Homeless camps trash Ballona Wetlands preserve

MARINA DEL REY, LOS ANGELES (KABC) -- Trash litters the ground across the 600-acre Ballona Wetlands Ecological Reserve, just south of Marina del Rey.

In the last year, the California Fish and Wildlife Department has hauled away 15 tons of garbage, much of it from homeless camps that began popping up last June. The department is working to eliminate the camps with the hopes of restoring the wetlands and opening them up to the public.

R.C. Brody, who manages the reserve, says the camps have been steadily destroying the habitat for wildlife.

"Fence lizards, the different type of upland birds, different reptiles. You do get some foraging from the water fowl too that come up here. You'll get an occasional egret or heron pecking away for a lizard," Brody said.

Friends of Ballona Wetlands is working to raise the millions of dollars needed to bring sea water back into the reserve and restore the wetlands.

"Once that happens, we're going to see less homeless just by nature of what's going to happen. We're going to have more tidal flow," said Lisa Fimiani with the Friends of Ballona Wetlands. "They're not going to be able to hide out and camp underneath native trees and bushes like they have been."

The Culver Marina Little League is hoping work starts soon. Their fields are on wetlands property, and their facilities have suffered nearly $40,000 in damage.

"They set fire to things," said Paul Lupi with the Culver Marina Little League. "Our dugout at one point was burned down. They've broken into our snack shack, ripped apart our irrigation systems. They've broken into our field boxes and used them as their houses basically."

Lupi believes restoring the wetlands will add to the beauty of the area.

The groups hope restoration work will begin late 2015.