SLO homeless sue city, saying they’re criminalized with few options for shelter
Unhoused residents in San Luis Obispo have filed a federal lawsuit against the city, claiming it’s “criminalizing homelessness” among those living outside or in their vehicles by cleaning out encampments and taking belongings without providing sufficient shelter space.
California Rural Legal Assistance (CRLA), Public Interest Law Project and the Law Office of Babak Naficy filed the lawsuit on Friday in U.S. District Court for the Central District of California on behalf of five unhoused people and the homeless nonprofit Hope’s Village of SLO.
“The lawsuit comes after the city repeatedly broke up homeless camps, destroyed homeless individuals’ property, and cited and arrested unhoused individuals, despite being capable of providing shelter to only a fraction of the city’s unhoused individuals,” the attorneys said in a news release. “The city has continued to threaten and to harass homeless individuals, who have no alternative housing or shelter, apparently seeking only to remove them from sight within city limits.”
Civil lawsuits present only the plaintiffs’ perspectives and do not show defendants’ points of view.
Attorneys filed the lawsuit only a few months after the city pursued new rules against using tents in public parks and removing shopping carts from retail stores — regulations homeless advocates saw as explicitly targeting unhoused people.
“This lawsuit is discouraging on many levels, especially as the city is doing more than ever before to increase housing here and provide public services to unhoused and unsheltered community members,” Christine Dietrick, city attorney, said in a statement to The Tribune. “We are confident in and will continue our years of hard work to proactively address homelessness in San Luis Obispo.”
“We remain committed to balancing compassion for our most vulnerable community members with accountability to ensure that individuals and groups are obeying the law,” Dietrick added. “There are many sides to every story and it is an extremely complex set of issues, but we are confident that our staff are making extraordinary efforts to help vulnerable people and protect our community every day, and we will defend our community in court. At this time, we ask the community to refrain from passing judgment until all facts are fully vetted through the legal process.”
SLO camping ordinances give homeless nowhere to go
The lawsuit claims San Luis Obispo ordinances that prohibit camping or sleeping overnight in vehicles, encroachment, being in parks or open spaces after hours and traveling outside designated trails, among other rules, leave unhoused people with nowhere they can live free of harassment.
“There is simply no place left for the individual plaintiffs to exist without hiding and without the fear and/or imposition of excessive fines,” the lawsuit said.
It alleges the city targets unhoused people living in encampments near the Octagon Barn south of the city, near San Luis Obispo Creek, along the Bob Jones Trail and in an area called “the Circle” near the 40 Prado Homeless Services Center and the Bob Jones trailhead.
“At each of these locations, unhoused individuals and families form small camps, stay for as long as they can, but are eventually forced to leave — sometimes via arrest — by police officers and park rangers,” the lawsuit said. “This cycle repeats itself again and again, and the city’s unsheltered residents find themselves constantly on the move, constantly hiding, and constantly in fear of being arrested.”
Lost encampment belongings, strict 40 Prado rules
The lawsuit also alleges the city does not follow its own “written procedures and protocols” regarding how law enforcement and cleanup crews are to treat unhoused residents’ belongings when they’re clearing encampments.
“The city’s regular policy and practice is to direct its agents to tell people at encampments that any items left at the encampments will be thrown away,” the lawsuit said. “It is also customary for the city to take and destroy items left at encampments. The city also regularly throws away or destroys the personal property of unhoused persons who were not able to move their belongings in the time that the city gave them to do so.”
Although San Luis Obispo does have a shelter, the 40 Prado Homeless Services Center, only 124 people of the 482 counted in the 2019 point-in-time homeless census can stay overnight, the lawsuit said. That number dropped to 70 people during the COVID-19 pandemic.
The lawsuit also alleged that 40 Prado “has strict rules that function to exclude many members of the city’s homeless community,” including those stipulating that clients must show IDs with San Luis Obispo County addresses and must complete chores around the shelter, regardless of potential disabilities.
“Taken together, the city’s dearth of affordable housing, limited shelter resources, and limited access to these resources create a situation in which many of its poor and disabled residents have no option but to live outdoors in cars, in tents, or sleeping rough,” the lawsuit said.
Attorneys will hold a news conference to announce the lawsuit on Wednesday at noon in the San Luis Obispo Courthouse annex at 1050 Monterey St. in San Luis Obispo.
