SAN DIEGO (KGTV) – Cesar Chavez Park in Barrio Logan is empty after port police issued a 10 a.m. deadline for all campers to leave the park Thursday morning.
The port told ABC 10News it has not issued any citations or made any arrests, but many of the park’s residents did not know where to go.
For weeks, 10News reported on the migrant families who lived in tents in the park, worked in the county or had children who attended schools nearby.
ABC 10News reporter Tali Letoi followed the event at Cesar Chavez Park and spoke with Beto from Mexico City, whose fears of not knowing what would happen next came true.
When Beto was pushed out of the park in a wheelchair with his dog, he had three carts full of belongings. But as he packed everything up and began to look for a place to go next, he realized the task was more difficult than he first expected.
“I can’t take any of my things in the shopping cart. I can’t take – you know, my companion, my dog,” Beto said.
He moved only a few hundred yards down the road from the park, which was about the farthest he could go.
“It’s a bit much to travel with everything and in a wheelchair? Carrying everything? I mean…” said Beto.
The park not only served as a safe place for him to lie down at night, but also as a community for him and other migrants.
“We had a great community. We weren’t afraid of anyone stealing from each other.”
Beto told ABC 10News that many people in the park went to work in the morning and he prepared food for some of them when they returned, just to help out.
“It’s not enough to just have one person; it takes a community and that’s exactly what we had here,” he says.
But now that he’s out of the park, Beto says, it puts him in greater danger.
“I don’t just mean my partner and my dog, but you’re not just looking at the where and the why, but also at who is around you,” says Beto. “It’s like the Wild West. You have your hands up and you’re nervous about everything and everyone.”
But he is not the only one who feels like they are in limbo.
“It’s hard to see so many families – so many people really going through this. They come home from work and have no place to rest,” Beto said.
In the meantime, local activists and organizations continue to work around the clock to help, including Ian Seruelo, chair of the San Diego Immigrant Rights Consortium. Seruelo told 10News that SDIRC is working with other partner organizations to help these individuals and their belongings.
“Many of them have accumulated a lot of personal belongings. Since they have no transportation, it is very difficult for them to move elsewhere,” says Seruelo.
While some have been able to extend their temporary stay in hotels and find accommodation in emergency shelters, for others it is only a matter of time.
“For the remaining migrants, we simply try to find out what they want to do so that we can help,” he says.
