San Francisco Mayor London Breed swiftly launched a crackdown on homeless encampments this month, immediately following the Supreme Court’s Grants Pass ruling in late June.
In Grants Pass v. Johnson, the court ruled that the Eighth Amendment’s “cruel and unusual punishment” clause does not apply to fining, ticketing, or even arresting those who are homeless (even in the absence of public shelters), overturning past legal precedents.
In San Francisco, the ruling vacates a 2022 injunction issued by Magistrate Judge Donna Ryu, which prevented the ticketing and arrest of unsheltered people for simply being homeless. Breed, long frustrated by her inability to take a tougher approach, swiftly directed the San Francisco Police Department and other city departments to launch what many describe as aggressive sweeps of homeless encampments and individual tents across the city’s neighborhoods.
Painting these new tactics as “tough love” and a shift “from a compassionate city to a city of accountability,” Breed has tried (unsuccessfully) to distract from them by simultaneously promoting the Journey Home program, which provides bus tickets for unsheltered individuals to a location of their choice.
Yet the sweeps happening throughout the city are impossible to ignore, particularly in the Mission, which has been swept 33 times since January. An SFPD “sweep schedule” from two weeks ago (obtained by Mission Local), detailing which parts of the city were to be swept and when, showed that the entire Mission was to be hit twice over a course of five days. These sweeps have been conducted in a manner that is not only aggressive and compassionless but also in violation of the city’s own laws regarding such procedures.
According to the Coalition on Homelessness, the tactics the SFPD, Department of Public Works, and several other city departments are using to clear encampments are commonplace practices that have taken place for years and are not limited to any one neighborhood.
Unannounced sweeps, failure to bag and tag items for later collection, and instances of police confiscating IDs are just a few examples of infractions that have been downplayed until now. The Mission is just one neighborhood where these problems have been observed, but it’s unique in that it clearly demonstrates the practical, legal, and emotional shortcomings of the policies and methods in place to address homelessness.
The rate of encampment clearings in the Mission has remained high ever since Breed issued an executive order on July 30 to begin conducting them more often and more aggressively. However, encampment and tent clearings in the Mission have been largely ineffective at encouraging unsheltered individuals to seek out alternatives (shelters, busing, etc.) to tents and vehicles. Many witnessing a sweep quickly gather their possessions to avoid confiscation, only to return to the same spot afterward.
Not all are so “lucky.” Legally, the Department of Public Works is required to give 72 hours’ notice before coming to a space and clearing it of unwanted or abandoned articles; law enforcement is required to give 24 hours’ notice before clearing obviously inhabited tents and encampments. But there are numerous accounts by unsheltered people of being given little to no time to take their things before they’re confiscated and thrown away—another illegal but commonplace practice. Those whose possessions are tagged have a window of only three days to collect their things from Public Works; otherwise, they’re required to fill out forms requesting the return of their belongings, a process that can be flawed, as the only identifier on a bag is a person’s name. On the other hand, those who have had their things discarded have to rebuild from scratch, which is not as easy as it sounds; a formerly houseless individual at a July SFMTA meeting commented that “being homeless is expensive,” a cruel irony that’s difficult to miss.
The emotional toll of the sweeps is profound. It’s not simply that a person’s belongings are being confiscated, but that their home, and sometimes their entire community, is swept away in a matter of minutes.
Michail Huston Jr., a 42-year-old man who has experienced homelessness for four years now, said, “The biggest impact was when DPW came and took my tent because there were sentimental values in there.” Huston recalled how employees of the Department of Public Works threw away his mother’s and brother’s cremated ashes: “They can’t be replaced, you know?” His is one of many examples of the lack of compassion displayed by the city when conducting sweeps, with seemingly no attention even to items as sacred as the remains of close family members.
The aggressiveness of the sweeps has forced many to find locations that aren’t normally targeted by the city. Daniel Howard, a 64-year-old man who has experienced homelessness for the last 23 years, spoke about the conditions on the streets post-Breed’s executive order. With the exception of a new tent he bought after his previous one was confiscated, he said he “lost everything… It’s rough. It’s bad actually, but now, the last two days the city has been coming by and I make sure to keep my tent far away from the street.”
One of the goals of these sweeps is to create such untenable living circumstances for unsheltered people that they have no choice left but to seek out a bed in a shelter. This, however, comes with its own set of complications, as many have existing trauma from previous experiences that lead them to actively choose living on the street instead of going to a shelter.
A representative from the Coalition on Homelessness explained that trauma from past incarcerations, involuntary psychological holds, and other violent experiences often makes shelters feel unsafe, deterring people from seeking a bed. As a result, when those who are unsheltered see a sweep coming, they gather up their things as quickly as possible and move to a location that has already been swept, rather than following the course of action the mayor hoped they’d be forced to take.
Families are not immune to the confiscation of their belongings or an automobile that might function as their only shelter. In the case of unsheltered migrant families, the Supreme Court’s decision makes their circumstances even more tenuous. Compass Family Services, an organization that works with and advocates for unsheltered families, reports that not only is there a vast shortage of family housing resources, but existing homelessness services are not equipped to provide legal help concerning asylum. According to Milli Atkinson, director of the Immigrant Legal Defense Program at the Justice and Diversity Center of the Bar Association of San Francisco, asylum cases can take years to adjudicate, and as there is very little crossover between homeless services and legal aid, it’s extraordinarily difficult (if not impossible) for migrants to obtain authorized work permits, which would open a wider array of employment opportunities and a way out of homelessness.
Aggressive sweeps, inadequate legal services, a shortage of mental health and community programs, and insufficient housing reflect a failing system that focuses on removing unsheltered people rather than addressing root causes.
Breed’s executive order confirms that resources are not to be improved, nor are the city’s homelessness services and systems to be overhauled in any meaningful way. Regarding unsheltered people in the city, whose style of existence has now been criminalized, Breed has made her main tactic perfectly clear: “We are going to make them… uncomfortable on the streets of San Francisco.”