McLean cites success fighting homelessness as she resists joining case about policing it

A major lawsuit over homelessness is back in the spotlight in the Boise mayoral campaign.

Mayor Lauren McLean emphasized she is not part of a coalition of Republican and Democratic West Coast leaders pushing to overturn a ban on no-camping ordinances. Meanwhile, former Police Chief Mike Masterson favors their appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court. Idaho Attorney General Raúl Labrador favors it too.

Housing has become unaffordable for wide strata of Boise residents. Half the candidates for mayor — Joseph Evans and Aaros Reis — have said they recently experienced homelessness.

A 2018 federal appeals court ruling in a Boise case banned Western cities from ticketing homeless people for sleeping outdoors if there is no space available at a shelter. A coalition of states, cities and others have petitioned the Supreme Court in recent weeks to overrule the decision, arguing that it unfairly strips government of the ability to address the troubles facing cities like Los Angeles, Portland and Seattle.

McLean, who was elected to her first term shortly after the court decision, said at a Monday debate that Boise has beaten “the odds” and is capable of handling homeless problems through its partnerships with local nonprofits.

Masterson said he would join the unusual coalition that includes Arizona legislators, a conservative think tank, multiple Western cities, and the states of California and Idaho that is challenging the rules on policing homelessness because they say cities need more clarity about how to address homeless issues.

What is Martin v. Boise?

In 2009, six people experiencing homelessness sued Boise after they were cited for camping in public, which city law forbade. In 2018, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals — which has jurisdiction over all states west of Utah, including Idaho — said the city’s laws were unconstitutional, and governments cannot criminalize sleeping on the street if people don’t have anywhere else to go.

The issue was a hot topic during the 2019 mayoral campaign, when former Mayor David Bieter argued in favor of the city’s right to ticket homeless people and hired a high profile Los Angeles-based law firm to appeal the decision to the U.S. Supreme Court, according to previous Statesman reporting.

During the 2019 campaign, McLean said she was against ticketing homeless people, but that she would not remove the city from its appeal if it were accepted by the highest court. Days after McLean won the election in a runoff, the Supreme Court declined to take up the case, called Martin v. Boise. That left the 9th Circuit’s decision standing.

In 2021, Boise settled the case for $1.8 million with promises to invest in better services for homeless people.

The case is back in the news because the small city of Grants Pass, Oregon, is appealing a similar ruling to the Supreme Court. While the Boise decision outlawed criminalizing sleeping outside, Grants Pass penalized homeless people with civil citations.

The Oregon town — represented by the same law firm that represented Boise, Gibson Dunn — appealed in August after the 9th Circuit also outlawed the civil penalties. Since then, some Western states and cities have joined on to the appeal, hoping to persuade the court to overrule the Boise precedent.

In a news release last month, Labrador said cities have the right to combat homeless encampments that “give rise to a multitude of public health and safety crises.”

“The Supreme Court must rule in favor of local and state governments, enabling us to prevent the unfortunate developments seen in California, Washington, and Oregon from occurring in Idaho,” Labrador said.

In a brief filed with the Supreme Court, California Gov. Gavin Newsom said that while he agreed with the initial Boise decision outlawing ticketing homeless people for sleeping outside when there is no shelter space, other courts have since interpreted the ruling “far more broadly than that,” instead “authorizing the use of classwide injunctions divorced from individualized inquiries into whether individuals truly have nowhere else to go.”

Eric Tars of the National Homelessness Law Center told The New York Times that coalition members looking to change the court outcome are “seeking to blame and penalize and marginalize the victims rather than take the steps they haven’t found the political will to take.”

What do mayor candidates think?

At a debate Monday at Boise State University, McLean said she is not interested in joining the other Western governments appealing the decision. She pointed to her work partnering with local agencies and nonprofits like Our Path Home and CATCH to form street outreach teams to connect troubled people with services.

The city’s partnerships “have made it possible for Boise to demonstrate that we can do this, we can beat the odds without the Supreme Court weighing in,” McLean said.

“I will not use taxpayer money to chase this,” she said. “Let those cities that are failing do that, while we continue to demonstrate that we can lead with compassion and common sense.”

Masterson, who was police chief when Boise implemented its camping ban and has been endorsed by Bieter, said a Supreme Court ruling would help the city. He also said the city ended its ban “long before” the courts weighed in, after the Boise lawsuit was filed.

“I think I would join the lawsuit, and it’s not just to overturn Boise v. Martin or Grants Pass,” Masterson said. “I think we need greater clarity from the Supreme Court on the direction we need to take.”

Masterson said California has “done some extraordinary things” with homelessness. He cited a new law expanding conservatorships. ABC News reported that the law would allow people with mental illness to be “detained against their will and forced into treatment.”

Masterson also said common perceptions of homeless people are “not a fair image.” Many are people “struggling to stay in their apartments” and who need services, he said.

A one-night survey documented a 6% increase in homelessness between 2020 and 2023 in Ada County, which also marked an 8% decline from 2012, according to previous Statesman reporting. But officials caution the single-night surveys of homelessness do not reveal the whole picture.

The two other mayoral candidates, Reis and Evans, who took part in Monday’s debate but who have not been fundraising, have recently been homeless, according to statements they have made.

Reis identifies as gender neutral. They have said they do not really want to be mayor and have partly based their campaign around advocating homeless people. They said they spent some nights this year sleeping on the grounds of City Hall.

Reis said “anti-homeless infrastructure” in the city, like benches that prevent people from lying down on them, should be removed to be kinder to people who are struggling.

Evans has said he is living in his van, because housing is too expensive. He listed Interfaith Sanctuary, a local shelter, as his address on his candidacy form.

Evans referenced a proposed nearly 300-bed expansion of the Ada County Jail, which is on the ballot in November to address what the Sheriff’s Office says is a building too small for the rapidly-growing region. Evans said a Supreme Court decision overruling the Martin case could have major implications for Idaho’s capital.

“Those 300 beds could quickly be filled by homeless Idahoans simply for the crime of being poor,” he said. “No. That’s not the Boise I believe in.”