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As winter nears, concerns grow over squatters occupying empty buildings
Area homeless population seeks shelter as camps are closed, weather turns cold
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Since residents of Green Hunter Homes left, the complex has been the target of vandals breaking windows and entering the empty apartments.
The door of the neighbor’s house was wide open, rocking slightly with the breeze, when Tammy Hansen returned to her midtown Gainesville home with her teenage daughter and toddler son one day this past week. But the neighbors had vacated months before, and Hansen began to worry that squatters might have found a place to hole up as the night air chills and winter approaches. She called police officers to inspect the place, and they found no one inside.