The U.S. Supreme Court ruled Friday that cities can enforce bans on homeless people sleeping outside, even if they don’t have enough shelter space to accommodate them.

That ruling, however, will have “little or no impact” on Portland, city officials say.

That’s because a state law passed in 2021 requires that local rules that regulate where homeless individuals can sit, lie or sleep outdoors on public property must be “objectively reasonable” in their “time, place and manner.” No court has been asked to rule on what constitutes an “objectively reasonable” provision under the law.

Cody Bowman, Mayor Ted Wheeler’s spokesperson, said in an email Friday that the city is “still required to follow state law that is on the books.”

However, Bowman said Portland wants to see the Legislature take up the issue again now that the Supreme Court has issued its ruling. He said the city believes the Legislature needs to consider “the tools cities truly need to manage public camping, provide sufficient shelter, and keep our streets safe and clean.”

In a split 6-3 vote, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled Friday that prior rulings by the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in the Grants Pass case and another case in Boise that narrowed what cities can do to restrict public sleeping on streets, parks and sidewalks may have inadvertently increased the homelessness problem by weakening how cities can respond.

Justice Neil M. Gorsuch wrote for the majority that the enforcement of laws regulating camping on public property is “commonplace” and not barred by the Eighth Amendment. He found that homelessness is “complex” and that Grants Pass’s limited fines for first-time offenders, bans from public parks for repeat offenders and a maximum of 30 days in jail for any violators are punishments that don’t add “terror, pain or disgrace.”

Citing a brief from California Gov. Gavin Newsom, Gorsuch wrote that many broadly agree that “policymakers need access to the full panoply of tools in the policy toolbox” and must “have the latitude” to tackle the complicated issues of homelessness and lack of housing.

In a strongly worded dissent, Justice Sonia Sotomayor called sleep a “biological necessity, not a crime” and said the city’s laws punish people with no access to shelter for the status of being homeless.

Oregon House Republican Leader Jeff Helfrich of Hood River applauded the court’s ruling.

“Our parks were never meant to be campgrounds, and now our cities can finally begin restoring our communities’ public spaces,” Helfrich said in a statement. “The Supreme Court’s ruling is a victory for common sense and highlights what conservative leadership looks like.”

In a joint statement, Sen. Kayse Jama, a Portland Democrat who chairs the Senate Housing and Development Committee, and Rep. Pam Marsh, an Ashland Democrat who chairs the House Housing and Homelessness Committee, said that the Supreme Court’s ruling won’t do anything to solve the root causes of homelessness.

“Homelessness will be solved by building more housing, supporting shelters and programs to get people on the path out of homelessness,” they said. “Local jurisdictions have a duty to maintain livability for everyone in their communities – and, importantly, there needs to be a reasonable balance between those concerns and the reality that too many Oregonians don’t have anywhere safe to sleep.”

Jimmy Jones, executive director of the Mid-Willamette Valley Community Action Agency, a nonprofit social services provider supporting Marion and Polk counties, called the ruling “unjust.”

“Criminalizing poverty and punishing the poor so that the rest of us will not be made uncomfortable by their poverty will not house, feed, or shelter a single person,” Jones said in a statement.

Polls in recent years have consistently shown that Oregon and Portland residents consider homelessness the top issue facing the state and region. A federal count of homeless individuals in 2023 found that Oregon had the third highest rate of homelessness in the nation.

An April poll commissioned by The Oregonian/OregonLive found that Portland area voters overwhelmingly favored fining and arresting homeless campers, even when no shelter beds were available to them, rather than allowing them to camp if there is no alternative.

In Portland, officials on Monday will begin enforcing a scaled-back homeless camping ban. The City Council unanimously approved the new ordinance two months ago to replace a more stringent measure that had been tied up in court.

The new rules require people who are offered shelter to accept it or face penalties, and it directs homeless individuals that they must keep their camping area tidy if they can’t access shelter. The ordinance scales back the potential of a 30-day stint behind bars for violators to just seven days and emphasizes a preference to offer offenders diversion.

Bowman said the city will also continue to work to “expand shelter services to provide a reasonable place for people living on the streets to stabilize and get connected to resources.”

On Wednesday, Multnomah County reopened a refurbished congregate shelter and adjacent tiny home pod in the Arbor Lodge neighborhood. The former pharmacy building and the sleeping pods together offer 106 beds.

Oregonian/OregonLive reporter Maxine Bernstein contributed to this report.

— Jamie Goldberg oversees The Oregonian/OregonLive’s politics, education and homelessness coverage. She can be reached at jgoldberg@oregonian.com or 503-221-8228. You can find her on X at @jamiebgoldberg

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