The U.S. Department of Justice says a proposal to allow homeless people to camp on some public land TKTK
The U.S. Department of Justice says a proposal to allow homeless people to camp on some public land balances homeless people's constitutional rights with the city's need to address unsafe conditions. HG

As the Seattle City Council prepares to discuss how to change the way authorities forcibly remove homeless people from where they're camping, the U.S. Department of Justice is weighing in.

In response to a request for comment from four Seattle City Council members, the DOJ reviewed the legislation as submitted by Council Member Mike O'Brien and concluded it is a constitutional protection of homeless people's rights.

"The proposed ordinance would provide for fair notice and resources to those living in public spaces before being removed," writes Lisa Foster, director of the DOJ's Office for Access to Justice in a letter to council members, "while still allowing the city to address unsafe, unsuitable, hazardous, or emergency conditions."

The DOJ's read of the legislation runs counter to the narrative pushed by Mayor Ed Murray and Council Member Tim Burgess that the proposed legislation would tie the city's hands in dealing with homeless encampments.

It's not the first time the department has stood up for the rights of people sleeping outside. Last year, in a statement related to a case in Boise, ID, the DOJ said punishing homeless people for sleeping in public places when they have nowhere else to go is both unconstitutional and "poor public policy."

"Too often, local jurisdictions have tried to simply move people experiencing homelessness to another area," the new DOJ letter reads, "without crafting more effective and systemic policy solutions that implement a Housing First response to addressing the problem of homelessness... Those laws have sometimes been used to remove poor people from a particular location without adequate procedural protections, essentially criminalizing the status of being poor or homeless."

The department is careful to note their position does not mean "unfettered encampments is the appropriate policy response to homelessness. Rather, the legal position affirming the constitutional rights of people experiencing homelessness should be viewed as a starting point in crafting appropriate policy responses."

While Seattle officials say people here are not arrested simply for being homeless, a recent series of reports from the Seattle University School of Law documented how cities across Washington State are increasingly criminalizing homelessness. One of the reports estimated Seattle would spend $2.3 million over the course of five years enforcing just 16 percent of its criminalization ordinances, which include bans on camping in public and sitting or lying on certain sidewalks during the day.

The Seattle City Council's human services committee will discuss O'Brien's proposed legislation, as well as a competing version from Council Member Sally Bagshaw, Friday at 9:30 am.