Denver officials closed the park adjacent to the Colorado Capitol on Wednesday, fearing diseases, bites and more from a rat infestation that grew worse as tents popped up in the area.
“Human and animal waste, drug paraphernalia, food waste … it’s making the conditions unsafe,” said Ann Cecchine-Williams, deputy executive director of the Denver Department of Public Health and Environment. “We’ll reopen the park when it’s safe for people to be here again.”
The closure at Lincoln Park is likely to last weeks and it could spread to Civic Center directly west across Broadway, though there aren’t any current plans to close that park, Cecchine-Williams said. In the meantime dozens of people who have been living in Lincoln Park in tents and makeshift shelters for the past few weeks will have to go.
Once the park is cleared, the department can coordinate with state officials and private contractors to assess the damage and figure out how to eliminate the rat infestation, she said.
Cecchine-Williams pointed to a rat hole near the base of a tree and a nearby bagel on the ground with small bites missing. Food waste like that has sustained the rodents, and the concern is that they could spread diseases through their feces and human contact, among other ways.
Rat bites also pose a serious risk, said department spokesperson Tammy Vigil.
“One of our employees said it’s the worst she’s seen,” Vigil said of the infestation.
While sidewalks on the perimeter of the park will remain open, nobody will be allowed to cross through the area.
Alice Fox, who has been living in the park for more than a week, said she couldn’t argue with the closure. Many living there fail to clean up after themselves.
But the rats are worse closer to the 16th Street Mall, Fox said, and she doubts anybody can stop the infestation.
As police collected drug paraphernalia from a nearby tent and Department of Transportation and Infrastructure staff swept the sidewalks, Fox shrugged and said she knows exactly where she’ll go.
“I have some special family that I can go see in the woods,” she said. “It’s better just to go where they’re unheard, unseen and they’re safe.”
Felicia Sena wrapped herself in a blanket and cried as crews cleaned through the area. She doesn’t know where she’ll go yet.
“Home,” Sena said, wiping a tear. “Just joking.”
Those who camped in the park had become like family, Sena said. But now it’s everybody for themselves.
She considered the encampment and the position those living there must now face.
“It doesn’t look good, it probably doesn’t smell nice, but as a city … is that how you treat people?” Sena said.
Fox and others began camping out as close as half a block from the Capitol in the weeks since a Denver County judge ruled against the city’s urban camping ban and police stopped enforcing the ordinance. City Attorney Kristin Bronson previously said her office would likely tell police to resume enforcement this week.
In that time, however, conditions deteriorated at the park and the rat population shot up, Cecchine-Williams said. Citizens complained.
Typically with camp cleanups, like those that took place at 24th, 25th, Stout and Lawrence streets last week, the city is required to give a week’s notice. Advance notice was not necessary in this case because the cleanup is taking place in response to a public health risk rather than blocked sidewalks, Vigil said.
Cecchine-Williams said Wednesday’s cleanup is the third of its kind in Denver since October 2018.
Representatives of Denver Homeless Out Loud, a local nonprofit advocating for people experiencing homelessness, disagreed with the characterization of what happened Wednesday morning.
“Don’t be fooled … this is a sweep,” the organization wrote on Twitter. “They will use any means necessary not to see the results of their poor public policy concerning housing.”
“It’s about finding any excuse to push poor people out of (sight),” the organization added.
Editor’s note: A previous version of this story incorrectly identified Lincoln Park.
