Washington –
The Supreme Court grappled with important questions Monday about the growing homeless problem as it considered whether cities can punish people for sleeping outdoors when shelter space is lacking.
The case is the most important to come before the high court in decades on the issue and comes at a time when record numbers of people lack a permanent place to live in the United States.
It started in the rural Oregon town of Grants Pass, which began charging people $295 to sleep outdoors as the cost of housing rose and tent camping popped up in the city’s public parks. The city appealed to the high court after the San Francisco-based 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that banning camping in places without sufficient shelter amounts to cruel and unusual punishment.
The justices appeared to be leaning toward a narrow ruling in the case after hearing arguments that showed the strong terms of the debate over homelessness in Western states like California, which is home to a third of the country’s homeless population.
Sleeping is a biological necessity and people may be forced to do so outdoors if they cannot afford housing or there is no space in shelters, Justice Sonia Sotomayor said.
“Where will we put them if every city, every town, every town lacks compassion and passes a law identical to this one? Where are they supposed to sleep? “Are they supposed to commit suicide and not sleep?” she asked.
Solving homelessness is a complicated policy issue, said Justice Brett Kavanaugh, who raised questions about both the role of federal courts and camping bans. “How does it help if there aren’t enough beds for the number of homeless people in the jurisdiction?” he said.
Other conservative justices questioned how far Eighth Amendment legal protections should be extended as cities struggle to manage homeless encampments that can be dangerous and unhealthy.
“What if there are no public bathrooms, do people have the Eighth Amendment right to defecate and urinate in the open?” said Justice Neil Gorsuch.
Other public health laws cover that situation, said Justice Department attorney Edwin Kneedler. He said people should not be punished just for sleeping outside, but argued that the Ninth Circuit’s ruling should be thrown out because the court did not do enough to determine whether people are “involuntarily homeless.”
Gorsuch and other justices also raised the possibility that other aspects of state or federal law could help resolve the problem, potentially without setting a sweeping new legal precedent.
The issue is urgent in the West, where a cross-section of Democratic and Republican officials say it makes it harder for them to manage the camps.
Hundreds of advocacy groups, on the other hand, argue that allowing cities to punish people who need a place to sleep will criminalize homelessness and ultimately worsen the crisis as the cost of housing rises.
Dozens of protesters gathered outside the courthouse Monday morning to advocate for more affordable housing, holding silver thermal blankets and signs that read “housing, not handcuffs.”
Homelessness in the United States grew a dramatic 12 percent last year to its highest level reported, as rising rents and declining coronavirus assistance combined with a lack of access to mental health and addiction treatment to put housing out of reach of more people.
More than 650,000 people are estimated to be homeless, the most since the country began using the annual point-in-time survey in 2007. People of color, 2SLGBTQ+ people and older people are disproportionately affected, advocates said .
The court is expected to decide the case at the end of June.
Rush reported from Portland, Oregon.