News from Patrick Flynn

Camp abatement.  It’s not a new summer opportunity for your kids, instead it’s the surprisingly complicated issue of how our community deals with camps established by our homeless population on municipal lands.  As background information, last year the Assembly approved an ordinance that allowed for the Anchorage Police Department to post notices at illegal camp sites and for eviction (removal) to commence 12 hours later.  But that’s not how the law has been employed.

Instead the eviction and removal process generally doesn’t begin until at least several days after notice is posted.  And, in fact, it appears most campers move prior to the eviction process.  But the possibility that only 12 hours might be permitted, along with circumstances where homeless residents have lost items of value to them, prompted a law suit on behalf of such individuals.  What’s followed is an interesting combination of agreements and disagreements on public policy and legal matters.  Let’s start with the former first.

From a public policy perspective the effort is to balance all residents’ right to enjoy public spaces free from either the concern that someone else is using them semi-permanently or that someone else using them poses a danger (to themselves or others); versus respecting the rights, and human dignity, of those unfortunate enough to find themselves homeless.

(Brief aside: yes, I recognize that a portion of Anchorage’s homeless suffer their fate primarily due to poor decisions they’ve made in their lives.  I would concurrently posit that at least as many of our homeless population find themselves in their position that, in slightly different circumstances, could befall any of us.)

And while I am frequently reminded that these camps are, by definition, illegal, I am also reminded that one way to mitigate the impact of camps is to give service providers in our non-profit community the opportunity to reach out to campers and provide the help they need.  That effort takes time, acknowledgment of which gave birth to the administration’s proposal to offer a five-(business) day waiting period prior to disbanding camps.

“Not enough,” said some service providers and the local chapter of the ACLU, who seek 10 business days between posting and abatement, and thus a law suit was filed.  In an effort to bridge the gap, I’ve proposed a seven-(business) day break (KTUU story here).  While I consider that to be a fair approach I would acknowledge that it doesn’t fully address the gamut of legal issues raised by the aforementioned law suit, which leads us to the legal matters portion of the discussion.

Because talks between the ACLU and the municipal attorney’s office apparently broke down over the issue of a five- or ten-day waiting period the ACLU filed its suit, which is more expansive than that solitary issue, on behalf of a homeless gentleman “harmed” by municipal action.  As that gentleman’s legal counsel the ACLU is obligated to zealously represent his interests and consequently, even if the public policy arm of the ACLU agreed with a seven-day standard, that doesn’t necessarily address the other aspects of the claim.  Indeed, the ACLU sent a four-page letter detailing their perspective on the shortcomings in my version of the legislation.  Further complicating matters is the municipal attorney’s response to the suit, which notes that the Assembly is expected to pass an ordinance with a different waiting period, meaning if we don’t do something at our June 22 meeting our position in the suit is weakened.  And, of course, my limited discussions with colleagues indicate a variety of viewpoints on what action we should ultimately take.

As for myself, I think the Assembly should adopt a public policy that tries to strike an appropriate balance between the rights of the many and the rights of the few.  If the court later tells us we failed we can return to the issue but trying to address every possible concern of one side or the other needlessly clutters municipal code and likely fails to appropriately balance competing interests.

With that, we’ll take up the issue tomorrow evening, so please let me know what thoughts you’d add to the conversation.

Regards,

Patrick