LOS ANGELES — First, the tents had everyone up in arms.

Two years ago, more than 170 tents or makeshift structures encircled Echo Park Lake, a beloved Los Angeles landmark that had became a sprawling homeless encampment.

Then, everyone was in fisticuffs over the fence.

After city workers in 2021 cleared the encampment — with protesters clashing with police nearby — construction crews erected an ugly chain-link fence that stood around the park until March.

Some nearby residents who witnessed the shootings, fires, fights and late-night parties in the encampment said the fence was essential to restoring order. Critics said it made Echo Park Lake feel like a jail.

Now, the fence is gone. The tents are, too. And folks are complaining about something else entirely.

Geese.

Big, aggressive, loud, always-pooping Canada geese.

"I get a lot of emails — mainly now about the geese situation at the park," Laila Molina, a field deputy for L.A. City Council District 13, told the Echo Park Neighborhood Council this summer when asked if there had been complaints about the chain-link coming down.

Councilman Hugo Soto-Martinez, who campaigned last year on removing the fence, said in a statement that he "knew that unless taking down the fence at Echo Park Lake was successful, my goose was cooked."

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