The past few years have been incredibly challenging for people across the country, including local government officials. The economic and public health challenges have caused the number of people who are in dire financial straits to blossom.
One of the major challenges local governments have faced for years has been those issues relating to housing in their communities. Housing issues are not going to disappear on their own and local government officials must plan for the future.
Recent court actions reflect the number of challenges local governments are facing with current and future housing issues. During the pandemic, the CDC imposed a nationwide moratorium on evictions of tenants who lived in counties experiencing high levels of COVID-19 transmission. In issuing the moratorium, the CDC had relied upon an old statute allowing them to implement measures like fumigation and pest extermination.
In a 6-3 decision, the U.S. Supreme Court held in Alabama Association of Realtors v. Department of Health and Human Services, that the statute relied upon by the CDC did not grant the CDC such sweeping authority. Thus, the Court allowed evictions to resume.
Increased evictions, obviously, may increase the burdens created by the problem of homelessness. Two recent federal decisions, one from the 9th Circuit and the other from our own 11th Circuit, highlight some of the many issues presented by the issue of homelessness. In Garcia v. Los Angeles, the 9th Circuit held that a city measure limiting the storage of personal property in public areas violated the Constitution. The city ordinance in question allowed the city to remove and discard any items that did not fit into a 60-gallon container or was not designed to be used as a shelter.
The court held that the city did not have the capability of storing so many items and destroying such unabandoned items would violate the Constitutional rights of the homeless. As a result, the court held that the city must allow for the homeless to store such unabandoned items in public areas.
In Fort Lauderdale Food Not Bombs v. Fort Lauderdale, the 11th Circuit reaffirmed that sharing of food with the homeless amounted to First Amendment expression. The city rule banned food sharing programs unless a written agreement was approved by the city. The court held that the rule did not provide guidelines to the official making the decisions in offering reasonable time, place and manner restrictions and violated the First Amendment rights of those wishing to share food with the homeless.
These cases and others like them show some of the many challenges local government officials are currently facing and may face in the future when it comes to housing issues.
This article was originally featured in the September/October 2021 edition of Georgia’s Cities Magazine.