Law enforcement and fire personnel frequently receive calls about or find evidence left behind from persons squatting in vacant homes and buildings in Poplar Bluff.
“It was a daily thing (at times in 2018); we were getting calls about people squatting in houses that didn’t belong there,” said Poplar Bluff Police Lt. Bob Moore. “They’re finding their way in somehow through windows, through doors.
“Some houses are not even secure that they’re getting into and squatting in.”
Moore said it seems the department received more calls for squatters in 2018 than “I have seen in the past.
“I can’t put numbers to that (but) in my mind, it just seems more common to get a call of squatters, people in a house that don’t belong.”
The problem, Moore said, is not limited to one area of the city.
“It’s pretty much all over town,” including on Barron Road, Moore said. “We found one (house) that was open and someone had been squatting in it… I found that unusual for Barron Road to be like that.”
No one was found in the home, but “you could tell they had been squatting there,” he said.
In some instances, Moore said, the evidence officers find is indicative of drug use.
Fire Chief Ralph Stucker said his firefighters also sometimes find evidence of squatters at the scene of structure fires involving vacant houses.
“You can tell somebody was there … by what you’re seeing (but) you can’t prove they were there,” Stucker said.
Vacant buildings were involved in 22 of the 66 structure fires in 2018, Stucker said.
Some of those fires, he said, may have started by squatters setting fires to stay warm.
“When we get there, if someone is squatting in the structure,” they already are gone because “they’re not supposed to be in there and they’ve started a fire. They think we’ll get them in trouble,” Stucker said.
Even though the structure is supposed to be vacant, “we can’t pull up and let it burn,” Stucker said. “We approach (the structure) as if it’s occupied until it’s verified it isn’t.”
Stucker described squatting as a year-round problem that intensifies in the cold weather.
While the winter has been mild thus far, “February is going to be cold,” Stucker said.
February usually has “at least two weeks of cold every year,” he said. “We’re going to have times when temps are below freezing.
“A body can only take so much. Poplar Bluff is not a big city. We can’t have eyes on every part of the city. (People) are going to be around vacant houses and use whatever is in there to try to survive.”
The police department tends to get less calls about squatters in the winter, Moore said.
“We haven’t been getting the calls on squatters like we did back in the summer,” Moore said. “I don’t know if people in the winter don’t have to find a place or (if) people are not out as much in their yards as they would be throughout the summer” to notice what is happening in their neighborhoods.
Moore said most of the calls the department receives come from citizens who “see them going in and out. Then, we get the call; we show up, figure out who they are and what they’re doing and send them on their way.”
Moore said the department also receives some calls from landlords who go to inspect their vacant homes and find people squatting inside.
Although forcibly entering a structure is considered burglary, “we don’t have a lot of people that will pursue charges,” Moore said. “Very few say … ‘I want to pursue charges.’ A lot just want them out.”
The squatters, according to Moore, are a mixture of local residents and out-of-towners, who may “hook up with someone who is local,” then they just stay.
Some have “burnt their bridges, stayed with their uncle, their aunt, their friends. The next thing they know, they are on the street,” Moore said. “They have no place to stay, and they end up going and find them a house.”
There are people coming into town constantly; some of them are not going to have a home, Capt. Dave Sutton said.
Some people, he said, come to Poplar Bluff to seek treatment at behavioral health facilities.
When discharged, “they may not have the means to get home,” Sutton said. “They may not have any kind of resources here, their friends, their family.”
But, he said, there are resources available to those individuals through the United Gospel Rescue Mission and other charitable organizations in town.
“I don’t think a significant amount of the squatters are the homeless population that we have,” said Sutton, who indicated Poplar Bluff also has a transient population due to the four-lane highways and railroad.
Both officers said the rescue mission isn’t a viable option for those who are actively using drugs or alcohol.
“A lot of people who do have a drug problem, they won’t go to the rescue mission because they’re using,” Moore said. “They know when they’re there, they aren’t going to be able to use, so they won’t go.”
Sutton agreed.
A lot of people, he said, won’t seek out services because “they would have to curb their behavior,” abide by curfews and follow restrictions on alcohol and drugs.
Sutton said there are some places that provide substance abuse counseling, but “when a person does not want that kind of help, their options are limited” and may result in squatting in vacant houses.
Stucker encouraged residents to pay attention to what is going on around the vacant structures in their neighborhood and report anyone they see coming and going to the police or the property owner.
Moore agreed.
Those living in the neighborhoods, he said, know what is a common occurrence and what is not.
There are more eyes there “than we have,” said Moore.
“Call us, and we’ll go and investigate,” he said. “ … If they do see people squatting in a house, it’s not that they’re calling (police) to get them in trouble.
“It’s that the people there may need help. We’ve got the ability to get them where they need to be.”