Current:Home > MarketsCalifornia Gov. Gavin Newsom orders sweep of homeless encampments -TrueNorth Capital Hub
California Gov. Gavin Newsom orders sweep of homeless encampments
Chainkeen Exchange View
Date:2025-04-10 20:56:05
SAN FRANCISCO – The homeless encampments that have joined the Golden Gate Bridge and Hollywood sign as recognizable features of the California landscape will soon be swept away if Gov. Gavin Newsom has his way.
Armed with last month’s Supreme Court decision allowing cities and states to enforce bans on sleeping outside in public areas, Newsom directed agencies Thursday to clear out the encampments that have proliferated in the state’s urban centers, most noticeably in San Francisco, Los Angeles and the capital city of Sacramento. Authorities would have to provide a two-day notice before taking action.
Before the Supreme Court's ruling on the Grants Pass case, a lower court's decision had thwarted municipalities' efforts to remove encampments.
“This executive order directs state agencies to move urgently to address dangerous encampments while supporting and assisting the individuals living in them – and provides guidance for cities and counties to do the same,’’ Newsom said in a statement. “The state has been hard at work to address this crisis on our streets. There are simply no more excuses. It’s time for everyone to do their part.’’
Newsom can’t dictate what local governments do regarding homeless encampments, but he can apply pressure through the power of the purse, granting or withholding funding.
With a seemingly intractable housing shortage and some of the highest housing costs in the nation, California has long been contending with homelessness, an issue that has become more prominent with the emergence of encampments and is often used by Republicans to bash the deep-blue state.
In a December 2023 report to Congress, the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development said California had 181,000 of the country’s estimated 653,000 homeless people, or more than 27%. The state’s population of 39 million represents just under 12% of the national total.
Homeless advocates have argued that banning people from sleeping outside criminalizes their inability to find a home. In her dissent on the Grants Pass ruling, Justice Sonia Sotomayor called punishing someone for being homeless “unconscionable and unconstitutional.’’
“Sleep is a biological necessity, not a crime. For some people, sleeping outside is their only option,” she said.
San Francisco's Coalition on Homelessness issued a statement in response to Newsom's executive order, saying: "Previous attempts to evict people living in encampments have failed to reduce the number of people forced to sleep outside in our state. Displacing, destabilizing and dispossessing people without real offers of permanent housing makes homelessness worse.''
Newsom’s office said that under his leadership the state has spent more than $24 billion in homeless and housing reforms, including more than $1 billion to address homeless encampments. Now he wants to see them removed.
“I don’t think there’s anything more urgent and more frustrating than addressing the issue of encampments in the state of California,’’ Newsom said in a video. “It’s time to move with urgency at the local level to clean up these sites.’’
veryGood! (195)
Related
- Charges tied to China weigh on GM in Q4, but profit and revenue top expectations
- Iowa will pay $3.5 million to family of student who drowned in rowing accident
- Survey finds fifth of Germans would prefer more White players on their national soccer team
- In new Hulu show 'Clipped,' Donald Sterling's L.A. Clippers scandal gets a 2024 lens: Review
- What do we know about the mysterious drones reported flying over New Jersey?
- R&B superstar Chris Brown spends Saturday night at Peoria, Illinois bowling alley
- ‘Cheaters don’t like getting caught': VP Harris speaks about Trump conviction on Jimmy Kimmel
- Family of Minnesota man killed by police criticize local officials and seek federal intervention
- Meet the volunteers risking their lives to deliver Christmas gifts to children in Haiti
- ‘Cheaters don’t like getting caught': VP Harris speaks about Trump conviction on Jimmy Kimmel
Ranking
- Average rate on 30
- ‘Cheaters don’t like getting caught': VP Harris speaks about Trump conviction on Jimmy Kimmel
- Evangeline Lilly Reveals She Is “Stepping Away” From Acting For This Reason
- Navy vet has Trump’s nod ahead of Virginia’s US Senate primary, targets Tim Kaine in uphill battle
- 'Most Whopper
- How shots instead of pills could change California’s homeless crisis
- Erich Anderson, 'Friday the 13th' and 'Felicity' actor, dies after cancer battle
- 83-year-old Alabama man mauled to death by neighbor's dogs, reports say
Recommendation
San Francisco names street for Associated Press photographer who captured the iconic Iwo Jima photo
Trump’s lawyers ask judge to lift gag order imposed during New York trial
Amanda Knox reconvicted of slander in Italy for accusing innocent man in roommate’s 2007 murder
Brittany Cartwright Details Horrible Insults Jax Taylor Called Her Before Breakup
This was the average Social Security benefit in 2004, and here's what it is now
Body of diver found in Lake Erie ID'd as director of local shipwreck team
Stolen classic car restored by Make-A-Wish Foundation is recovered in Michigan
Watch Live: Attorney general, FBI director face Congress amid rising political and international tensions