Closing Tent City and sending its residents to a new shelter with a curfew and other tough rules may put more homeless people back on the streets, in parks and in residential neighborhoods, city officials said on Wednesday.

      City police are already making plans for beefed-up enforcement of overnight trespassing laws in city parks and other laws. They expect to pay overtime to put more officers on patrol in neighborhoods frequented by homeless people, and have scheduled training for officers on how to deal with vagrants.

    The new Homeless Assistance Center on Sunrise Boulevard is scheduled to open Feb. 1. Tent City, near downtown, is expected to close about six weeks later.

     But the new center will have a curfew, a 60-day limit on stays, and a requirement that residents look for work. Some homeless people will choose to remain on the streets rather than conform to those rules, officials predicted.

    One of those homeless people is Charles Williams, who waited, cigarette in hand, for a community group to show up with dinner at Tent City Wednesday night.

   Williams, 45, sa id he knows this for certain: He makes his own rules. And he wont change to move into the Homeless Assistance Center.

      It'll be like a minimum-security prison, said Williams, who said he has been at Tent City since 1995 because health problems keep him from working. I dont want anyone telling me Ive got to go to bed by 10, and when to get up. Id (rather) be on the streets.

     Thats just what city officials are worried about.

     They're not going, said Commissioner Carlton Moore. I dont see any plan about the ones who do not want to conform to the new shelter's rules.

    He said police will make sure the homeless do not congregate around areas like the Riverwalk, but he is worried about vagrants loitering in residential neighborhoods and parks near the tent.

      We need to do everything we can to take care of the people who do have homes, he said.

    Police Chief Michael Brasfield promised his department would adopt a no-tolerance policy to make sure homeless people dont wander the streets.

     Beginning next week, his officers will take a mandatory four-hour class called Homeless 101, where they will be taught how to talk the homeless into seeking help. Brasfield also said there will be an increased police presence downtown from motor units to mounted ones when the tent starts to fold.

     And if the homeless just wont go?

     Then theyll face arrest, Brasfield said.

     But thats a last resort. The 110-bed city jail is 70 to 80 percent occupied (with people who committed other crimes) on a slow night, he said.

    And what happens after people reach the 60-day limit on stays in the new center?

     On Wednesday (January 20) the county, which is building the multimil lion-dollar Homeless Assistance Center, promised to pressure social service agencies to provide care after people leave the center.

     Steve Werthman, coordinator of the countys homeless program, told commissioners the county is working on a plan that would require agencies that have a contract with the county to offer beds to the homeless after their 60 days are up.

     Well be going through some growing pains, said Vice Mayor John Aurelius, referring to the transition period when the tent comes down. Youd be crazy to say youre not concerned about it.