A canvas car port with a wood picnic table and benches in it, and a wood burning stove just outside of it, served as the dining quarters. Inside the fencing, there were seven tents: five small one-person tents, and two larger multi-person tents, including one that housed the Shaws. On Thursday, work on the new site was ongoing, including putting the final touches on a fence with green privacy netting that surrounds the camp. “All these guys here work to make things better.” “It makes a huge difference, it really does,” Woodard said. And on the street above a bus stop, bike path and sidewalk are nearby, providing good access to residents. The new site is safer because it’s under the bridge and away from any tall trees, including cottonwoods, that might shed their branches, he said.

“It looked like the water would go up 10 feet or more.” “That weekend was kind of crazy,” Woodard said. Woodard and a few camp residents and volunteers spent much of the day removing the old metal fence posts and moving the camp to its current location, under the bridge and at higher ground. Residents had a scare a couple weeks ago when heavy rains caused a nearby waterway to rise, potentially endangering the camp. The camp is the brainchild of Bernie Woodard, operations manager for Elk Island Trading Group, LLC, which owns the land under the bridge and Elk Island itself. A total of 10 tents are allowed, and the number of residents generally varies from six to 10. The camp opened three months ago, after receiving the necessary permits from the city. “Before, I was constantly worried about my camp getting raided,” Joshua Shaw said. And while life is far from ideal, they both say it’s better than it had been. The Shaws are among a half-dozen people living in Roseburg’s first sanctioned tent city. It’s often wet and cold, and the noise from cars driving across the bridge overhead is constant. For the last two months he and his wife Crystal have lived in a tent under the Washington Avenue bridge in Roseburg.

Joshua Shaw swears he’s sleeping better than he has in a long time.

Who said we are better than that