Salinas council advances camping and storage ordinance changes, adopts administrative procedures amid heated public comment

The Salinas City Council on Feb. 3 advanced amendments to Chapter 16 of the municipal code governing camping and storage of personal property on public property and adopted an accompanying resolution that updates administrative clean-up procedures.

Assistant City Manager Lisa Murphy framed the ordinance changes as an effort to align local rules with recent court standards, operational experience and the governor’s recommended best practices. Key proposed changes include removing the prior allowance that permitted camping from 7 p.m. to 7 a.m., prohibiting camping within 25 feet of critical infrastructure and reducing the notice period for removal of encampments from 72 hours to 48 hours.

Murphy emphasized the city’s combined strategy — prevention, outreach (including the SORT team), shelter options, collaboration with nonprofits, and encampment cleanup — and told the council that roughly $57.6 million in grant funding has been expended on homelessness-related programs in recent years. Keisha Lopez, the city’s homeless services manager, described operational steps for outdoor cleanups: targeted outreach, bin days to allow packing, an optional storage form for belongings and a retrieval window before disposal.

The public comment period was lengthy and sharply divided. Medical professionals and homelessness advocates urged caution, asked for more data, and called for evidence-based alternatives (sanctioned encampments, tiny-home villages and expanded substance-use treatment). Several speakers cited studies they said link involuntary displacement to increased ER visits and deaths. Others — including business owners and residents from neighborhoods with large encampments — urged stronger enforcement to protect public health, public safety, and business operations.

Council members expressed the same tension in different terms: several supported the ordinances as tools to address public-health and safety hazards (trash, human waste, fire risk, and obstruction of public ways), while others pressed staff to provide more data and asked for rapid exploration of alternatives such as sanctioned encampments and tiny-home sites. The council added a direction asking city staff to coordinate an intergovernmental homelessness summit and to return with additional data. The ordinance vote will require a second reading at a future meeting; the council adopted the updated administrative procedures by majority vote during the meeting.

What happens next: The ordinances will return for a second reading and final adoption at a future council meeting. Staff will also plan the intergovernmental summit and bring back more detailed data on costs, service activity, and potential housing/sanctioned-site costs for council consideration.

Selected direct quotes from the hearing: Assistant City Manager Lisa Murphy: “Salinas is home to 50% of the county’s homeless population.” Homeless Services Manager Keisha Lopez on outreach and storage: “There is an actual form that needs to be completed if a resident determines that they do want to utilize the storage…They don't need to have ID to collect their things.”