Clinica Sierra Vista's street medicine teams meets with the unhoused in Fresno. Clinica Sierra Vista photo

It’s been a little more than two months since the U.S. Supreme Court gave cities the green light to crack down on homeless encampments. Already, Santa Monica is considering barring its homeless residents from using sleeping bags, San Joaquin County is poised to force unhoused people to move 300 feet every hour, and Fresno has made it illegal to camp anywhere at any time — even if no shelter is available.

At least 14 California cities and one county have passed new ordinances that prohibit camping or updated existing ordinances to make them more punitive, another dozen are considering new bans, and at least four have dusted off old camping bans that hadn’t been fully enforced in years.

The cities taking action span the state, from the Bay Area, to the Central Valley, to Southern California. Many are places where voters lean conservative, but a few are cities run by Democrats, such as San Francisco, Long Beach and Antioch.

The trend toward criminalization marks a significant shift in how California manages the more than 120,000 people who sleep on its streets and sidewalks, and it could lead to more arrests, citations and fines.

“The problem is out of control, and residents are demanding a solution,” said Vista Mayor John Franklin. The city in San Diego County recently voted to resume enforcement of a 1968 ordinance that bans encampments city-wide.
But advocates for the rights of unhoused people worry the push toward enforcement will make the problem worse. Without opening more shelters or affordable housing, breaking up homeless camps will do nothing but shuffle people from one spot to another. Activists say displacing people from encampments can sever their ties to case workers, medical clinics and other vital services. That disruption — in addition to fines and arrests — makes it harder for people to find housing.

“A lot of communities, I think, rather than doing the hard work of providing housing and other services, are criminalizing homelessness and making it illegal for people to stand, sit, sleep or use anything like a blanket,” said Alex Visotzky, senior California policy fellow for the National Alliance to End Homelessness. “And these policies, of course, fail to reduce homelessness and also create additional barriers to housing people.”

‘We’re going to have zero tolerance’

In 2018, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals ruled it was unconstitutional to punish someone for sleeping outside in a public place if there was nowhere else for them to go. For six years, California cities interpreted that to mean they couldn’t unilaterally ban camping, and they couldn’t remove a homeless encampment unless they had a shelter bed available for every person they displaced.

In the summer of this year, that all changed. The U.S. Supreme Court in June determined it was OK for the city of Grants Pass, Oregon to ban camping on all public property, even if there was no room in local homeless shelters. That ruling untied the hands of cities throughout California and other western states, allowing them to impose all manner of restrictions on camping.

A month after the court ruling, Newsom issued an executive order directing state agencies to clear encampments on state property, and encouraging local governments to do the same.

Not long after, the Vista City Council voted to resume enforcing an encampment ban that passed in the 1980s, but hadn’t been enforced since the COVID-19 pandemic.

“It doesn’t allow any daylight or any funny business,” said Mayor Franklin. “It very clearly does not allow you to sleep in any public space, or have a tent or anything else.”

Federal health guidelines recommended cities stop clearing encampments during the pandemic, in an effort to slow the spread of the virus. Vista, like many California cities, complied. As a result, the city saw a massive explosion in encampments, Franklin said.

Vista opened its first homeless shelter this year, with 36 beds for city residents. The city had 170 unsheltered homeless residents this year, according to its most recent point-in-time count. But Franklin says on most days, there are shelter beds available, and people decline them when offered.

Franklin hopes the ordinance will get people to agree to addiction treatment and other services as a way to stave off prosecution. But so far, many of the people who received a citation haven’t shown up in court —– and continue to live on the street.

The San Joaquin County Board of Supervisors this week OK’d changes to its camping ordinance that would prohibit sleeping in a tent, sleeping bag or car for more than 60 minutes. It would also prohibit someone from sleeping within 300 feet of anywhere they had previously slept within the past 24 hours.

“We’re going to have zero tolerance,” Supervisor Tom Patti told CalMatters. “We’re going to have definitive enforcement.”

The county will continue to offer people shelter, he said. But if they refuse, “We’re going to offer them the opportunity to visit our local county jail.”

The changes to the camping ordinance are up for final approval Sept. 24.

Homelessness more than doubled in San Joaquin County this year compared to 2022 — the largest increase of any county in California, according to a CalMatters analysis of point-in-time count data. The county changed the way it counted this year, which could account for at least some of the significant increase. But Krista Fiser, chair of the organization that conducted the count, acknowledged: “Anecdotally, you can see it’s getting worse.”

Several projects designed to help have yet to be completed, including new shelters in Stockton, Tracy and Manteca.

Other cities are ramping up enforcement without changing the rules. The Folsom Police Department created a new homeless outreach team in July, which will enforce the city’s existing camping ban, Police Chief Rick Hillman told ABC10.

San Francisco Mayor London Breed also has been vocal about her intention to aggressively crack down on encampments.

Court orders, and camping bans with caveats

For at least one city, cracking down on encampments isn’t as simple as passing a new ordinance.

In 2022, the city of Chico settled a lawsuit filed by eight homeless residents over the city’s enforcement of its anti-camping ordinances. Under the terms of that agreement, the city now has to jump through a series of hoops before it can remove an encampment, such as: Notifying plaintiffs’ lawyers, giving a 10-day warning to the camp occupants, and making sure there are enough shelter beds available for everyone about to be displaced. The city can’t clear more than three encampments at one time.

But that settlement was based on outdated legal precedents, according to Chico officials. Now that the tide has turned, with the Supreme Court giving cities more power to enforce camping bans, Chico wants out of the agreement.

“It’s absurdly restrictive,” City Manager Mark Sorensen said. The city filed a motion asking the judge to vacate the settlement, and is awaiting a ruling.

Other cities, at least on paper, are taking a cautious approach by allowing law enforcement to cite and arrest homeless people — but only in specific situations.

In July, the Palm Springs City Council banned camping on sidewalks and in parks and other public spaces — if shelter is available. The ban won’t go into effect until the city finishes construction of its new homeless shelter, which likely will be later this month.

“We want to do everything possible to ensure people have a roof over their heads and a place to stay, as opposed to just sweeping away the problem,” said Mayor Jeffrey Bernstein.

The Berkeley City Council on Tuesday green-lighted a resolution that says the city will continue to offer people shelter whenever “practicable.” When no shelter is available the city would be able to cite or arrest people only if their encampment meets certain criteria: If it poses a fire or health hazard, is on a street median, is a public nuisance or interferes with construction work.

That proposal didn’t pass muster with local activists, who sent a letter in opposition to the mayor and City Council. Council members will vote once more on the measure before it becomes final.

“If approved, the City will have moved forward with a resolution that undermines the City’s stated commitment to best practices and to housing first principles without taking any steps to actually resolve the homelessness crisis,” wrote the East Bay Community Law Center, joined by several other organizations. “ Instead, this resolution would effectively criminalize individuals for being unhoused; place unhoused residents at increased risk and subject them to loss of community.”

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Marisa Kendall covers California’s homelessness crisis for CalMatters. With more than six years of experience navigating this complex topic, Marisa has won multiple awards for her sensitive, comprehensive coverage.