Governor Gavin Newsom just issued an executive order that would represent the largest homeless encampment sweep effort in the nation since the Supreme Court handed down their decision that cities can ban sleeping outdoors.
After the Supreme Court issued their decision in late June that cities can prohibit unhoused people from camping outdoors, San Francisco Mayor London Breed was quick to vow that she would use these new powers to more aggressively clear homeless encampments across the city. She’s not the only one.
The New York Times reports that Governor Gavin Newsom issued an executive order Thursday morning directing state agencies to clear encampments, in what the Times calls “the nation’s most sweeping response” to the Supreme Court decision.
You may recall that the state transportation agency Caltrans was involved with clearing Oakland’s notorious Wood Street encampment in the summer of 2022. Newsom’s executive order Thursday declares that other state agencies like California State Parks and the Department of Fish and Wildlife would also be involved with encampment clearing.
Local governments now have the tools they need to address the decades-long issue of homelessness.
— California Governor (@CAgovernor) July 25, 2024
Today, we are issuing an executive order that directs state agencies & urges locals to address encampments while connecting those living in them to housing & supportive services. pic.twitter.com/z9dYwAct5w
Newsom’s announcement was accompanied by a Twitter video where he’s donning a pair of Joe Biden-style aviator sunglasses and seen picking up and carrying trash, looking like Mister Very Hands-On.
“I don’t think there’s anything more urgent and more frustrating than addressing the issue of encampments in the state of California,” Newsom says in his video. “We’re done. It’s time to move with urgency at the local level to clean up these sites.”
But Newsom also engages in his signature advance-blaming of cities if his new order has little impact. “We have now no excuse with the Supreme Court decision. This executive order is about pushing that paradigm further and getting the sense of urgency that’s required of local government to do their job,” he adds.
As the Associated Press points out, it’s still up to cities to order the encampments' removal, and state agencies would just help with the grunt work. That outlet reports that Newsom’s order provides guidelines that “direct state agencies on how to remove” the encampments, but those state agencies would still take their marching orders from local governments. The AP notes that “The order makes clear that the decision to remove the encampments remains in the hands of local authorities.”
And some of those local authorities might push back. After the Supreme Court decision, Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass said the ruling “must not be used as an excuse for cities across the country to attempt to arrest their way out of this problem or hide the homelessness crisis in neighboring cities or in jail,” according to the Times.
California currently has an estimated 180,000 unsheltered people statewide. And Newsom’s order is big on announcing more aggressive encampment clearing, but has very little to say in terms of resources for, you know, providing those people with someplace to go once all their stuff has been hauled away.
And there is certainly the political angle here of how California’s homelessness problems can be weaponized against Kamala Harris’s presidential campaign. While the highest state office Harris ever held was California Attorney General, which is not a job that has much jurisdiction over the homelessness issue, there’s sure to be plenty of California “failed state” rhetoric from the Trump camp in the months to come.
It seems unlikely that Newsom's executive order is going to be able to haul away or clear that sentiment.
Image: Gov.CA.Gov
