Florida’s new law making it a crime to sleep in public, which goes into effect next month, is expected to spark a “tsunami of lawsuits” and do nothing to alleviate the state’s homelessness crisis, the mayor of Fort Lauderdale has warned.
Dean Trantalis said the city is scrambling to find ways to comply with a bill signed by Republican Gov. Ron DeSantis in March and set to become law Oct. 1. The bill requires municipalities with insufficient shelter capacity to set up campsites for homeless people.
At a contentious meeting of the Fort Lauderdale City Commission last week, suggestions ranged from camping in the parking lots of David Beckham’s soccer stadium and on the roof of City Hall to offering one-way bus passes to transport homeless people to other states, but commissioners took no action.
“The city is in a bind because the state has put this strict order on all communities but has not provided any relief to work with us to meet their expectations,” he said of the public camping bill.
“We’re doing the best we can to address this issue. We’ve staffed our police departments and our private homeless outreach programs, and we’ve doubled that in the last year, because we feel this is a priority. But the mandate from the state is a heavy burden.”
Fort Lauderdale’s homeless population is expected to nearly double from 2022 to 2023, leading to an 18.5% increase in Florida’s homeless population and a 12% surge nationally, according to the data.
Trantalis said he is concerned that funding currently being used for homeless services and supports will be lost when a provision in DeSantis’ law takes effect in January that allows for legal action against municipalities that fail to curb rough sleeping.
“Any private citizen can sue if the city doesn’t fix the conditions at the encampments,” he said. “This will create a whole new level of cottage industry of lawyers who think they can take money away from the city instead of putting it toward helping the homeless.”
“This will be a tsunami of litigation hitting every city. And again, will it benefit the homeless? Of course not.”
Homeless advocates have expressed similar concerns.
Diana Stanley, CEO of Rose Place, one of Palm Beach County’s largest homeless shelters, told the Guardian in March that the bill would put the financial and logistical burden of providing accommodation solely on cities and counties, with heavy fines if they fail to provide it.
“Instead of taking a punitive approach, we should work together to find solutions,” she said.
Trantalis also said the city hasn’t received the level of cooperation it hoped for from law enforcement and the courts in establishing procedures for dealing with people who sleep in public after the law goes into effect.
Last week, Broward County Sheriff Gregory Tony penned an outspoken opinion piece in the South Florida Sun-Sentinel declaring that he had instructed his deputies at the jail to refuse to admit anyone they picked up for “violating city ordinances.”
“Homelessness is not a crime, and the county jail system is not the solution to homelessness,” Toney wrote. “Arrest and incarceration are not options our community can tolerate, nor are they options that homeless people deserve. There must be a better way.”
But Trantalis said that wasn’t the intention.
“We’ve been talking about bringing people into court and putting them in jail, not to criminalize them, but to give them shelter and provide social services to those in need,” he said.
“We weren’t going to have them have a criminal record. The prison system is a quick, immediate facility to get people off the streets and put them in a safe place while they get addiction treatment, mental health services, whatever they need to get out of homelessness.”
Ron Book, president of the Miami-Dade Homeless Trust, which implements Miami-Dade County’s homelessness plan and prioritizes the acquisition and renovation of affordable housing over shelters, said he welcomes the discussion the legislation has prompted.
“What gives me hope is that for the first time in over 30 years we’re having a real dialogue about how to address homelessness. While the proposed encampment bill clearly had flaws, I believe the proponents listened to us and made some changes,” he said.
“(But) I don’t support encampments. They’re a bad idea and they don’t do anything on a broad scale to end homelessness.”
But legal experts who have studied Florida’s law see elements of a state power grab.
“This appears to be intended to shift the policy issue of whether to arrest homeless people for sleeping or ‘camping’ in public from local to the state level,” said Steven Schnabley, a University of Miami law professor and author of a 2020 research paper on homeless camps.
“But the problem is, if this bill is going to solve the homeless problem, it’s not actually providing any funding from the state,” he said, adding that the bill is just making a “political statement” rather than solving the homeless problem.
He continued: “If the state was serious, they’d have a comprehensive plan in place, without holding local governments up to the sword of Damocles with lawsuits.”
Schnabley also noted that homeless encampments are not functioning.
“Where can they be put? There are requirements that only the county can approve. They can only be put up for a year and they can’t be near residential areas. There’s no way they can put it in the middle of nowhere and then move it a year later,” he said.
“You can’t do that to people who work with the homeless when they’re in segregated encampments. If I was in the city attorney’s office, I would struggle with whether we really have to arrest or threaten to arrest every single person who is homeless and sleeping on the street. Probably not, because that would be allowing or condoning it.”
