Florida’s Escambia County has a serious problem with squatters thanks to squatters not being held accountable for their illegal behavior.
“There are so many people going back and forth it’s ridiculous. I’ve been on the phone with code enforcement and the sheriff’s department. There are at least 15 to 20 people constantly walking down my driveway to get to their [camp] to buy drugs, prostitution, whatever they’re doing back there,” local resident Gwen Gibson told the Pensacola News Journal.
Gibson lives next door to land owned by the Merrill family. The land has, unfortunately, become a hotspot for homeless camps.
“Each day it’s normal for Gibson to deal with trash and fires as well as people camping along her back fence. Sometimes she finds them on her property passed out from drug use or injured from a fight,” according to the Journal.
“At one point, the campers regularly used the bathroom around a tree just over her property line on Merrill’s land and in direct view from her kitchen window. She said the area was so disgusting, the crews Merrill hired to clean up the property became sick during the work,” the Journal notes.
An Escambia County woman says she came home from the hospital to find 4 squatters had moved into her home. 3 of them are now in jail. Tonight, what the woman found in her home and who she blames for the incident. @weartv @WEARTV_Showers pic.twitter.com/6Jx23P1FHa
— Brent Kearney (@BKearneyTV) April 14, 2022
Back in April, the Escambia County magistrate reportedly ordered the Merrill family to clean up the homeless camp there. The family’s patriarch, Pensacola businessman Collier Merrill, responded at the time by doing nothing, hoping that the homeless inhabitants would leave on their own.
But that has since changed.
“We’ve been working on another project, hoping they would go ahead and move on their own, but actually they’re not going to do that, so we are now making this a priority to get in compliance with the county,” he told the Journal.
“By whatever means” is necessary, he added.
Unfortunately, it’s not clear that his efforts will be successful.
“The Merrill property, which is owned by multiple members of the family, is part of a wider area in Brent where hundreds of homeless people have been camping in and around private and county-owned property,” the Journal notes.
“A couple of blocks from Merrill’s wooded land, Escambia County is allowing people to camp on vacant property off North Palafox, where earlier this year Escambia Code Enforcement counted another 130 campsites. Many had moved there from the camp the city of Pensacola closed under Interstate-110.”
Part of the problem is that the area is littered with “[o]utreach organizations that provide services to the indigent and homeless.”
“Church groups and individuals also regularly bring food and other supplies to the unsheltered campers, which neighbors understand, but say is problematic because it encourages some to stay,” according to the Journal.
An Escambia County woman returned home from a hospital stay and was given an unwelcomed surprise. @BKearneyTV details how squatters took over the woman’s home. — https://t.co/mnkA1mes7Z pic.twitter.com/jxZ9bpyLqg
— WEAR ABC 3 (@weartv) April 14, 2022
According to the Journal, local officials/leaders are “more complaints than ever” these days about the homeless and the problems they’re causing.
“That is the biggest, No. 1 problem in the county. There’s no other complaint I get more than, ‘What are you doing about the situation?’ And I know the other commissioners have to be getting it too,” Escambia commissioner Mike Kohler said.
“I see it place after place I go, and a lot of the places are in really poor communities where people basically just want to live in a decent neighborhood. Now they’re just like, ‘Why do I have to live like this? I’m paying my taxes. I shouldn’t have to come home and have homeless people laying in my yard,'” he added.
Escambia County Code Enforcement reportedly receives similar complaints.
“We’re definitely getting more calls than we have historically ever had. We’re getting a lot more calls because although there may have been a camp 100 feet back in the woods before, that may have been a harder place to get to, now it’s close to the right of way,” Escambia Senior Natural Resources manager Tim Day said.
He believes the crisis is due in part to the COVID pandemic. To avoid spreading the virus, the county avoided moving the homeless during the pandemic, thus emboldening the homeless and making them less afraid to be seen/caught.
“Before COVID, they would have been deep in the property and there may not have been as many. They would have been working hard to keep their encampment hidden from everyone so it’s just not in your face. That’s the result of what happened with COVID and the new normal that developed during COVID,” he explained.
The “new normal” indeed …
Writers and editors can be contacted at [email protected] with feedback, tips, or corrections.
V. Saxena is a staff writer with a decade of experience as a professional writer, and a lifetime of experience as an avid news junkie. He holds a degree in computer technology from Purdue University. Saxena also contributes to BizPac Review.
- Tucker Carlson’s most jaw-dropping 5-minute rant praises countries with Sharia Law over Western cities - March 24, 2026
- Jesse Watters kicks off awkward debate about whether Kamala Harris is hot - March 24, 2026
- NYC middle school promotes artwork of Mamdani’s anti-Semite wife, but blocked Holocaust survivor from speaking - March 24, 2026
Comment
We have no tolerance for comments containing violence, racism, profanity, vulgarity, doxing, or discourteous behavior. If a comment is spam, instead of replying to it please click the ∨ icon below and to the right of that comment. Thank you for partnering with us to maintain fruitful conversation.