Photos by John Ross Ferrara.

A couple dozen members of the activist group Friends of the Humboldt Houseless rallied outside the Eureka courthouse yesterday evening to protest the city’s treatment of the homeless community living in the Palco Marsh.

The protest comes a week after anti-crime protesters picketed outside the Bayshore Mall. Although the groups represent opposing sides, they have a common target in the Eureka City Council. Neither side is pleased with the council’s inability to solve Eureka’s ongoing homeless problem.

Protester John Earl said those representing the houseless community need to keep their momentum going.

“We have to keep the momentum going in the community because when the City Council meets in January, the agenda items are going to come back up,” Earl said. “If we don’t have momentum, we’re not going to have the showing that we need like last time where we just got [the council’s decision] put off until January.”

Protesters defended the homeless community’s “right to sleep” and sported tent costumes marked with pro-homeless messages like “a tent is affordable housing.”

Earl said there is no simple solution to the city’s homeless problem, and that anti-crime activists are making the homeless scapegoats for the city’s problems.

“[The anti-crime protest] was a thinly veiled attempt at accusing the homeless for crime in the community,” Earl said. “We have housed people all over the place that do drugs and commit crimes. Yet it all gets thrown on the people who are the most visible, and that’s the people on the streets.”