Lengthy Seaside will start citing and presumably arresting homeless individuals as a part of the town’s effort to crack down on its most problematic encampments.
These actions will probably be used as a final resort to take away encampments identified to be “difficult spots,” Lengthy Seaside Deputy Metropolis Supervisor Teresa Chandler introduced in a memo this week.
“This enforcement mechanism will be used as an additional tool when appropriate,” Chandler stated, “while continuing to apply a human-centered approach to addressing homelessness.”
Metropolis officers stated the plan is to determine encampments that pose a public risk or block entry to libraries, parks and seashores. It should additionally goal homeless camps the place individuals have repeatedly declined to just accept service or shelter.
There have been 3,376 individuals experiencing homelessness tallied within the metropolis’s newest homeless depend — down 2.1% from 3,447 in 2023. Not less than 70% of the inhabitants lives outside.
Within the final 12 months, public works groups have responded to three,200 encampments in Lengthy Seaside, in keeping with the memo. However it didn’t disclose the price of the citations or what the size of jail time can be for individuals who accumulate citations.
Chandler didn’t reply to a request for remark.
Nonetheless, the town plans to indicate restraint.
“Enforcement of the city’s anti-camping ordinance through issuing of a misdemeanor citation will generally be utilized after multiple attempts of outreach and at the team’s discretion, as appropriate,” the memo stated.
It’s all the results of the Supreme Courtroom ruling in June that stated counties and cities can implement legal guidelines proscribing homeless individuals from sleeping or tenting in public areas, even when there isn’t satisfactory shelter out there.
The ruling was thought of a win by the leaders of many cities within the West, the place a majority of the nation’s unhoused individuals reside. However for homeless advocates, it was a devastating blow after rulings by the ninth Circuit Courtroom of Appeals that held it was unconstitutional to implement anti-camping legal guidelines in opposition to individuals who had no residence and nowhere to sleep.
Advocates feared that the enforcement of anti-camping ordinances would solely result in fines and arrests and make it harder to handle homelessness.
Lengthy Seaside officers acknowledge that enforcement of its anti-camping legal guidelines will in all probability have some unlucky penalties.
“Fines associated with citations can have destabilizing effects on people who are already extremely low-income,” the memo stated. “The experience of receiving fines and forced movement may result in material and psychological harm, lost belongings such as documentation, exacerbated mental and physical health complications and other trauma.”
Metropolis officers stated the enforcement may trigger individuals to maneuver to different components of the town or to neighboring cities. It should additionally create extra challenges for outreach groups that depend on sustaining connections with unhoused individuals.
Nonetheless, metropolis officers say they’re doing all the pieces they will to strategy the state of affairs as humanely as attainable, together with having constructed a brand new homeless shelter and extra housing items.
The memo calls on the town to spice up funding for motel vouchers and everlasting housing to offer individuals a route out of the shelter system, in addition to to extend staffing on the Homeless Companies Bureau and different departments that work with homeless inhabitants.
“It is important to remember that this approach builds upon a strong foundation of existing work,” the memo stated, “and that the city’s capacity to address homelessness has grown dramatically over the past few years.”
Town plans to assessment the effectiveness and affect of its enforcement efforts in six months.
