The scenes were emblematic of the crisis gripping the small, Oregon mountain town of Grants Pass, where a fierce fight over park space has become a battleground for a much larger, national debate on homelessness that has reached the U.S. Supreme Court.
The town’s case, set to be heard April 22, has broad implications for how not only Grants Pass, but communities nationwide address homelessness, including whether they can fine or jail people for camping in public. It has made the town of 40,000 the unlikely face of the nation’s homelessness crisis, and further fueled the debate over how to deal with it.
“I certainly wish this wasn’t what my town was known for,” Mayor Sara Bristol told The Associated Press last month. “It’s not the reason why I became mayor. And yet it has dominated every single thing that I’ve done for the last 3 1/2 years.”
Officials across the political spectrum — from Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom in California, which has nearly 30% of the nation’s homeless population, to a group of 22 conservative-led states — have filed briefs in the case, saying lower court rulings have hamstrung their ability to deal with encampments.
It’s getting to the point that you can’t sleep anywhere legally unless you’re paying someone for the space you’re occupying. Most of the cities near me have destroyed the woods that homeless people lived in, forcing them to move and leaving behind a weird ass looking stand of trees.
I used to work with homeless people and as much as being outside sucks, shelters can be worse. We had people in their 70s who went to shelters and slept on the floor, their heads almost touching their neighbors. They had their meds stolen and had to sleep on top of their belongings to keep them safe. A lot of people chose to sleep outside in the summer because they felt safer.
This is the point of enclosure and it’s been true for hundreds of years now. This is the concept the stole the planet from the people.