

"Milde's vehicle was later located on 28 Street North, just outside the city limits - exactly where he said it would be," reads the Lethbridge police news release. In the days and weeks that followed, police conducted extensive searches in the river valley and surrounding area, but no trace of Milde has ever been found." "Footprints in the snow led into the coulees.
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Police say evidence suggests Milde died by suicide, but his body has never been located.Īnyone with new information is asked to contact police at 40, or anonymously through Crime Stoppers.In Sonoma County, Calif., officials are struggling to address a homeless encampment with roughly 200 residents.Ĭharles Gibson pushes a shopping cart toward his soggy tent on a tenuous patch of a grassy drainage ditch along a bike trail in Santa Rosa, Calif. He's one of nearly 200 people living in a sprawling camp here that has sprung up along a popular recreation corridor. It's a community, Gibson says, that often feels caught between opposing forces who aren't always listening.

"I mean, they want us to be able to govern ourselves, but they are not giving us the tools we need," Gibson says. "They don't want you hiding, but they don't want you in their face, you know?"Īcross California and other parts of the country, these growing homeless encampments evoke shantytown "Hoovervilles," where hundreds of thousands of destitute Americans lived during the Great Depression. The encampments are frustrating residents, raising health and safety fears and fueling a debate over poverty and inequality in one of the nation's wealthiest states. National California Governor Pushes $1.4 Billion Plan To Tackle Homelessness The fight over the encampment in Santa Rosa in Northern California's Sonoma County underscores the challenges of finding a lasting solution to the growing crisis.

"I never thought that I would drive past a mile-long shantytown on my way to work.Īmid a growing chorus of outrage at filthy, unsanitary conditions and the presence of rats and used drug needles, the camp has divided locals and even prompted an effort to recall a local politician. And yet, that's the reality that we're facing right now in Sonoma County," says County Supervisor Lynda Hopkins, whose district includes the encampment.įor months, makeshift tarp, tent and pallet "homes" have filled a stretch of the paved bike trail that sides right next to Highway 12, a major commuter artery into Santa Rosa, the county seat. "I also get emails of people who are just heartbroken at seeing the level of suffering - people freezing cold, living in a tent in the rain with no access to running water or electricity or sewer services." "It's incredibly challenging," Hopkins says, noting she gets scores of emails each day from frustrated, alarmed and angry constituents. While homelessness is a hard-to-fix national problem, it is particularly severe in California. The state's homeless population jumped 16% in the past year.
