Fresno passes law limiting where homeless can camp. Will the ruling be challenged?

Fresno City Council has approved stricter limitations on where the homeless can set up camp, despite strong public opposition.

Introduced by Councilmembers Garry Bredefeld of District 6 and Miguel Arias of District 3, the ordinance prohibits impeding sidewalks, streets or other public-right-of-way within 500 feet of sensitive areas such as schools, childcare facilities, public parks and public libraries, as well as the city’s warming centers, cooling centers, and city-permitted shelters for the unhoused. While there are no explicit fines or penalties associated with the ordinance, city leaders and staff have discretion to enforce the rule.

The ordinance is about “making our streets and community safe,” Bredefeld said May 25, while Arias said the ordinance is meant to “protect children and the areas where they visit most of the time when accompanied,” such as libraries, school sites and childcare facilities. He also said it would also help unhoused individuals that are disabled when they try to access the city’s warming centers, cooling centers, and shelters.

The ordinance passed in the consent agenda 5-1. Councilmembers Arias, Bredefeld, Luis Chavez, Nelson Esparza, and Mike Karbassi voted in favor, while Council Vice President Annalisa Perea cast the sole no vote. President Tyler Maxwell was absent during the vote.

More than a dozen people, including Fresno residents, LGBTQ groups, homeless advocates and faith leaders, commented in opposition to what they call the “sit, lie, sleep” ordinance.

Kat Fobear, a professor at Fresno State, said the ordinance “is a direct attack against the LGBTQ community.” She said the ordinance would criminalize homelessness, which disproportionately impacts trans people.

“Homelessness is fundamentally an LGBTQ rights issue,” she said.

Some homeless and community advocates read Bible passages as they urged the council to reconsider the ordinance, which they say is overly broad and criminalizes homelessness. Others asked for more funding for mental health services, affordable housing, rent control, and an update on the tiny home village project.

Rev. Tim Kutzmark, a minister at the Unitarian Universalist Church of Fresno, urged the council to “remember your compassion.”

“Every time I walk into City Hall, I see the words ‘In God We Trust’ (above the dais),” he said. “We forget that God trusts that we’re going to do the right thing and my faith teaches me that we’re called to protect and prioritize the most vulnerable among us.”

Homeless advocate Bob McCloskey said the city would likely face a lawsuit over the measure and reminded the council that last year, a judge blocked an ordinance that would have restricted the public from homeless encampment cleanups.

Fresno civil rights activist Gloria Hernandez also raised concerns about the possibility of a lawsuit and said she’s “sick and tired of spending my taxpayer money defending the city on frivolous ordinance(s).”

ACLU has ‘serious concerns’ with ordinance

In a June 7 letter addressed to city council members, the ACLU of Northern California’s senior counsel William Freeman urged the council to reject the ordinance, saying it further criminalizes homelessness and is “in violation of numerous provisions of the U.S. and California Constitutions.”

The seven-page letter details nine separate areas where the ACLU thinks the ordinance is unlawful, and where a “legal attack on it would be successful.” Freeman says the ordinance violates the 14th Amendment equal protection claim, and right to free movement, for example.

2023.06.07 ACLU NorCal Letter to Fresno City Council by Melissa Montalvo on Scribd

“The language of the Ordinance and Fresno’s history demonstrate that the Ordinance is based on animus toward unhoused people,” he wrote, “and therefore denies unhoused people equal protection under the law.”

He also said the “vagueness” of the ordinance invites “arbitrary or discriminatory enforcement, enabling police officers to target only unhoused people.”

City leaders said last month that the ordinance is a “forward-thinking” measure to limit the city’s liability by making sure that these sidewalks are accessible under the Americans with Disability Act. But Freeman said the ordinance could violate ADA rules by placing an “undue burden” on people with disability-related needs.

“People with a variety of disabilities have a disability-related need to sit, lie, or sleep in proximity to various locations throughout the City, such as near public amenities and places of recreation, doctors’ offices, stores, and other sources of support,” the letter says.

In a text message to The Bee on Thursday, Bredefeld said he disagreed with the ACLU. He said the ordinance “in no way criminalizes the homeless as the ACLU falsely claims.”

“What it does do,’” he said, “is ensure the safety and security of all citizens who want to use sidewalks to enter schools, libraries, child care centers without having to walk over or around someone who is lying on the sidewalk and blocking it.”

He said homeless advocates and the ACLU should focus on “getting homeless off the streets, not fight to keep them on the streets.”

It’s not immediately clear whether the ACLU plans to pursue litigation over the ordinance.

Freeman said the ACLU welcomes the opportunity to discuss the matters in the letter “as an alternative to legal action.”