Homeless camps could be cleared from parks, libraries under proposed Sacramento County measure

Sacramento County is developing a broad ordinance that would allow officers to clear homeless encampments from a wide variety of the county’s public spaces, such as parks, libraries and schools.

It expands on an earlier proposal that would have allowed law enforcement to clear encampments off of “critical infrastructure” such as flood levies and the areas directly surrounding county homeless shelters.

The Sacramento County Board of Supervisors last week also requested a separate ordinance that would specifically allow clearing of camps in the American River Parkway.

The proposals come on the heels of recent board votes to spend big on homelessness in the county’s new $7.3 billion budget and to establish the county’s first tiny home village at a site in south Sacramento.

The expanded camp-clearing ordinance was discussed Tuesday in a workshop-style meeting. Supervisors did not take a formal vote.

Tensions played out in hours of public speeches, where some county residents implored the supervisors to clear encampments for safety and environmental reasons, while others said the ordinance would unfairly criminalize homelessness.

The supervisors seemed to end the meeting nearly unanimously in favor of sweeping action to allow law enforcement to disband camps in much of the unincorporated county. At the end of the meeting, four out of the five supervisors — all except Supervisor Don Nottoli — voiced support for an expanded ordinance, which they want to include parks, schools and libraries.

Violators of the ordinance would be subject to criminal penalties such as an infraction or a misdemeanor for repeat violators in the same 30 days.

The expanded ordinance, however, might run into legal challenges. A 2018 ruling from the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals generally prohibits local governments from enforcing anti-camping ordinances unless they can offer shelter beds to the people being moved.

In addition to expanding the ordinance’s jurisdiction, Sacramento County Director of Homelessness Initiatives Emily Halcon said at the meeting that the revised ordinance would include the implementation of “defensible space” around the county’s new Safe Stay communities for homeless residents and would consider the implications of the Americans with Disabilities Act in terms of being able to restrict encampments on sidewalks in the county.

County spokeswoman Janna Haynes said the ordinance will go through two more steps before it can be adopted. It will first be formally presented to the board to allow any final amendments or changes, and then it will face a final vote.

What do Sacramento residents want?

Multiple people who spoke in favor of the ordinance during a three hour public meeting last week cited the environmental impact that trash from encampments can have on creeks in the county, including on the American River Parkway.

Others noted safety concerns posed by various encampments. Heather Brownholtz, a Carmichael resident, spoke of a home break-in she faced by a homeless person. She also cited the murder of Emma Roark on the American River Parkway earlier this year.

“I do feel that I have to have a voice for the women and the children of our community, and we deserve to be safe,” Brownholtz said.

But others argued that the ordinance effectively criminalizes homelessness, and fails to address the root causes that are driving people to live on the streets, such as the lack of affordable housing.

“We are not talking about housing,” said Claudia Cardoza Aderholt. “We’re not. We are disbursing funds, but we are not talking about what is actually going to help [the homeless], help their pets, help the county and overall the constituents and residents.”

Bob Erlenbusch, the executive director of the Sacramento Regional Coalition to End Homelessness, said the ordinance would punish homeless people rather than work toward a solution to the problem of homelessness in the county.

After the county opted to fund new tiny home communities last week, Erlenbusch said, it was ironic to see the board embrace the new ordinance.

“The Board of Supervisors was proactive in creating at least one, perhaps two tiny home villages, and then on the other hand, criminalized the thousands of people who are not among the 200 that would fit into the tiny home,” Erlenbusch said.

At the close of the meeting, supervisors pushed back against criticism that the ordinance would criminalize homelessness. Supervisor Patrick Kennedy said rather than punishing the unhoused, “what we’re asking is for people to live by societal norms.”

Kennedy and Supervisor Phil Serna both pointed to other actions the board has recently taken to address homelessness, such as funding allocated for shelters and other assistance in the new county budget.

“The vast majority of our time is spent trying to figure out how to help people who are unsheltered in our community, but that does not mean we should disregard the impact that it is having not only on our critical infrastructure and sensitive environmental areas, but in our neighborhoods,” Serna said.

Is the homeless ordinance enforceable?

County documents regarding the ordinance recognize the 2018 federal court ruling known as Martin vs. Boise limits its enforcement abilities because the county would not have enough shelter to offer people who could be moved from camps.

“The increased availability of emergency housing and shelter … is key to the county’s ability to criminally enforce ordinances and statutes prohibiting individuals from unlawfully being on public property,” one document says.

The county’s last count, published in 2019, estimated that 5,570 people experience homelessness each night, but Erlenbusch estimates that number has likely doubled or even tripled — making it unlikely that the county could have shelter for all unhoused people by the time the ordinance would pass.

Because the ordinance cannot yet be enforced, Erlenbusch suggested that it might serve as more of a symbolic action than one that could create immediate change in the county.

“The way the ordinance reads, it’s ‘we are not going to enforce this until we have got enough housing,’” Erlenbusch said. “So that’s why … it seems more symbolic than anything else.”

This story was originally published June 21, 2022 at 5:25 AM.