As San Francisco cracks down on homeless encampments, a question rises: Where will people go?

SAN FRANCISCO —  A week into what Mayor London Breed has called a “very aggressive” effort to clear homeless encampments across San Francisco, a key question looms: Where will the people living in those tents go?

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Outreach workers, backed by law enforcement officers, have fanned out in recent days in targeted efforts to clear some of San Francisco’s most visible encampments, confiscating personal belongings and telling the owners it’s time to pack up and go.

They’ve cleared unsanctioned tent cities under freeways and a stretch of sidewalk in the drug-plagued Tenderloin with the aim of forcing people off the streets. On Monday, city workers visited a longtime encampment lining the sidewalks outside San Francisco’s only DMV office that had been cleared more than a dozen times this year only to resurrect days later. By Monday night, the sidewalks were clean.

Breed’s efforts are buoyed by a pivotal June 28 U.S. Supreme Court ruling that authorized local communities to more forcefully restrict homeless encampments on sidewalks and other public property.

In response, Breed said that San Francisco, a city that’s become a favorite right-wing punching bag for its sprawling homelessness crisis, would launch a more determined initiative to clear encampments. The time had come, she said, to address “this issue differently than we have before.”

An estimated 8,300 people are living homeless in San Francisco, about half of them sleeping in parks and on sidewalks in makeshift shelters. Despite a years-long effort to move people into temporary shelter or permanent housing, tent encampments remain a glaring problem, often accompanied by trash, theft and open drug use.

For years, Breed and other city officials said their hands were tied by decisions issued by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit that deemed it cruel and unusual punishment to penalize someone for sleeping on the streets if no legal shelter was available. Now, bolstered by the Supreme Court ruling, city personnel can take a tougher stance if people refuse help.

But San Francisco, along with many other West Coast cities looking to crack down on encampments, still hasn’t figured out where people are supposed to go once their tents are dismantled: The city’s shelters — with roughly 3,600 beds — are at 94% of capacity, according to the San Francisco Department of Homelessness and Supportive Housing.

“Unfortunately, San Francisco does not have enough shelter or housing for every person experiencing homelessness, but we do have some beds available each day to support the work of the outreach teams, and we continue to grow our system,” Emily Cohen, the department’s spokesperson, wrote in an email.

Jeff Cretan, the mayor’s spokesperson, said the city doesn’t necessarily expect a huge influx of new people in shelters. After years of attempts to move people inside, those still living on the streets tend to be the most resistant to accepting offers of shelter, often because they’re struggling with mental illness and substance-use disorders.

In the first three days of this week’s encampment sweeps, only about 10% of the people offered shelter have accepted it, Cretan said.

Click here to read the full article in the LA Times