VIRGINIA BEACH

City staff are exploring authorizing a "tent city," a move that would make the Beach the first community in the state to sanction a homeless encampment - if the City Council approves the idea.

Mayor Will Sessoms, however, said he doesn't support it.

"I just don't see it happening," Sessoms said. "I could not recommend it because I do not want to encourage homelessness. I want to work to keep people from being homeless."

Andrew Friedman, director of the city's Housing and Neighborhood Preservation Department, said officials are looking into how such an encampment would be operated, including issues involving policing, sanitation and the duration of its existence.

Any camp would have to meet city requirements for campgrounds and health and safety, Friedman said. Any proposal would ultimately go before the City Council for land use approval.

There are at least a dozen known encampments around the city and they keep popping up. Anyone can wind up out there in the current economy, said William Duncan, a local advocate for the homeless.

City staff members think an authorized encampment could make it easier for the city to keep tabs on the homeless and provide services to them.

In March, however, the city shut an encampment on Loretta Lane in Seatack that had more than 20 people living in it, tacking eviction notices to trees after the property owner sanctioned the evictions. Last month, a woman died in a small encampment off Loretta Lane.

A January count found 453 homeless people in Virginia Beach, down from 517 the previous year. Officials plan on conducting a summer count Aug. 12-14.

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