photo by: Kansas Legislature screenshot

Mayor Lisa Larsen speaks in opposition to Kansas House Bill 2430 on March 2, 2023, at the Kansas Capitol.

Lawrence Mayor Lisa Larsen told lawmakers at the Kansas Capitol on Thursday that proposed legislation regarding local camping rules would criminalize homelessness and only hurt efforts to get those people housed.

Larsen gave oral testimony in Topeka against Kansas House Bill 2430, which is known as the “Safe Cities Act.” The bill places requirements and restrictions on how cities can approach public camping and sleeping, and potentially restricts cities’ eligibility to receive state funding designated for addressing homelessness. The bill also lays out penalties for those who camp or sleep on local or state-owned land without authorization, making the act a nonperson misdemeanor.

Larsen said that criminalizing homelessness and imposing punitive measures were dehumanizing and cruel, as well as counterproductive to efforts to help get people housed.

“House Bill 2430 criminalizes homelessness, punishable by fines, jail time or both,” Larsen said. “Criminal records make it more difficult for Kansans experiencing homelessness to access the affordable housing, health services and employment necessary to exit homelessness.”

Larsen added that with limited state and local budgets, elected officials should turn to humane, more cost effective policies, not ineffective measures that waste taxpayer dollars. She noted what it costs to house someone in jail in Lawrence and said that money could be better spent elsewhere.

“In Lawrence, it cost our taxpayers $226.15 per day to house a person in jail,” Larsen said. “So I ask you, in what world would anyone consider that to be an efficient use of taxpayer dollars, especially when that money could be used to develop solutions?”

The bill was introduced on Feb. 20 and is currently being considered by the House Committee on Welfare Reform. Judge Glock, representing the Cicero Institute, a conservative think tank based in Austin, lobbied in support of the bill. Glock claimed the bill would prevent problems with homelessness seen in other cities, such as Austin, Los Angeles and San Francisco, and encourage people to seek help.

“The bill is a modest but necessary reform that ensures that cities and public places enforce widely adopted and accepted laws against public disorder and public camping while encouraging people who are living on the streets to get the help they so desperately need,” Glock said.

However, disapproval from the many social service professionals who were in attendance was nearly unanimous. Glock was the only person to speak in favor of the bill during the hearing, a representative for the City of Topeka posed questions from a “neutral” position, and 24 people made oral testimony against the bill.

Many of those who expressed opposition worked in social services or other agencies that work directly with those experiencing homelessness. They came from communities throughout the state, including Lawrence, Johnson County, Wyandotte County and Kansas City. Among them were Mathew Faulk, who works in homeless outreach for Bert Nash Community Mental Health Center, and Lacee Roe, director of community engagement for the Lawrence Community Shelter. Both Faulk and Roe said that prosecuting people experiencing homelessness for camping has proven to be ineffective and only causes harm.

“Arresting people for engaging in survival activities like sleeping or camping does not make cities safer,” Roe said. “Instead it creates tension between police and poor people most vulnerable to crime. This bill is titled ‘Safe Cities Act,’ yet no part of this bill promotes public safety. Instead it criminalizes poverty and creates barriers to funding housing solutions for communities that need it the most.”

John Goodyear, general counsel for the League of Kansas Municipalities, also spoke in opposition to the bill, saying that it violated local control and the constitutional right for local governments to pass and enforce ordinances.

“House Bill 2430 guts these local policies, supplanting local enforcement and discretion,” Goodyear said. “Cities have conducted extensive research to try and determine the best, lawful and most effective strategies for addressing public camping or the obstruction of the right-of-way.”

In Lawrence’s case, city leaders made changes to the city’s camping ordinance in consideration of those experiencing homelessness. In 2020, the Lawrence City Commission added an exemption to the city ordinance that makes it illegal to camp on public right-of-way. The exemption, aimed at decriminalizing homelessness, allows people to camp on certain public property in the downtown district when there is no available space at the overnight homeless shelters.

The bill would prohibit policies that directly or indirectly prohibit or discourage the enforcement of any order or ordinance prohibiting public camping, sleeping or obstruction of public right-of-ways, including roads and sidewalks, or enforcement of those policies. The bill would give the attorney general the power to bring a civil action against any government that violates the bill’s provisions, and to recover expenses for those actions.

Another provision of the bill would require state departments allocating funding to local governments with a higher per-capita rate of homelessness than the state average to determine compliance with the regulations before funding is provided.

City Manager Craig Owens provided written testimony against the bill. Owens spoke to the city’s specific efforts to address homelessness and to create its camping ordinance.

“Lawrence has listened to residents and worked with experts to develop appropriate rules and ordinances that address camping and the specific challenges that Lawrence faces,” Owens wrote. “Why would the state want to intervene, as HB 2430 would allow the Attorney General to do, to make a city enforce laws that the city has carefully calibrated?”

Owens goes on to say that the city believes that the proposed legislation could have a negative effect on the efforts of cities to address homelessness, especially for those cities with a higher per-capita rate of homelessness than the state average that could use the most assistance. He said the requirements in the bill for state departments allocating money to “determine that the political subdivision is compliant” with the bill would slow down vital programs and could chill funding from other non-state sources.