Bill that bans encampments set to be voted down

The Sacramento Bee already have the power to do so if they wish.

“But for us to put it in law, it’s like trying to make a problem invisible versus addressing the core of the problem,” she said.

For 50 years, Skinner said, local governments worked to suppress the supply of housing, and the senator said that they bear some responsibility for the state’s homelessness crisis.

Though the bill has the support of a handful of interests — California Baptists for Biblical Values, the California State Sheriff’s Association, the cities of Carlsbad, Exeter and Oroville and the Riverside County Sheriff’s Office — it is opposed by several dozen others.

Among them: ACLU California Action, Disability Rights California, the Vera Institute of Justice, the Western Center on Law and Poverty and many pro-housing and homeless advocacy groups.

Jones spoke Tuesday on behalf of SB 1011, saying it would “help protect our most vulnerable populations: children, seniors and families.”

The bill, which Jones called compassionate, would require enforcing authorities to give unhoused people 72 hours notice before clearing their encampments. It also would make creating such an encampment a misdemeanor or infraction offense.

Jones said Tuesday that the goal was not to criminalize homelessness.

Jones and Blakespear said that their bill was inspired by an ordinance passed by the City of San Diego last year. The lawmakers said that it had led to fewer unhoused encampments in the downtown area.

A report by Calmatters found that while encampments were less common in high-traffic areas such as downtown, the city’s main park and around certain schools, encampments are still prevalent, perhaps even more so, near freeways and along the banks of the San Diego River.

“The city’s homeless shelters are full, often with no beds for people who want to avoid a citation. There’s no evidence the city’s overall homeless population has decreased in the eight months since enforcement started,” according to the Calmatters report.

But support for the bill was clearly lacking Tuesday.

Wahab said that she could not support the bill.

“Just because people that are unhoused make people uncomfortable, does not mean it should be criminalized,” Wahab said.

Sen. Kelly Seyarto, R-murrieta, spoke in favor of the bill, saying that when public spaces are taken up by encampments, they are no longer public spaces. He said those spaces “should be available to everybody.”