WASHINGTON — Standing off to the side of a road in Georgetown, Robert, who didn’t want to share his last name, is talking to me about what it’s like to be homeless.
The 42-year-old is shirtless, tanned and holding a cardboard sign. Before we start talking — in the middle of one of the worst heat waves in Washington, D.C., in years, — he accepts a water bottle from a car before another lays on its horn. I shared a Gatorade with him, and one for his girlfriend, as we spoke on a park bench nearby.
After being in-and-out of the “revolving door” prison system in Georgia for much of his life, he left home and moved to Washington, a place he said changed his life. Despite living on the street for some time, he likes the city, a place he said he came to because he “wanted to talk to presidents.”
Robert’s story is similar to the more than 500,000 other people experiencing homelessness or who are in emergency shelters across the country. They not only face the elements, but a divide among advocates about what should be done to help them.
For Robert, Washington’s assistance programs, like food stamps and Medicaid, and his case manager, have helped him partially get back on his feet. He’s now situated in an apartment in one of the city’s quadrants and is excited to get a cellphone soon. It wouldn’t have been possible without his own initiative and the established services in D.C., he said.
Before getting access to an apartment, Robert lived on the street, including in encampments, temporary shelters or tents put up by those who live in them. They’ve become a flashpoint for people who say they create unsafe living conditions for the homeless and public safety issues for cities.
A year ago, the Supreme Court ruled cities could dismantle homeless encampments. But Robert thinks that’s unfair to the people who live in them. He called the ruling “horrible,” because there is “nothing” the people who live in them can do about it.
Plenty of advocacy organizations and lawmakers are split on the issue in a way that transcends party lines. Most of the people who engage in the issue of homelessness genuinely want to see things improve, but are split on the best way to bring that about.
A year after the Grants Pass v. Johnson decision was issued, how to help homeless people, and whether local governments should dismantle encampments, remains a point of controversy.
Grants Pass ruling
In a 6-3 decision, split along ideological lines, the Supreme Court ruling overturned years of precedent.
The case originated in Grants Pass, Oregon, but began decades before with the Pottinger v. City of Miami case in the 1980s and was revived by the 2018 Martin v. City of Boise case. The 9th Circuit held that the cruel and unusual punishment clause of the Constitution banned cities from enforcing public camping ordinances against homeless people when shelters are at capacity.
In Grants Pass, a majority of the Supreme Court justices ultimately determined that the “enforcement of generally applicable laws regulating camping on public property,” including limited fines, temporary bans from public camping and a maximum sentence of a 30-day stay in jail, does not constitute cruel and unusual punishment.
“Grants Pass’s public-camping ordinances do not criminalize status. The public-camping laws prohibit actions undertaken by any person, regardless of status,” the ruling states. “It makes no difference whether the charged defendant is currently a person experiencing homelessness, a backpacker on vacation, or a student who abandons his dorm room to camp out in protest on the lawn of a municipal building.”
In the year since the Supreme Court’s decision, more than 300 cities have enacted laws that allow law enforcement to intervene with the homeless population, Jesse Rabinowitz, a communications director at the National Homeless Law Center, said.
Some say the June 28, 2024, ruling is a “great tool” to help “push” homeless people to get off the street, but others condemn it.
Rabinowitz argued that it’s not a left versus right issue. For example, California Gov. Gavin Newsom wrote a supportive statement about the Supreme Court’s Grants Pass decision.
“Everyone except billionaires is struggling in this economy,” Rabinowitz said. “We need to build an economy and a housing system that works for the many, not for the few.”
While different people have different takes on the decision, they do have a common goal — looking to help people who are unhoused.
Andy Wassenich is the director of policy at Miriam’s Kitchen in Washington. Miriam’s Kitchen began as a meal service for the homeless in the area, but now connects people with permanent housing, mental health and medical resources.
Even before the Grants Pass decision, D.C. made efforts to clear one of the city’s largest encampments, Wassenich said.
Once, there were as many as 40 people living on a grassy square just blocks away from the White House. Today, it’s overgrown, empty and there’s fencing up. The homeless people who camped there were moved after the National Park Service and D.C. government agreed to intervene. The impetus was for “city beautification” ahead of the country’s 250th anniversary, and because dismantling an encampment is now allowed by the Grants Pass decision, the area is now empty, Wassenich said.
It’s made the work Miriam’s Kitchen does a lot harder, he added.
“We once had 40 people all in one place. Now, we have 40 people in five different spots,” Wassenich said.
While it’s widely understood that crime and drug use happen at encampments, Wassenich noted that the sense of community and accessibility to resources can make it easier for those working with those experiencing homelessness.
