named Justin said around 9 a.m. Tuesday, as he tossed sections of worn cardboard out of his shelter in the makeshift village.

Sonoma County officials had raised the possibility that this encampment, occupied by roughly three dozen people, would be cleared out sometime Tuesday.

The trail was closed Friday afternoon between Hampton Way and Dutton Avenue. Officials say they intend to reopen that section by the end of the week.

Fencing off sections of the popular pedestrian and biking trail to deal with such encampments has become a common occurrence.

In the summer of 2020, officials closed a 3-mile segment of the trail for over a month. That move came five months after Sonoma County cleared nearly 300 homeless people from a sprawling encampment, and supervisors agreed to spend up to $12 million to house those people.

As of 4 p.m. Tuesday, no county workers had arrived to evict the residents of the latest bivouac to spring up on the trail, which connects Santa Rosa and Sebastopol.

Aware that it was a possibility, however, most of the three dozen or so occupants, most of whom asked that their full names not be used to protect their privacy, spent the morning going through a process that has become frustratingly familiar: collapsing their tents and tarpaulin shelters, extinguishing warming fires, and packing possessions in carts, bike trailers and backpacks.

By 10:30 a.m., around a dozen people — some from the county, others from nonprofits and agencies who work with those experiencing homelessness — had fanned out to help residents find shelter.

As of 2 p.m., according to Sonoma County public information officer Gilbert Martinez, “15 to 18” of the encampment residents had agreed to move into area shelters, such as Los Guilicos Village in east Santa Rosa.

Workers for FS Global Solutions, a company contracted by the county, distributed plastic bins and collected the residents’ most prized possessions, according to company director Matt Foege. Those items will be stored for 90 days, after which every effort will be made to return them to their owners, he said.

Residents who’d taken their leave left a miscellany of refuse: damaged grocery carts toppled onto their sides, wooden pallets, bamboo poles, unwanted bike wheels and frames, several stuffed animals, a stray crutch, a copy of the book “5-Minute Winnie the Pooh Stories,” a Pringles canister with plenty of chips still inside.

Justin and his wife had previously spent a year and a half in the Los Guilicos Village shelter, but ended up leaving.

“We’re not allowed to go back there now,” said Justin, who expressed the desire to find regular employment.

“But it’s tough to go out and get a job when you’re filthy.”

Asked if he knew where he would be staying that night, he replied, “No idea.”

Nor did Manuel Ramirez, who patrolled the strip on his mountain bike, executing a stylish cyclocross dismount when he saw a neighbor to chat with.

The 61-year-old had one backpack strapped to his shoulders and another to his handlebars. “This is all I got,” he declared. Ramirez has been without permanent housing for a dozen years, and looks forward to turning 63, in 15 months. “I can start getting Social Security.”

“I’m not happy with this life,” he said, “but what can I do?

“Well,” he said, after a pause, “I know what I can do.”

He left that thought hanging in the air.

Chris J., who looks a decade older than his 53 years, and has spent much of the past 23 years without a roof over his head, straddled his bike in the middle of the trail. Strapped to his handlebars was a lunchbox bearing the likeness of Elsa from the movie Frozen.

Sticking to the subject of extreme temperatures, he wondered, “Has it been extra cold, or am I going senile?” No, he was assured, this has been an exceptionally cold — and wet — winter.

On a recent night away from the trail, Chris recalled, he brought a toaster to a nearby gas station. There are some electrical outlets available between 11 p.m. and 4 a.m., “when the tamale people get there.”

To fend off the cold, he would wrap a garment around the appliance, “then just kind of get under a blanket and curl around the toaster,” pushing down the lever that warms it up. One obvious disadvantage: the lever kept popping up, so he spent the night pushing it back down. But at least he stayed warm.

Another night, he spent in a laundromat that was inadvertently left open. He took the opportunity to dry many of his clothes.

Asked if she knew where she was going, once she left the Joe Rodota Trail, a woman named Marissa replied with a smile, “I know I’m going to hell if I don’t pray.”

Her friend, Joe, said he was hoping to be assigned a hotel for a month. “He just got started with a job,” she said. “He needs somewhere he can shower and rest.”

They’d been living in a van, but the rear differential was broken, and the vehicle sprung a leak during the recent monsoon-like rains.

“There was black mold in the van,” said Marissa. So they moved to the trail, which felt something like a family.

“Everyone on this trail — they’re good people,” she said. “We’re all just damaged, you know?”