FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
April 23, 2024
Contact:
Tina Pinedo, DREDF Communications Director, media@dredf.org
BERKELEY, CA — Yesterday, the U.S. Supreme Court heard oral argument in City of Grants Pass, Oregon v. Johnson, a case that will decide whether municipalities can fine and arrest people for sleeping outside when they have nowhere else to go.
The Grants Pass case started in 2018, when three unhoused people sued the City to challenge a group of local laws that allow them to be fined and arrested for sleeping in public when they have nowhere else to go. The challengers claimed that the laws violate the Eighth Amendment’s prohibition against cruel and unusual punishment. A federal district court in Oregon agreed, and the Ninth Circuit upheld that ruling. Grants Pass appealed to the Supreme Court in January, asking them to overturn the Ninth Circuit’s decision. If they do, it will give city governments the green light to fine and arrest unhoused people for sleeping in public, whether there is available shelter or not.
The outcome of the case will affect the civil rights of hundreds of thousands of unhoused people across the western United States. Currently, more than 600,000 people in America experience homelessness on any given night, with nearly half—250,000—sleeping outside. Data from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) shows a rise in homelessness for both sheltered and unsheltered individuals in nearly every state. And HUD’s 2023 Point-in-Time Count, estimates that one in three people experiencing homelessness in the U.S. have a disability, making this a disability justice issue. The primary cause of the record levels of homelessness we see today is the unaffordable housing market, according to research from the Harvard Joint Center for Housing Studies.
Earlier this month, the Disability Rights Education and Defense Fund (DREDF) submitted a friend-of-the-court brief to the Supreme Court in support of the challengers, written with the help of pro bono partners from the international law firm O’Melveny & Myers. Twenty-three disability rights organizations and scholars signed on to the brief, which explained why subjecting unhoused people to endless and unavoidable punishment for sleeping in public when they have no other place to sleep, is of deep concern to the disability community. DREDF’s brief talked about how people with disabilities face unique challenges and deep-rooted stigmas that put them at high risk of homelessness. The brief also discussed how laws allowing unhoused people to be fined and jailed for sleeping in public spaces worsen disparities experienced by people with disabilities and other marginalized communities.
“This case is incredibly important, not just to the unhoused people it will directly effect, but in defining who we are as a nation,” said Michelle Uzeta, Deputy Legal Director at DREDF. “Fining and jailing people for sleeping outside—a biological necessity—when they have no other place to go, is inhumane and a demonstrably ineffective response to homelessness. We hope the Supreme Court sees that the real solution is providing people with safe, accessible, and affordable places to sleep and the support services they need to become stable.”
Theane Evangelis, the lawyer representing Grants Pass, told the justices during yesterday’s arguments that the Ninth Circuit’s decision tied the city’s hands by “constitutionalizing the policy debate” over how to address growing encampments. Counsel for the challengers, Kelsi Corkran, pushed back on that claim, pointing out that the 9th Circuit’s order still leaves the city with “an abundance of tools to address homelessness,” including “time, place and manner restrictions on when and where unhoused people sleep” and the ability to clear encampments. All the Grants Pass laws do, said Corkran, is “turn the city’s homelessness problem into someone else’s problem by forcing its homeless residents into other jurisdictions.”
Of the many questions asked by the justices during the over two hours of argument, Justice Sonia Sotomayor arguably asked the most important one: where will homeless people go “if every city, every village, every town lacks compassion and passes a law identical to this? Where are they supposed to sleep? Are they supposed to kill themselves not sleeping?” Tellingly, that question received no answer from Evangelis and Grants Pass.
A ruling by the Supreme Court is expected by the end of June.
About Disability Rights Education and Defense Fund
Disability Rights Education and Defense Fund (DREDF) is a leading national civil rights law and policy center directed by individuals with disabilities and parents who have children with disabilities. Founded in 1979, DREDF works to advance the civil and human rights of people with disabilities through legal advocacy, training, education, and public policy and legislative development. Learn more at dredf.org.