Rabinowitz and Wassenich both criticized the Grants Pass ruling and cities that have opted to ticket and arrest the homeless for camping outdoors in the last year.
“We know that throwing people in jail for being homeless or giving them tickets keeps them homeless longer and wastes a ton of resources,” Rabinowitz said.
Rabinowitz said it is cheaper for taxpayers to fund affordable housing units than it is to jail someone or to leave them in encampments. The homeless community regularly uses public services including emergency response, hospitals and other facilities, he said.
The Grants Pass ruling is an unnecessary strain on a homeless person’s journey to a successful life, Rabinowitz argued. If they are jailed or have a criminal record, it can be harder to find a job or housing; if they are fined, it can hurt their credit. Cities often have to cover the cost of hauling away tents and other belongings when encampments are taken down.
Did ending encampments help the homeless?
But Robert Marbut, President Donald Trump’s former homelessness czar, thinks Grants Pass will ultimately help homeless people.
Marbut referenced the affirmative decision, written by Justice Neil Gorsuch, that said a panel of judges shouldn’t decide the best policy to solve homelessness. They can never “‘match’ the collective wisdom the American people possess in deciding ‘how best to handle’ a pressing social question like homelessness,” Gorsuch wrote.
“The Supreme Court gave us a great tool, to use local government agencies to get people into treatment and recovery,” Marbut said.
Marbut noted that the fentanyl crisis exploded in encampments across the country, spiking mortality rates for the community in recent years.
“Grants Pass comes along and says law enforcement, EMS, fire departments, street ambassadors can lean into this and start being much more aggressive,” he said.
“I prefer the term engaging, and engaging on the street and not allowing you to continue to hurt yourself and hurt your community simultaneously. So, to me, Grants Pass was an incredible response of the court to the new realities of fentanyl,” Marbut continued. “Fentanyl is a game changer.”
Marbut said he looks at the issue through a clinical lens.
He questioned why, if city service responders step in to save the life of a suicidal person about to jump off a bridge, we don’t do the same for homeless people who are more likely to die living on the street.
Scott Howell, the former state Senate Democratic minority leader in Utah, agreed.
“I think Grants Pass was really something that was necessary, and what it was, was a course correction that gave the local communities really the ability to maintain safe and clean public spaces for everyone,” he said.
Utah has led the way in innovation for the homeless, Howell added.
Utah couples compassion with structure
In 2015, leaders in the state declared a victory over chronic homelessness after Utah implemented a statewide housing-first model. Since then, however, chronic homelessness in the state has nearly quadrupled, pointing to the failure of a “housing only” model, the Deseret News previously reported.
In Utah and across the country, many advocates pushed a housing-first model. The idea was that once people have a roof over their heads, then they will find stability.
“Most of my clients had significant mental health issues, and the best way for them to get treatment was for them to get housing first, because once people get stabilized and safe, then they’re better able to receive services,” Rabinowitz, a licensed social worker, said.
However, a housing experiment in downtown Salt Lake City, showed how a housing-first model can prove to be difficult.
Opened in 2021, the Magnolia gave chronically homeless single men and women studio apartments and supportive services.
Since opening, according to at least one report, residents have expressed concerns about safety. The online publication Utah Stories reported earlier this month that “according to multiple sources, roughly 30 of the 65 residents have died since Magnolia opened in 2020 — many from overdoses."
The Road Home, the nonprofit that opened the apartment complex, disputes those numbers, noting that homeless individuals have a much lower life expectancy than the general public because of a variety of factors.
According to the Road Home, of the 119 residents who have lived at the Magnolia, 11 individuals have died at the facility due to a “variety of significant health issues,” and another 12 individuals who lived in the building died at another location, including care centers or during a hospital stay.
“At the Road Home, we are pushing hard to reduce deaths among the homeless population by creating supportive crisis and housing programs such as the Magnolia which has onsite staff members 24/7 plus a full team of onsite case managers as well as onsite full-time support from mental and mental health partners,” Road Home CEO Michelle Flynn said in a statement to the Deseret News.
While designated housing facilities can provide a roof and resources, problems found in encampments related to crime and drug use are more difficult to solve.
Robert, in Washington, D.C., can attest.
“I’ve been solicited for sex from men, women, you know, I’ve been jumped, I’ve had guns pulled on me, knives pulled on me,” he said. “It’s scary at times, like you can get yourself into serious situations.”
Now, Utah officials and advocacy organizations are working to find a new way forward. In March, the Utah House passed a law mandating that counties expand homeless shelter capacity and allow camping in freezing temperatures, Deseret News previously reported.
