Protesters and counterprotesters went head-to-head outside the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco on Wednesday, where a panel of three judges heard arguments over whether to appeal an injunction that prevents the city from moving unhoused people under certain circumstances.
The legal battle started in September 2022, when the Coalition on Homelessness sued San Francisco for violating the city’s own ordinances around clearing encampments. Attorneys for the coalition, representing both the ACLU and Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights of the San Francisco Bay Area, argue that the city has violated federal precedent by not providing appropriate shelter before removing unhoused people, and that it trashed personal belongings during its sweeps.
“They have cited and arrested thousands of unhoused people whose only crime was having nowhere else to go when the city obviously did not have shelter to offer them,” Zal Shroff, interim legal director for the Lawyers Committee, told KQED in an interview before the hearing. “You can still clean the streets, you can enforce your drug laws, you can enforce your accessibility laws, clear all safety hazards, but you can’t keep policing unhoused people from block to block solely for the crime of being too poor to afford a home, when you obviously haven’t given them a place to go.”
Tensions were high outside the packed courthouse, where more than 100 people rallied both for and against the injunction while surrounded by a significant police presence.
“We are compassionate, we are supportive, we continue to help people. But this is not the way,” Mayor London Breed said outside the courthouse on Wednesday. “It is not humane to let people live on our streets in tents, use drugs. We have found dead bodies, we found a dead body in these tents. We have seen people in really awful conditions and we are not standing for it anymore. The goal here is to make sure that the court of appeals understands we want a reversal of this injunction that makes it impossible for us to do our jobs.”
San Francisco resident Fred Winograd showed up to the rally to protest the injunction. “It’s unfair to the people on the street and it’s unfair to the city,” Winograd told KQED. “Outside of my door someone can camp and stay there and not be moved because of this injunction. That’s harmful to the residents and businesses of this city, and it’s got to stop.”
Others, like Terri Beswick, came to show their support for the Coalition on Homelessness and its lawsuit. “I love that the court took a stand on this and I hope they stick to it,” Beswick said. “If you want people off the streets, you have to give them somewhere to stay.”
Wednesday’s hearing laid out initial arguments, but it could be several months before the panel of judges issue their ruling over the injunction, which was first issued by U.S. Magistrate Judge Donna Ryu.
City Attorney David Chiu formally appealed the injunction in January 2023, with the backing of Mayor Breed, multiple city supervisors and a coalition of residents and business owners.
“We are trying to address the conditions on the street and this lawsuit makes it harder to do so,” Chiu told KQED. “There are a number of issues with the injunction, which we believe is unnecessarily broad, exceeds legal precedent and has strained our city’s ability to meet practical and legal obligations.”
Plaintiffs maintain that the city can clean its sidewalks and enforce its sit-lie laws so long as shelter is offered and personal belongings are protected. If someone refuses shelter, the plaintiffs said the city could then enforce its laws.
But the city is far from meeting the need for temporary shelter beds or permanent supportive housing.
