State Chapters > California

Will L.A. impose new rules on sidewalk sleeping? Protests and debate erupt at City Hall

(1/2) > >>

rangerrebew:
 Will L.A. impose new rules on sidewalk sleeping? Protests and debate erupt at City Hall
 
By Emily Alpert ReyesStaff Writer
Sep. 24, 2019
 

As surging numbers of people bed down on the streets of Los Angeles, politicians have faced radically different demands from residents and activists on how to react to the spread of ramshackle encampments.

Progressive activists have called to end the criminalization of homeless people and roll back rules that bar sleeping on sidewalks. Some community groups, in turn, want the city to ramp up enforcement of such rules to eliminate filth and blight.

At a meeting Tuesday at City Hall punctuated with shouting and hissing from the crowd, members of the Los Angeles City Council began to discuss how and whether to rewrite city rules about sidewalk sleeping — and came out with no clear answer.

https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2019-09-24/homeless-sleeping-street-sidewalk-law-controversy

skeeter:
As LA contemplates allowing the lunatics to run the asylum.

PeteS in CA:
IIRC, there's a court case, currently in appeal to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, that precludes cities from enforcing such things unless they have provided shelter beds to which those displaced can go. It's so loony I would neither be surprised if the Ninth upheld or smacked down the ruling. But that is part of the context in which cities in the Ninth Circuit - not just California - must operate. The crazy activists are another part of the context, and then there's politicians who like to kick cans down the road for their successors to deal with.

sneakypete:

--- Quote from: skeeter on September 26, 2019, 04:20:36 pm ---As LA contemplates allowing the lunatics to run the asylum.

--- End quote ---

@skeeter

About 30 years too late for that one.

PeteS in CA:
What I referred to above:

https://hotair.com/archives/john-s-2/2019/09/26/city-la-joins-push-asking-supreme-court-overturn-homeless-decision/

City Of LA Joins Legal Challenge To 9th Circuit’s Boise Decision


--- Quote ---Last week, LA County’s Board of Supervisors voted to file an amicus brief in support of a legal challenge to a 9th Circuit decision which determined it was unconstitutional to prevent the homeless from sleeping on sidewalks unless they were offered a bed somewhere else. That decision has limited what municipalities in western states can do to deal with homelessness. Yesterday, the city of Los Angeles decided to join the push to ask the Supreme Court to overturn the so-called Boise decision:


--- Quote ---City Attorney Mike Feuer announced today that he filed an amicus brief asking the U.S. Supreme Court to take on Martin v. Boise, saying his office needs more clarity on its ability to enforce sidewalk bans.

In the brief, Feuer says the city agrees that “no individual should be susceptible to punishment for sleeping on the sidewalk at night, if no alternative shelter is available.” But, he argues, the Boise decision—which covers nine states in the west, including California— raises more questions than it answers…

In the amicus brief, the city attorney says there are three questions left unresolved in the Boise decision. One of those questions is: How many beds, exactly, must the city build before it can take “enforcement action.”
--- End quote ---

--- End quote ---

Personally, I think the Boise decision is fundamentally flawed. It should not be a city's responsibility - ultimately, taxpayers' - to provide free housing to bums just because the bums choose to infest the city.

Navigation

[0] Message Index

[#] Next page