Howell now works with Solutions Utah, a homelessness advocacy organization. They have taken a “careful look” and learned a lot through trial and error.
“We learned that not everyone’s prepared to go into a house,” he said of an individual who lacked the skills to maintain household cleanliness, adding, “Housing first is great when you have the skill set.”
Still, Howell argued the Grants Pass decision enabled local governments to have a “stronger legal framework to insist on results and not just good intentions.”
His colleague at Solutions Utah, Chair Lynn Ames, said sometimes, people need an extra “push” to get help. Grants Pass allows local municipalities to use the “leverage of the law” to do that, he said.
The issue remains, though, that there aren’t established, adequate, sustained wraparound services, especially when shelters are at capacity, the advocates say.
Howell said in Utah, there are conversations happening about creating solutions and refining systems that are “grounded in dignity.”
“Compassion without structure is ineffective,” he said.
“It’s one thing to go tell these people, ‘you can’t camp here,’ but if we don’t have a place for them to go, then we’re just going to move that problem somewhere else,” Ames said.
Salt Lake City Police Chief Brian Redd echoed that sentiment.
He said it’s a “really complex issue,” but at the local level, Salt Lake is beginning to align its policing of encampments with the criminal justice and social services systems to individualize a route of care to best fit a person’s needs, while also making the systems more efficient to help them.
“One of the things that we’re trying to do is take a population that maybe is cycling on our streets and take a look and start to try to follow these individuals through the system to see where we can maybe get them the resources and the treatment they need,” Redd said.
Redd noted that law enforcement in Salt Lake will continue to enforce the law and look out for public safety, but officers will offer to take the homeless to resource centers, when they are willing — although he said that is rare. People are unwilling for a variety of reasons, he said.
What can be done to help those who are homeless?
Maurice “Mo” Egan was homeless in San Francisco’s Tenderloin District and smoked crack for 20 years. No one would have been able to pull him out of the middle of his addiction and off the streets, he said.
“The public law enforcement, our elected officials, we have to do something to give people a nudge,” he said.
Today, nearly 20 years later and sober, Egan is the director of neighbor recruitment at The Other Side Academy, a training school in Salt Lake City that aims to inform positive behavior, teach skills and guide homeless people through a reintegration program.
Egan believes there should be academies like his everywhere. They’ve seen success with a four-pronged, results-expected approach, meaning they want people to be “drug-free, crime-free, employed and housed.”
Experts also say there’s an importance to finding employment for people. Howell noted there’s a “dignity of work” and contributing to society that can be a significant motivator in someone’s life. “Felony-friendly employers” are necessary to make that happen, he said.
While the dust may have settled on the Grants Pass ruling from last year, the decision remains as controversial as ever. There isn’t a clear “solution,” because it’s a complicated issue that comes down to an individual’s needs, advocates say.
Based on the most recently available Point-in-Time count from the Department of Housing and Urban Development, there were more than 517,000 people unsheltered or sheltered in an emergency shelter in the United States in January 2024. The data collection by the department is to inform Congress of trends in the homeless population for funding.
Despite a growing housing crisis nationwide and an uptick in the homeless population, the Trump administration’s Department of Government Efficiency had planned to cut about half of HUD’s staff and billions in funding for homelessness initiatives, The Washington Post reported in February.
According to an analysis from the Center for American Progress, Trump’s “Big, Beautiful Bill,” which is currently being evaluated in the Senate, would make it more difficult for homeless individuals to access health care and food assistance with cuts to both Medicaid and the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program.
And funding is only one part of the issue.
Redd said that while law enforcement in Salt Lake stands ready to help people get to resource centers, a police officer walking up to an encampment may be unsuccessful.
“I think people who have a lived experience, people who have maybe been to prison or who’ve had addictions and have overcome those things and are successful, those individuals are also going to play a key role,” Redd said.
Egan and Howell both highlighted the importance of lived experience in outreach efforts and wraparound services. Egan said The Other Side Academy has been successful because its staff has lived experience. They understand what it’s like to be in the shoes of those they seek to help.
Egan argued that while conversations are centered around material ways to help homeless people, it can be ineffective because it’s not coming from a person-to-person level of aid. He pointed to the difficulties at the Magnolia apartment complex in Salt Lake.
“Everybody’s throwing assets at a human problem that deserves a human response,” he said.
Back in D.C., Robert also spoke about the human aspect often lost when the issue of homelessness comes up. When asked what he’d like the average American to know about homelessness, Robert teared up.
“We might be dirty and smell,” he said, “We’re still human.”
Editor’s note: This story has been updated to reflect new information provided to the Deseret News by the Road Home.