photo by: Kim Callahan/Journal-World

A man named Deezy packs up his belongings at Sandra J. Shaw Park Tuesday, Sept. 16, 2025.

At sunrise Tuesday the City of Lawrence began transforming Sandra J. Shaw Park, which has been a homeless camp for years now, back to its intended use as a recreational area.

After months of notice that the area had to be vacated, only a handful of campers remained Tuesday, but vast piles of debris from about 15 campsites littered the landscape, necessitating a fleet of bulldozers, backhoes and dumptrucks to clear away.

Four to five holdout campers and at least one dog were awakened by a team of Lawrence police and workers from the City of Lawrence and Bert Nash Community Mental Health Center around 7 a.m. The campers were politely told that the day they had been warned about had arrived.

“Get your wits about you and grab your important stuff,” Lt. David Ernst told one man through the flap in his tent. “We’re cleaning this up today.”

One woman was on her way out of the park with a bike and said she’d be back later. Ernst told her there would be no later. If she had anything valuable in her tent, she needed to retrieve it now.

“My medical records,” she said, as she turned back to her campsite in the woods.

photo by: Kim Callahan/Journal-World

Police watch a woman’s bike as she returns to her tent to collect valuables ahead of the clearing of Sandra J. Shaw Park Tuesday, Sept. 16, 2025.

The handful of campers peacefully, if somewhat slowly, complied, piling belongings into various containers to move to their next location. For some, like a woman who appeared to be in her 50s or 60s, that would be one of the city shelters until she obtained housing via a voucher. For others it was uncertain.

A 34-year-old man who went by the nickname Deezy told the Journal-World that he didn’t know where he was going to go. He said he had lived at the park for the past two and a half years.

His home there, which he said had burned down once before, consisted of a large dugout covered with pieces of wood, metal and canvas. Metal pipes coming out the side — a makeshift chimney — provided heat during the winters. On top of the structure waved a large American flag, one of the few belongings he took with him.

photo by: Kim Callahan/Journal-World

A man who goes by Deezy took his flag off his dwelling ahead of the clearing of Sandra J. Shaw Park Tuesday, Sept. 16, 2025.

“Just so you know, I have two bows,” he told Ernst as he emerged from his dwelling and added bows and arrows to a wheeled recycling cart.

“That’s fine,” Ernst said. “I appreciate you telling me. Just grab what you can carry.”

Ernst told Deezy that he appreciated the work that had gone into his dwelling.

“This is your house,” Ernst acknowledged, noting that a better — and safer — house would hopefully be in his future if he could avail himself of government services.

As the campers moved out their belongings, city workers spray-painted an “X” on the sides of their tents, indicating to soon-to-be-arriving cleanup crews that the dwelling had been checked and was vacated. A case manager from Bert Nash patiently spoke to campers, trying to ascertain “what I can do for them in the moment.”

photo by: Kim Callahan/Journal-World

A campsite at Sandra J. Shaw Park Tuesday, Sept. 16, 2025.

Since last spring, advocates for the homeless had been hosting meals at the park to tell campers that they would have to move soon and letting them know what services and shelters were available. In May they were told that later in the summer additional Pallet shelters would be in place next to the Lawrence Community Shelter.

Flyers passed out at the lunches said camping would no longer be allowed: “Encampment Closure: Effective Aug. 15,” the flyers read. “Camping will no longer be allowed anywhere in Lawrence, including Brook Creek Park, Burcham Park and Sandra Shaw Park.”

As it turned out, the Pallet shelters next to LCS weren’t ready until about a month after that Aug. 15 deadline, but are now set to provide an additional 48 beds for the homeless, including their pets.

Misty Bosch-Hastings, director of the city’s Homeless Solutions Division, told the Journal-World last month that the purpose of the Pallets by LCS was to fill a “critical gap in low-barrier shelter options.”

The other two shelters are the main LCS facility and the Pallet Village on North Michigan Street, and neither fills that niche. The Village prioritizes vulnerable groups such as veterans, the elderly, women without children emerging from domestic violence situations and individuals with disabilities who require specialized support and care. The LCS facility on East 25th Street is a largely congregate setting that’s not suitable for everyone.

Later Tuesday morning officers and advocates for the homeless visited nearby Burcham Park, where dozens of people and dogs reportedly still live in the woods, many of them for years now. Those campers — 15 were directly contacted by police Tuesday — were told that they would have to vacate no later than Wednesday morning and that the area would then be bulldozed and restored to its original purpose: a city park.

photo by: Kim Callahan/Journal-World

Police and city workers notify campers that they must vacate Sandra J. Shaw Park Tuesday, Sept. 16, 2025.

photo by: Kim Callahan/Journal-World

Asher Erikson, of Berth Nash Community Mental Health Center, speaks with a woman at Sandra J. Shaw Park Tuesday, Sept. 16, 2025, ahead of the park’s clearing.

photo by: Kim Callahan/Journal-World

Lt. David Ernst looks at a disused bathing facility at Sandra J. Shaw Park Tuesday, Sept. 16, 2025.

photo by: Kim Callahan/Journal-World

A campsite at Sandra J. Shaw Park Tuesday, Sept. 16, 2025.

photo by: Kim Callahan/Journal-World

A city worker enters a campsite at Sandra J. Shaw Park Tuesday, Sept. 16, 2025.

photo by: Kim Callahan/Journal-World

City crews discuss the clearing of Sandra J. Shaw Park Tuesday, Sept. 16, 2025.

photo by: Kim Callahan/Journal-World

A bulldozer razes a campsite at Sandra J. Shaw Park on Tuesday, Sept. 16, 2025.

photo by: Kim Callahan/Journal-World

Sandra J. Shaw Park is pictured Tuesday, Sept. 16, 2025.

photo by: Kim Callahan/Journal-World

Fog hugs the ground just after sunrise at Sandra J. Shaw Park Tuesday, Sept. 16, 2025.