Homeless sue Sacramento, police over removal of portable toilet at downtown camp site
Homeless residents looking for access to bathroom facilities filed suit in federal court Tuesday against the city of Sacramento and its police department, alleging that officers ordered the removal of a port-a-potty that had been placed near an encampment.
The lawsuit, which seeks class-action status for 30 homeless people living at the site near Seventh and North B streets, was filed by Sacramento civil rights attorney Mark Merin and seeks a court order prohibiting the city from removing a port-a-potty that has replaced the one that was ordered removed earlier.
“While politicians fret and pay consultants to plan and advise, but still neither provide shelter or restrooms, a few private citizens have stepped up to (plate) and service port-a-potties where homeless encampments have sprung up,” the lawsuit says. “What does the city do? Order the portable toilets removed endangering public health and depriving the homeless people who use the port-a-potties of dignity and the opportunity to dispose of their human waste in sanitary fashion.”
The lawsuit, which names homeless residents Patrick Mahoney, Caroline Kennedy, Suracha Xiong and Brandon Allen Sr. as plaintiffs, says “a compassionate private citizen” hired a company to place the port-a-potty near the camp on Jan. 16 and maintain it, and adds that homeless residents – dubbed the “Hopeful Community” – agreed to clean and protect the toilet.
“For nine days members of the Hopeful Community celebrated the presence of the port-a-potty, used it, kept it clean, and felt more human and dignified by the presence and accessibility of the convenience,” Merin’s lawsuit says. “Then, after nine days, abruptly and without notice, the port-a-potty was removed on orders of the Sacramento City Police and the Hopeful Community was crushed and dejected.”
After that removal, a group arranged for another toilet to be placed at the site on Monday “to protect the right of homeless people to dispose of their waste in a dignified and sanitary fashion.”
City spokesman Tim Swanson said the city has not yet been served with the lawsuit, so it would be premature to comment on it. The Sacramento Police Department declined comment on the lawsuit because it cannot comment on pending litigation, said Officer Karl Chan, police spokesman.
In order for a portable toilet to be placed on public property, it would have to go through a permit process with the city, Chan said.
The suit notes that the city’s homeless crisis has caused encampments that contribute to e. coli contamination of Sacramento’s rivers and endanger public health.
“The number of homeless people attempting to survive, unsheltered, in the City of Sacramento skyrocketed by 85% between 2015 and 2017 and increased an additional 19% in the two years that followed,” the suit says. “Vastly undercounted, the number of unsheltered homeless people continued to record levels causing the Sacramento City Council in January 2020 to declare a shelter crisis suspending provisions of state and local regulatory statutes, regulations, and standards of housing, health or safety which otherwise hinder provision of shelter to homeless persons.
“From 2016 to 2017 the number of deaths among the unsheltered homeless population rose by 75% and is four times that of the death rate in the general population,” the lawsuit reads.
There are more than 5,570 homeless people in Sacramento County, mostly in the city, a count conducted about a year ago found.
In 2018, 132 homeless men and women died in Sacramento County – the highest number of homeless deaths on record, according to an annual report by the Sacramento Regional Coalition to End Homelessness. The number of deaths surged to 124 in 2017 from 71 in 2016.
The lawsuit claims the city violated homeless residents’ right to privacy, right to bodily integrity and that its actions constitute “punishment for involuntary and life-sustaining activity.”
The same day the lawsuit was filed a Sacramento man who has been trying to provide port-a-potty access to the homeless in another area received permission to do so from the county.
Evan Edgar, a Sacramento engineer, said he received a permit Tuesday to place a toilet at Northgate Boulevard and Highway 160 on Department of Regional Parks property.
He previously had stationed one near the Garden Highway last year, but the county ordered it removed after 15 days because it had no permit, he said.
Edgar says he expects the new portable toilet — which is costing $89 a week and being funded by him and private donors — to be in place Friday. That is part of what Edgar is calling “Operation Brown Trout” to help reduce pollution of Sacramento waterways.
Sacramento homeless activists have long been asking city and county officials to install more bathrooms and showers for the homeless to use.
In 2016, the city placed a portable bathroom facility on Ahern Street between North A and North B streets, about a half-mile from the site named in the lawsuit, but it is no longer there.
The City Council has approved a somewhat controversial plan to open a bathroom facility downtown at Cesar Chavez Plaza. The council was set to vote Tuesday to hire a contractor to construct that facility.
Many homeless men and women use the restrooms at large homeless service provider Loaves and Fishes, but that facility normally closes at 2:30 p.m. on weekdays and is not open on weekends.
A public bathroom facility is now open for 14 hours on weekdays and 8 hours on weekends at a shelter at 1400 North A Street, said Stephen Watters of First Step Communities, which runs the shelter.
This story was originally published February 4, 2020 at 2:32 PM.
