How Lakewood Addresses Homelessness After the Grants Pass Ruling

Like many Washington local governments, the City of Lakewood struggles to connect unhoused individuals with shelter and available services. This connection is sometimes as simple as outreach and education. At other times, the solution is much more complicated. 

This blog is about how Lakewood is approaching homelessness, with an innovative combination of regulations directed at prohibiting camping in public spaces and direct, supportive services to unhoused individuals.

The Legal Landscape

In response to Washington's homelessness crises, many local governments have enacted ordinances to regulate or prohibit sitting, lying, or camping in public places. The controversy over these ordinances has played out in the media, the state legislature, and the courts to determine what level of regulation cities may impose on the unhoused population.

In the 2019 court case Martin v City of Boise, the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit held that ordinances prohibiting acts of public sleeping or camping are cruel and unusual punishment when localities enforce them against unhoused individuals lacking available shelter as a reasonable alternative to sitting, lying, or sleeping in public locations.

Martin’s holding forced local jurisdictions to tailor their enforcement practices to avoid public sleeping or camping restrictions when available beds were lacking or insufficient, although questions lingered as to what constituted “available beds.”

Following Martin, on January 21, 2020, Lakewood adopted Ordinance No. 728 on temporary shelters, prohibiting such structures on rights-of-way and in other specified public areas in the city. While the ordinance might be defensible under a Martin v. Boise challenge, it accomplished little as a tool to connect unhoused individuals with services that could help them transition to better living situations.

In the meantime, a series of Grants Pass (OR) ordinances prohibiting sleeping and camping in city streets, sidewalks, alleys, or parks was challenged shortly after the Martin v. Boise decision, with the case ultimately making its way to the U.S. Supreme Court in City of Grants Pass v. Johnson (2024). In this case, the plaintiffs argued that the city ordinances violated the U.S. Constitution’s Eighth Amendment ban on cruel and unusual punishment. The Supreme Court disagreed, noting:

• The Eighth Amendment only addresses the type of punishment imposed for violations, not whether acts should be punished;
• The ordinances apply to prohibit certain acts regardless of whether or not a violator experienced homelessness; and
• The ordinances impose punishments (jail time and fines) that are neither cruel nor unusual, as jurisdictions across the country regularly use them to address various types of prohibited acts.

The Grants Pass decision overruled Martin v. City of Boise, and, in the ruling, the Supreme Court criticized Martin’s standards as essentially unworkable in practice for courts and cities and counties nationwide.

On July 15, 2024, Lakewood adopted Ordinance No. 808 (Ord. 808), which is based directly on the Grants Pass ordinance, and prohibits sleeping on city sidewalks and in other public spaces. In passing this and other ordinances addressing homelessness, the city was harmonizing its approach to enforcement with these recent court decisions.

Lakewood city staff and councilmembers also recognized that enforcement actions against the unhoused did little to help this population unless there were also investments in outreach, education, housing, and supportive services. Fortunately, the city has been building these resources over the years.

Local Services Addressing Homelessness

Lakewood dedicates a percentage of its general fund to social services, and recipients are selected through a public process.

The city also incorporates outreach into the Lakewood Police. This includes the city’s Behavioral Health Contact Team (BHCT), a collaborative effort between Lakewood Police and Greater Lakes Mental Health Care. The BHCT pairs law enforcement officers with mental health professionals to respond to calls involving individuals experiencing mental health complications.

The BHCT is familiar with the unhoused population in Lakewood, and it is common for a team to conduct mental health checks on individuals, whether they are housed or on the street. In most instances, team members can greet individuals by name or recognize when someone is new to the city. The BHCT works to get people streamlined mental health and medical care, and to find solutions to other personal challenges, even going so far as to offer rides to warming centers or to important appointments.

Lakewood is adjacent to the cities of Tacoma and University Place, and the Town of Steilacoom. Together, these municipalities contribute resources to regional solutions led by Pierce County, such as a tiny house village in Spanaway and temporary housing facilities like Aspen Court in Tacoma. Neither of these are located within the incorporated boundaries of Lakewood, but each is within a 15-minute drive. However, Lakewood does have several adult family homes, mental health facilities, and other enhanced services facilities.

One of the Lakewood's goals for Ord. 808 is to incentivize unhoused individuals to accept assistance — such as that provided through the BHCT — and to eventually move people into stable housing.

Once the city council passed Ord. 808 in July 2024, the BHCT spent a month reaching out to unhoused individuals, distributing flyers about the ordinance, and discussing potential enforcement. Again, the goal was to get all unhoused individuals into stable housing and supportive services before having to enforce the ordinance.

To date, there have been no arrests due to noncompliance with the new regulations. This may be due to the fact that BHCT team reviews any instance where arrest is imminent prior to acting. One encampment has been cleared under the new city regulations, and at least two formerly unhoused individuals have entered shelters and are now housed.

Closing Thoughts

For any city seeking to follow the lead of the City of Lakewood, here are a few things to keep in mind.

First, state law may eventually preempt cities from incentivizing the unhoused to accept assistance and shelter. (There is a conflict in theories about how to address the needs of the unhoused population and states retain authority to preempt local government approaches. The court holdings to date are very specific, which leaves room for state legislatures to enact laws to protect the status quo on the streets.)

Secondly, underpinning the dissent in Grants Pass is the concern that laws such as those used by Grants Pass and Lakewood “criminalize homelessness.” For this reason, some Washington State legislators are pushing to make the holding in Martin v. Boise state law. If advising a local government on the adoption of this type of ordinance, the governing body should also be made aware that such a tool may be short-lived.

For any local government that is seeking to follow Lakewood’s lead in addressing the challenging issue of unhoused people in their communities, it is not as simple as adopting an ordinance and enforcing it. Enforcement programs must use ordinances as one tool for very specific instances when other tools have failed. Those who oppose enforcement of “anti-camping” laws theorize that such laws only create a revolving “arrest and release” cycle rather than addressing the needs of the unhoused population. This is one reason the Lakewood City Council established the BHCT in 2015 and continues to invest in regional and local partnerships to end homelessness. It is also evident in the investment of time and resources in programs such as the Rental Housing Safety Program, and the allocation of 1% of the general fund for social services.

Ord. 808 gives unhoused individuals the incentive to change. Already the city has seen people, when faced with a potential infraction, more readily cooperate with social service providers. We hope this ‘carrot and stick’ approach will help move more people into healthier living conditions.