Bolsa Chica camps upset

The Bolsa Chica wetlands are habitat to numerous forms of life, from birds to marine animals to trees. But also living amid the trees and bushes is a presence some residents call less benign — transients who critics say leave piles of waste and make neighbors fear for their safety.

Camping under bushes and trees out of easy view and easily moving across property lines when evicted from one spot, transients on Bolsa Chica lands are hard to target. Some spots are under city jurisdiction, others county or state, not to mention private owners like Shea Properties.

Environmental activist Mark Bixby, who often walks the wetlands and surrounding areas, said such camps come back year after year, and they endanger neighbors.

“Me and other people, we’re out there constantly,” Bixby said. “We know as soon as these camps are set up. We report it to people as soon as we’re aware of it.”

Nearby resident Kristen — a crime victim who did not want her last name publicized because she feared for her safety — said she was badly shaken when someone came running out of the wetlands Aug. 26. Screaming obscenities and threats, the man then pounded furiously on whatever he came across, including a trailer with her kids inside.

“He said he was going to kill me,” she said. Worse, she’d seen the man before, and worried he remembered her.

Huntington Beach police arrested Jeffery Allen Morgan, 43, within minutes, and Kristen’s family was not harmed. Orange County Superior Court records show Morgan has pleaded guilty to counts of illegal camping, possession of a controlled substance, criminal threats and battery over the last 10 years.

Until recently, residents say some large camps were on city land owned by developer Shea Properties. A walk through the area Monday found eviction notices posted throughout the area, and a giant trash receptacle filled with junk from a camp that had just been cleaned up.

But just a few hundred feet over, tents — empty during the day — were set up under the concealing trees and bushes of state land. Some spots appeared charred from campfires, and the smell of human waste wafted over the area.

As real as the human danger is the risk to habitat, Bixby said. Piles of trash and human waste are one thing, but fires can threaten a wide area.

“Fires are a chronic issue out there, especially in the state [eucalyptus] grove,” Bixby said. “With the killer drought we have out there, everything could go up.”