People living at Blakeslee Junction, a railroad interchange in Centralia and the location of the area’s largest homeless encampment, were given a one-week deadline to clear out by Tuesday, Sept. 5, lest they be escorted off the property by the Washington State Patrol.
The land was recently sold by the Washington State Department of Transportation (WSDOT), which has agreed to clear and clean the area before transferring it to the next owner, a railroad company.
Chuck Wiegard, of Centralia, owns a .4-acre parcel at the junction and has watched the encampment develop over the last nine years. This weekend, in a letter he penned and hand-delivered to The Chronicle, Wiegard said he serves as the “liaison” between Blakeslee Junction and “the outside world.”
But, in Wiegard’s words, Blakeslee Junction is not just an encampment. He calls it “our community.”
His letter addresses several talking points around the encampment that county officials have used to advocate for it being sweeped, including a fire in March that, due to their hindering firefighters’ response, pushed WSDOT to tow several RVs at the entrance to the encampment.
“The fires, they were set by an individual that had problems with relationships,” Wiegard said.
He’s concerned that misconceptions and possible misinformation have been used to hasten the clearing of the encampment.
In a statement on the announcement of WSDOT’s sale last week from Lewis County Commissioner Sean Swope, he wrote, “the heart-wrenching reality remains that overdoses are reported almost weekly, with a recent tragedy taking another life just last week.”
But Wiegard said there has only been one death in all nine years of the camp’s existence. He and other people living at Blakeslee Junction believe it was a suicide by heroin overdose.
“He went and found God and came back and apologized to everyone,” Wiegard recalled, saying he thought these were signs that the man who died was considering suicide.
Wiegard also said the man “told somebody off site” he was experiencing suicidal ideation.
“That’s the only death we’ve had in nine years,” Wiegard said. “We haven’t had an overdose in almost three months now.”
Swope has advocated for the encampment’s clearing for several years now, and recently asked Lewis County Health Officer Joe Wiley to declare a health emergency for the encampment. Wiley opted not to do so because the area hasn’t been the site of an infectious disease outbreak, he said, but he did send a “fairly strong letter,” as he put it, to WSDOT and the Centralia Police Department asking for movement on the encampment being swept.
There have been several overdoses at the encampment, Wiegard said, but those people have been revived with Narcan, a nasal spray that rapidly reverses the effects of an opioid overdose, that was provided by Gather Church in Centralia.
Swope also cited health concerns about the site in his ask to Wiley. He is concerned that an accumulation of trash and human waste would be a threat to the area’s water and environment.
Wiegard said the camp has pooled funds and requested services from local port-a-potty and dumpster services, but the businesses declined.
With recent ordinances passed by Lewis County and the cities of Centralia and Chehalis that outlaw camping on government property, Wiegard believes the encampment clearing out will cause occupants to “scatter and hide,” he said in an interview on Monday morning.
“And I don’t know what that means to the public,” he said. “Instead of out of sight and out of mind, you’ll have them everywhere.”
Wiegard also worries about access to his land once the sale is completed. He wants to sell his .4-acre property, he said, but only for “the right price.”
The railroad company, Rainier Rail, that purchased WSDOT’s property, he said, offered $5,000 for it. Wiegard’s assessed value on the Lewis County Parcels map is $17,400.
Wiegard’s role as the liaison is not just self-assigned. He’s also the point person for the county health department when messages need to be communicated to the encampment. When conversations with the counties and cities around clearing the encampment first began, he recalled, “We understood that Centralia and Lewis County had places for these people to go. Well, turns out, they got the night-by-night shelter and nothing else.”
The shelter, run by the Salvation Army on North Gold Street in Centralia, is open for people to stay from 7 p.m. to 7 a.m. every day. Wiegard is concerned that, for people currently staying at Blakeslee Junction, the shelter is “not a viable option.”
“For some people it is. But, most of these people are on Social Security and are older people. The fact that they’d have to pack up all their stuff every day and leave at 7 in the morning, that’s not going to happen,” Wiegard said.
He believes some of those people would sooner go find another place outside to live.
“We are all locals here, so we are not going anywhere,” Wiegard wrote in his letter. “This is our home. If we went somewhere else we would be in the same situation with no resources, and that’s a scary thought.”
