Industrious homeless hauled a TV set, microwave and even a chair up a secured ladder and strung electric cords to an outside outlet to cook meals and watch episodes of their favorite shows on the roof of the Manteca Marketplace shopping center on West Yosemite Avenue.
Eight blocks away police have had to chase homeless off the Manteca Library roof where they sought warmth on chilly winter nights from the heat generated from mechanical equipment after city workers discovered the individuals were also urinating on their lofty perch damaging the roof.
Community volunteers in the wee hours of the morning getting ready for a Library Park event are stunned when a city worker opens the locked park restrooms and two homeless individuals are inside where they had been sleeping on the concrete floor littered with hypodermic needles.
In the Manteca Industrial Park, homeless have shamelessly ripped apart walls and ceilings in a vacant building to steal copper for recycling.
Stories from Manteca’s current struggle with the homeless?
Close, but no cigar. These incidents happened 10 years ago. The building they were gutting was the old Indy Electronics complex where ultimately they did $500,000 worth of damage. One homeless man looking for copper to steal fell through a skylight to his death.
Homelessness is not a new issue for Manteca. 
And  it has been a lot worse.
It should also be noted when it comes to the main issue regarding homeless — single adults — the heavy lifting of dealing with them and even directing them to services has been done by the Manteca Police.
The police are the same people that get black eyes from some who say they aren’t doing enough to address the problem and black eyes from others that claim they are harassing the homeless when they enforce the law.
It’s safe to say the visible homeless issues are cyclical. When things get of hand such as a point in the 1990s when they were blatantly pitching  tents in parks the pressure was applied and eventually the homeless retreated into the shadows.
Over the years it has been clear there are law-abiding homeless that strive not to bring attention to them and melt in seamlessly in the background. There are also those that break laws.
There is little doubt that law-abiding homeless at one point or another will have to urinate in a public place. When they do, they are breaking the law. But no one ever sees them do it because they are discreet. They aren’t like the homeless guy last summer who unzipped his pants and started urinating facing East Yosemite Avenue traffic near In Shape.
For any lawyer who may be reading this that is counting on a big pay day trying to make a case Manteca Police are systematically violating the constitutional rights of the homeless, the homeless that aren’t making a public display or urinating or defecating in downtown doorways as they have been known to do at night before police stepped up enforcement aren’t the ones police are dealing with.
It’s because Manteca Police have been careful to follow the spirit of the law and not the letter of the law. It follows the mantra of their boss, Police Chief Nick Obigacion — it is not against the law to be homeless.
It should also be noted the effort of the last 18 months that the police department has served as point to help get three hardcore homeless single adults off the street. That doesn’t sound like a lot but it is three more than at any time in the past 25 years and counting.
It is a problem that can only be changed one homeless individual at a time.
Unfortunately the homeless tide keeps growing.
On Wednesday near the McDonald’s on Louise Avenue in Lathrop there were three homeless individuals — two who looked like the hobos of old and a younger, almost clean-cut looking guy.
I stopped and asked a few questions. They were on their way up from the Bay Area after drifting north from LA. The younger guy who said he was 19 joined them in San Jose. While I didn’t ask why they were homeless I did ask where they were heading. One of the older guys said they were looking for a “hospitable place.”
A hospitable place?
This is purely conjecture on my part but I assume when they say they are looking for a “hospitable place” it means a more opportune environment to survive on the street than it means getting help to get off the streets.
What is opportune isn’t someone trying to help them get ID so they can start their way back to the world you and I live in. That’s not saying that there aren’t some willing to do that when they get the chance. But when your entire processions are in a raggedy old backpack or in extra thick garbage bags slung over your shoulder as you carry a gallon jug of water opportune means places you can conceal yourself to sleep and places where you can rummage through trash bins for food or pilfer recyclables from Toters to convert into cash.
I’m certain everyone — myself included — has empathy to some degree for homeless adults.
And while a share of homeless in Manteca are homegrown, many aren’t. They’re simply looking for a more “hospitable place.”
The last thing Manteca would ever want to do is build homeless shelter per se for single adults.


This column is the opinion of executive editor, Dennis Wyatt, and does not necessarily represent the opinion of The Bulletin or Morris Newspaper Corp. of CA.  He can be contacted at dwyatt@mantecabulletin.com or 209.249.3519.