Farreaching protections for homeless in Santa Rosa
Homeless people in Santa Rosa gained new protections Friday with a courtapproved settlement that requires local governments to provide shelters with beds and accommodations for the disabled and requires police to preserve and store private property they seize at unauthorized encampments.
The settlement, following several police actions that shut down and cleared homeless camps, was reached after months of negotiations mediated by U.S. District Judge Vince Chhabria of San Francisco, who issued an injunction enforcing its terms. It takes effect Aug. 12 and runs through June 30, 2020, but could be extended by further agreements.
“They’ll have to change how law enforcement works,” said Adrienne Lauby, cofound
er of the advocacy group Homeless Action! “Now they say, ‘You’ll have to move along or I’ll have to arrest you.’ They’ll have to ask people if they need accommodation and make an assessment” of their needs.
Santa Rosa Mayor Tom Schwedhelm said the settlement reflects his city’s position that, although homeless people are not exempt from criminal laws, “homelessness is not a crime, and those who are experiencing homelessness must be treated with dignity and respect.” He said he hopes the agreement is “a model for other cities.”
The advocacy group and three homeless people sued Santa Rosa and Sonoma County in April 2018 after officers removed an encampment in the city’s Roseland neighborhood to make room for an affordablehousing project. The suit alleged that the raid included unconstitutional searches and property seizures, discriminated against the disabled and violated their right to fair housing under state law.
Under the settlement, police who encounter homeless people on public property cannot arrest them without first “providing an opportunity to be placed in adequate shelter.” The shelter must be open day and night; have beds rather than floor mats; allow people to be housed along with their spouse, partner, child or caregiver; and have accommodations for a person’s “disability-related needs.”
Lauby said the disability provision was important because many homeless people — more than half, by her estimation — suffer some form of disability. A lawyer in the case, Jeffery Hoffman of California Rural Legal Assistance, said a common problem is placement of the disabled in “a large emergency shelter with a lot of people in close quarters, which may worsen their symptoms.”
The settlement says that for those with mental health problems, “a barracksstyle placement may not be adequate.” It also says shelters must provide separate quarters for men and women for those who object to a mixedgender placement.
Before clearing a campsite, officers must give the homeless time to collect and move their belongings. Unattended items with indications of ownership must be collected and stored for 90 days to allow the owners to retrieve them. Those provisions do not apply to items that have been abandoned, like an empty tent or a bag of clothes scattered across a sidewalk, to bulky furniture or to objects that pose an “immediate health or safety risk,” the settlement says.
Lauby said those provisions were based on rules already in effect in San Francisco.
The settlement also requires Santa Rosa to establish a training program for employees who regularly interact with the homeless.