(ESCAMBIA COUNTY, FL.) --- In May 2025, the City of Pensacola approved 13 $40,000-$50,000 hygiene trailers for Offentsive’s “Camp O2” site after the organization spent $79,340.45 in public grant money on infrastructure there, before completing the soil testing it had listed as a potential hard stop due to Superfund contamination concerns.
Photo Credit: Facebook / Offentsive / Offentsive declares the need and intent to have soil testing done to move forward with the camp
On May 16, 2025, Offentsive announced on Facebook that Opening Doors Northwest Florida (ODNWFL) had been approved for a Challenge Grant for Camp O2. The announcement stated nearly $100,000 would cover privacy fencing, security systems, utilities, sidewalks, storage, and other site improvements, and that all spending must be completed by June 30, 2025. The organization also stated it would be fully transitioned from Camp O to Camp O2 by June 30, 2025.
Transaction records from ODNWFL show money was spent between May 21, 2025 and June 26, 2026 on electrical work, a privacy fence, and a 20-foot combination building with an office at Camp O2.
On September 10, 2026, City Council voted 6-1 to amend the lease with Offentsive. The amendment removed 13 Pallet shelter units from the Offentsive site and redirected them to Re-Entry Alliance Pensacola (REAP), on Moreno Street, nearly doubling REAP’s site to 27 units.
The hygiene units remain approved for Offentsive.
The vote came after Council member Bare and the public questioned why assets were being delivered to a site with no residents.
Photo Credit: Facebook / Offentsive / Unit arrival before Council approval
“I’m really upset that something's been delivered without approval,” said public speaker Francesca Yabraian.
Councilman Charles Bare said the trailer was valued at four to five times what a pallet shelter is.
“They don't have anybody there right now. But for me to give them a hygiene unit when they're not capable of taking any pallet shelters doesn't make sense,” Bare said. He proposed an alternative to “just take everything out for Offentsive. We could just not give them anything.”
Mayor D.C. Reeves confirmed the timing.
“Under the current lease, it was already going to be delivered.”
Deputy City Administrator Cliff Collins told Council the urgency was due to American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) funds and Public Benefit Corporation Pallet going out of business. Collins also said he was unsure about the environmental status of the parcel.
“I did not know the area itself was a Superfund site, and that's something I'll have to look into," Collins said.
The Offentsive site at 4100 N Palafox is adjacent to the Escambia Wood Superfund Site. In a February 22, 2025, post, Offentsive listed “soil testing for contamination associated with the Superfund site” as one of the final potential hard stops for Camp O2.
The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) confirms the Escambia Wood site involves creosote and pentachlorophenol contamination and has land-use restrictions based on industrial or commercial use rather than unrestricted residential use.
Michael Kimberl of Food Not Bombs told OpGov.News he has worked with people on the property for years.
“From over a decade of working with people on this contaminated piece of property, myself and others started noticing a pattern of people with very aggressive forms of cancer,” Kimberl said. “Every summer there would be an outbreak of staph infections. And it was all people that were engaging with the soil.”
Kimberl also described how the property has been treated.
“Since there's no economic value to the contaminated property, we as a community turn a blind eye to impoverished people utilizing property that we can't develop or make money off of as a community," Kimberl said. Kimberl pointed to the lack of concern for homeless utilizing the property and the issues it could cause "It's economic racism on a grander scale."
Mayor Reeves said the site is private property and the city’s role is limited to permitting.
“We are not here to dictate what use Offentsive is using on private property so long as they are following rules and policies of this city,” Reeves said.
Reeves also said all Pallet units and the trailer remain city property, leased for $1 per year.
Unanswered questions include whether soil testing was completed for Camp O2, who authorized $79,000 in spending before Council approved final occupancy, why was there so much spending after the June 30, 2025 deadline and before a soil test was completed, and is the proposed property at 4100 N Palafox leased to the city.
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