`Jungle' Rubbish: 120 Tons

Nearly a month after they began, workers have hauled 120 tons of debris out of "The Jungle," the mile-long brushy hillside encampment above Interstate 5.

State and city workers on July 18 began bulldozing and cleaning out about 50 sites that homeless people had been using in a steep area below Beacon Hill between South Spokane Street and Interstate 90.

City officials said the encampment posed a health, sanitation and fire hazard. Only about a dozen campers were still around when the cleanup began.

The heavy-equipment work was completed in 10 workdays, although yesterday there was still litter to be picked up by hand. That will be done whenever state Department of Corrections crews, who also do highway cleanups, are available.

That work should be finished by the end of the month, said Terry Wittman, who manages the city's response to encampments.

The bulk of the cleanup "was literally garbage, food debris, containers, bottles, cans," Wittman said.

"Maybe 30 percent was building materials that the structures were made out of. The remainder was discarded clothes, household items, a lot of old speakers, a couple of old TV sets, junk stuff that every house has."

Some of the wooden and cardboard shacks were fairly substantial. One had two windows.

The various departments hadn't totaled their costs yet, but Wittman and Phil George, maintenance-and-operations superintendent in the state Department of Transportation's Bellevue office, said the money was coming out of their budgets and didn't represent additional allocations.

New growth has begun to reclaim some of the campsites, but there also will be some plantings to curb erosion, Wittman said.

The agencies, including police, are planning to monitor the area. Although officials have said it is extremely difficult to keep out squatters, Wittman promised to monitor and respond to any encampments in The Jungle or other greenbelts.