Hands Across Montecito: Union Pacific Railroad Police Visit Montecito

By Sharon Byrne | May 30, 2023

Citynet, Deputy Calderon, Andrew, and the Union Pacific police walking along the tracks near the cemetery (Courtesy photo)

I got a bit of a surprise call last Thursday from Agent Potter, with Union Pacific [UP] Railroad Police. We’d been notified by the County’s encampment response team that UP was coming to do a South County cleanout sometime in April – outreach teams should work to clear inhabitants of camps so that Union Pacific could remove all remaining trash and abandoned camps. April came and went, though, with no sign of Union Pacific.

Melissa from CityNet following Billy from Montecito Fire and Union Pacific into a camp (Courtesy photo)

Montecito contains both the 101 and railroad lines, so the Hands Across Montecito team is constantly navigating jurisdictional boundaries. Most camps are just inside the city limits, west of the cemetery. We often do outreach in that area, but the City of Santa Barbara has outreach teams that should be working it. We’re always working in the Caltrans right-of-way, along the UP lines. Sheriffs and Montecito Fire accompany us, and we really appreciate the support of our public safety partners, as we’ve been unable to engage SBPD or Santa Barbara City Fire. MFPD and Sheriffs cross outside their jurisdiction into Santa Barbara at Channel Dr. when we head towards the Bird Refuge. The frequent fires at the Hot Springs exit are within City of Santa Barbara city limits, though on Caltrans land. Caltrans has been stepping up their camp-clearing programs since the pandemic. They’ve also been fencing off their land to prevent future camps. We often clear the camps in Montecito for them, with Andrew from Earthcomb and Heal the Ocean, and place the Caltrans bags on the 101 shoulder for them to retrieve.

The missing link has been Union Pacific. We last saw them in October 2020 for a clearing. They let us know they’d been bogged down in Goleta, which has seen an explosion in camps in the past few years. The Hands team was heading out at 7 am Friday morning, so we invited them along for the walk. They accepted, and we met up at the Chevron at Coast Village Rd.

Union Pacific Agents Cona and Potter arrived, along with CityNet, Sheriff’s Deputy Calderon, Billy from Montecito Fire, Andrew with Earthcomb, Beth Sullivan from the Coast Village Improvement Association, and Andrea Hein, a founding member of the Hands Across Montecito project.

We went through the Butterfly Lane tunnel, and down to a huge camp before the Olive Mill exit sign. Though we were early, the inhabitants had already left the camp. It is in the Caltrans’ right-of-way, so won’t be Union Pacific’s responsibility.

The group met in the morning at the Chevron near the Butterfly Lane undercrossing (Courtesy photo)

Deputy Calderon and Billy from MFPD inspect a camp against the freeway for fire hazards (Courtesy photo)

The Hands team learned some great info from the UP Police:

1. Railroad property is private property. Public property, like Caltrans’ right-of-way, requires a 72-hour posting period. Union Pacific does not have to adhere to that window. They can order someone to leave the same day.

2. Every railroad crossing has an identifier and phone number to call if you spot a hazard or camp nearby. That identifier gives Union Pacific the precise location.

3. Union Pacific has thousands of miles of railroad tracks. Keeping them clear of camps is massive and very expensive. This is why we don’t see them often.

Andrea had to leave the team early, and headed back to the Butterfly Lane tunnel. Unfortunately, she ran into one of the camp inhabitants, a very hostile veteran we encountered in January, who is on Caltrans’ land and refuses to leave. He accosted her verbally. Deputy Calderon noticed, and he and Agent Cona headed back to intervene and assist Andrea. This is but one reason we always take a sheriff’s deputy with us on outreach.

We spoke to Agent Potter Tuesday morning, when UP hoped to be in Montecito. We helped scout locations where they could place equipment close to their property for clearing. They were just coming into the top-end of Santa Barbara, but he’d served notice at a camp across from the cemetery, and the entire camp was gone as of today. They won’t be clearing the camps in the Caltrans’ right-of-way, so we’re in conversation with Caltrans as to how to do that.

The Hands team really appreciated meeting the UP Railroad Police, and taking them through our area, to see our unique challenges.

Sharon Byrne is the Executive Director of the Montecito Association