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Supreme Court lets stand ban on destroying property of L.A. homeless By Gale Holland, Los Angeles Times June 24, 2013, 10:20 p.m. A long-running dispute over a controversial cleanup campaign on downtown's skid row ended Monday when the U.S. Supreme Court refused to consider lifting an order that bans the city of Los Angeles from destroying property left unattended by homeless people. The court, without comment, left standing a lower-court ruling that prevents the city from disposing of the contents of shopping carts and cardboard shanties that homeless people leave behind temporarily while using a restroom, filling water jugs or lining up for meals. City Atty. Carmen Trutanich had argued that the ban posed a public health hazard by making it impossible for the city to clean public streets and sidewalks on skid row, which has the highest concentration of homeless people in the city. Attorney Carol Sobel, who represented the homeless plaintiffs, accused the city of letting trash and filth pile up for months to support its legal argument. She said skid row's streets and sidewalks are now being cleaned "with no problem." "The city could find no evidence of a public health crisis," she said. "The thing they should do is provide housing for the people." Trutanich, who asked the high court to step in, did not return phone messages. If the justices had taken up the case, it could have had a ripple effect in cities such as Fresno and Honolulu that are facing legal action over clearing homeless encampments and destroying property. The suit was brought by eight skid row residents who accused city workers, accompanied by police, of seizing and dumping their personal possessions — including identification, medications, cellphones and toiletries. In a 2-1 decision, the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals decided that the transients' possessions could be taken only if they posed an immediate threat to public health or were evidence of a crime. If the city carts off their things, the city must give owners a chance to reclaim them before they are destroyed. The city, in a court filing, said homeless people defied cleaning schedules by leaving overflowing shopping carts and piles of possessions covered with tarps and blankets on the sidewalks, breeding vermin and bacteria. The county Department of Public Health inspected skid row last year and cited the city for multiple violations of health codes. The city launched a major cleanup effort that homeless advocates said was a model of how street sanitation can and should be done. "There was adequate notice and everybody moved their property," Sobel said. The city, however argued that forcing workers to sort through homeless peoples' belongings put their health at risk, particularly when there are facilities where the things can be stored. The Central City East Assn., a nonprofit business group, has a storage center on skid row where homeless people can leave their possessions. The city last year added 500 plastic trash bins to the center's existing 600 containers, but organizers said there are never enough. Estela Lopez, executive director of the Central City East Assn., said she feared that the court action threatened the health of homeless people as well as everyone who works on skid row. "Until there are enough units for everyone and everyone agrees to housing, there will be a huge demand for sanitation," she said. gale.holland@latimes.com |
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