Advocates decry homeless sweeps ahead of MLB's All-Star game

DENVER (AP) — Ahead of Major League Baseball’s All-Star Game in Denver next week, city officials are facing scrutiny from advocates who accuse them of accelerating the clearing of homeless encampments near Coors Field as the sports world turns its attention to Colorado’s capital city.

Mayor Michael Hancock has emphatically denied that the All-Star Game influenced any clearing decisions, saying the city is just getting caught up after suspending cleanups at the beginning of the pandemic. It resumed regular cleanups last summer.

Officials knew before the city was chosen as the All-Star host that it faced a big cleanup effort, with more encampments than ever, Hancock said.

In cleanups, also called homeless “sweeps,” encampments are fenced off and the people living in tents there are told to pack up and leave so the area can be cleaned.

In March, just before Denver was chosen as a substitute host — Major League Baseball pulled it from Atlanta in April over objections to Georgia’s voting law that critics condemned as being too restrictive — data shows sweeps increased, with cleanups taking place over nine days. The previous peak over the past year was eight days, in October.

But the sweeps picked up even more in May and June with 17 scheduled cleanups taking 22 days, 11 days each month with two or three days of cleanups a week, according to public records obtained by The Associated Press, which were first reported by Denverite, an online news outlet that covers the city.

The city conducted sweeps for 17 weeks straight from early March to late June, a streak that was unmatched during any other period, according to cleanup notices provided to city councilors since December 2019.

The city used to conduct two or three cleanups a week before the pandemic began and has returned...