BOISE -- Rhodes Park isn't only a popular place for skaters. It has also been a favorite hangout for Boise's homeless, who moved back in when the park re-opened in April.
Since the tent city known as Cooper Court was shut down, many of Boise's homeless hang out at the skate park during the day. They have a right to be there - even though some park users aren't happy about it.
Boise police have been busy monitoring the area and making sure everyone is safe and obeying the law.
Before the Rhodes Park revamp, the area under the I-84 overpass across the street from the park was a high-profile spot for the city's homeless to congregate and camp out. Once construction started at the park last year, a chain link fence went up and those folks were forced to relocate.
Now, sidewalks outside the park are once again crowded with bikes, blankets, bags and bottles.
"This is home to mostly everybody down here," one homeless woman, Meaghan Sletto, told KTVB.
Rhodes Park has become home to a group of Boise's homeless.
"I've been on the streets a little over a year," Sletto added.
Within that year, Sletto says she's been displaced multiple times: from the freeway underpass, to Cooper Court. After the city cleared out the homeless living in the tent city, Sletto wound up sleeping in a Porta Potty.
"We had nowhere else to go after the mass eviction," Sletto said.
Rhodes Park is once again their hangout, since all the services they use are so close by. During the day they eat at Corpus Christi, just yards away. At night, Sletto says most of them sleep at nearby shelters like Interfaith Sanctuary or River of Life. But, she adds, if those shelters are too full or someone isn't allowed in there, they end up sleeping outside at Rhodes.
But during the day, homeless folks say they mind their own and don't bother the kids who use the park to board and bike.
"We don't want people to be afraid to skate or bring their children here," Boise police Bike Patrol Officer Tom Shuler told KTVB.
Officers say it is a feeling some parents have expressed.
"This is a city park and so people can be here. As long as we're not out here destroying things," Officer Shuler added.
Being public property, Boise police officers spend a lot of time educating concerned parents as well as the homeless about what they can and can't do. The main law they are enforcing is the city's camping ordinance, which prohibits people from camping out overnight in this area.
"It goes both ways. Just educating both groups saying everybody has got a right to be here. Let's all enjoy it," Shuler said.
He tells KTVB that officers have found some needles and other objects near the sidewalk, which caused some concern about the possible dangers that overnight camping poses.
"We spend a lot of time down here just to be seen. So I know that probably dissuades a lot of things going on."
But there hasn't been a large number of citations because police have a good relationship with the crowd.
"Not like we had with Cooper Court or the underpass. But we're really working to not let that happen again, we're trying to keep it smaller, more of a daytime [place] so people aren't spending the night here," Shuler said.
Boise PD wants to encourage anyone looking to come down here to donate food to give that to shelters and local agencies. They say food attracts more people to the area and a big gathering of people here could pose more dangers.