SCHUYLKILL COUNTY, Pa. — No trespassing signs are now nailed onto trees along the Schuylkill River in North Manheim Township, where a homeless encampment once was.
After complaints by residents in the area, the encampment site behind the former Days Inn Hotel was cleared to make way for a new development project.
Heather Boher is an intake worker at Servants to All, a homeless shelter about seven minutes away from the former encampment site. It's the only shelter in Schuylkill County.
"We are the only homeless shelter in Schuylkill County. We have a street outreach caseworker who has interacted with not just that encampment but numerous encampments in Schuylkill County, and we always encourage the people to come down here for shelter," said Heather Boher, Servants To All Intake worker.
At the beginning of last month, the new property owners told those who lived at the homeless encampment they had until the end of the month to leave and were directed toward local shelters.
But those who lived at the encampment site never showed up.
"Most of the people in those encampments are homeless by choice. They don't necessarily want to be in a shelter, and they don't want to have to follow the rules that come with being in the shelter, or they just don't want to be bothered being in another room with someone else. They just don't want to deal with other people," explained Boher.
The question now is where did the homeless go?
"There are other camps. We get information about where people are staying. The case manager that works the street outreach program she gets tips from other people that say you know, oh, we've seen people over here, or there's a camp over there, or this is where we're staying, and they'll just find another one, or make another one," said Boher.
Boher says those who choose to be unhoused can still use any of the resources provided by servants for all and are encouraged to the shelter's main goal is to get everyone a place to stay.