(ConservativeInsider.org) – The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals lifted an injunction that previously stopped San Francisco authorities from clearing up homeless encampments in the streets.
Now, homeless people in the liberal city can face arrests if they fail to evacuate the shelters as law enforcement braces for a decisive crackdown against the street tents.
Previously, a court ruling barred law enforcement from clearing homeless encampments without giving people a new place to live, suggesting that these actions violate the Eight Constitutional Amendment rights of the homeless people, which stops the government from imposing “cruel or unusual punishments.”
This verdict comes in the aftermath of the US Supreme Court decision in the Johnson vs. Grant case, in which the high court allowed cities to arrest people for sleeping in public even if they do not have any other place to go.
While the exact course of action of the San Francisco government remains unknown, the city’s mayor, London Breed, has previously suggested imposing “significant penalties” on such people.
According to City Attorney David Chiu, this verdict will allow the city government to recalibrate its priorities and focus more on the homeless facilities while also making streets safer.
Till now, the city’s government was only clearing encampments that posed serious safety or health hazards, but they were still unable to evacuate unhoused people even if they were declining shelter facilities. Mayor Breed now argued that the verdict puts the government in a better position to deal with the homeless people who continue to decline shelter services and prefer to live on the streets.
San Francisco has almost 8,323 homeless people, which is almost a 7% increase compared to 2022. While local authorities managed to reduce the street encampments by 17% last year, almost 360 street tents were still reported in April throughout the city, which continues to trouble locals.
The issue has also become a major talking point of the San Francisco mayoral elections with almost every candidate promising a strict action against these encampments.
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