Human Rights Watch Criticizes Los Angeles, State for Criminalizing Homelessness

Human Rights Watch released a lengthy report Wednesday criticizing local officials and Gov. Gavin Newsom for criminalizing homelessness and failing to uphold the “internationally protected human right” to “adequate housing.”

The organization, which reports on human rights abuses in some of the most dangerous places on Earth, said the United States as a whole, and the city of Los Angeles in particular, treats “housing first and foremost as a commodity,” while “their primary response on the ground is to criminalize those who don’t have it.”

The 310-page report, “‘You Need to Move!’ The Cruel and Ineffective Criminalization of Los Angeles’ Homeless,” is comprised of dozens of case studies, charts and graphs of arrest and clearing data, and extensive sections of social commentary. It tells the story of homeless lawsuits and major enforcement actions from Echo Park to Venice.

“Criminalization effectively destroys life and property on the basis of race and economic class,” we read. “It is a set of policies that prioritizes the needs and values ​​of the wealthy, property owners, and business elites at the expense of the rights of those living in poverty to an adequate standard of living.”

The report’s authors point to decades of “national austerity, including drastic cuts to social welfare over the past few decades, the failure to fund social housing, and the removal of regulations that support the development and protection of social housing,” as the cause of the homelessness crisis.

However, the bulk of the report focuses on the city of Los Angeles.

In a detailed analysis of arrest records obtained under the Public Records Act, Human Rights Watch found that homeless people, who make up only about 1% of the city’s population, accounted for 38% of all summonses and arrests from 2016 to 2022, and 17% of all people booked into jail after an arrest.

This represented 20% of all felony arrests, 42.6% of all misdemeanor arrests, and more than 99% of misdemeanor arrests.

“A homeless person in Los Angeles is 79 times more likely to be ticketed or arrested than someone who is housed and 27 times more likely to be jailed,” the report says.

The report’s authors praise Mayor Karen Bass for seeking a new approach, but say her signature Inside Safe program has not proven to be sufficient.

Inside Safe “prioritized publicly visible encampments over allocating rooms for those most in need,” it said. “This priority appears to be driven by City Council office preferences and neighbor complaints, rather than helping the most vulnerable.”

The report criticizes the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority, which it said “yielded to demands from city officials, particularly those in City Council offices, to actively engage in destructive sanitation efforts, which disrupted the process of building trust and relationships.”

In response, LAHSA issued a statement saying it participates in city- and county-administered programs that fund the joint authority.

“Over the past few years, our staff has noticed that the LAPD’s role in cleanup operations has been limited,” we read. “Without LAHSA, there would be no professional staff trained in trauma-informed care dedicated to assisting homeless individuals and representing their interests on cleanup crews.”

The report also criticized Newsome’s mental health initiatives, which provide a court-ordered process for family members seeking treatment for a mentally ill person and expand the criteria for establishing guardianships to include people who are unable to provide for their own safety or medical care, including addiction treatment.

“People who fail to comply with a court order may be expedited to probation,” which is “particularly dangerous for homeless people who are constantly monitored and may become a prime target.”

Newsome’s office responded with a statement saying the suggestion that the CARE Court and guardianship reform “have endangered individuals is a gross misrepresentation.”

Instead, they are “compassionate, necessary responses to the crisis on our streets and in our homes, providing essential mental health and substance use services that are proven to save lives, break cycles of suffering, homelessness and incarceration, and support our loved ones living with the most serious mental illnesses and serious substance use disorders,” the release reads.

Bass did not respond to a request for comment.

The report, based on research conducted from April 2021 to March 2024, only mentioned a U.S. Supreme Court ruling in June that allows citations or arrests for people camping in public places.

In an email, lead author John Raphling, a senior researcher at Human Rights Watch’s U.S. program, said the ruling and Newsome’s subsequent executive order calling on cities to clear out encampments “risk deepening the crisis and making it a cruel treatment.”

The report repeats the standard truisms about homelessness—that housing is the only effective way to end it—with an activist tone reflected in its explanation of its preference for “homeless” over “homeless” as a more accurate term. “Homeless,” it argues, implies that the person does not belong in the community and should be “removed from view,” while “homeless” recognizes their right to exist in their community and their human right to housing.

“Criminalization,” we read, “is based on the ideological belief that homelessness is caused by individual ‘pathologies’ or perceived moral deficiencies, as opposed to common economic conditions.”

The report adds an additional dimension to its conclusions by placing the issue of homelessness in the context of international principles.

The criminalization, the bill says, violates prohibitions on cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment contained in two treaties ratified by the United States, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment.

The document cites two other treaties that recognize the right to adequate housing: the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) and the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, which the United States has signed but not ratified.

The report praised the cleanup efforts conducted by the Los Angeles Bureau of Sanitation, which primarily focused on removing waste and hazardous materials.

“However, a significant part of the LASAN clearance operation involves the mass destruction of camps, confiscation of property, and destruction of belongings, including clothing, bedding, tents, medicines, personal documents, family heirlooms, and other personal items,” the document reads.

The report said the City and County of Los Angeles, the State of California and the U.S. government should “reaffirm the right to adequate housing as defined in international human rights law and invest sufficient resources to progressively realize this right.”

“To help slow the spread of homelessness as quickly as possible, the city and state should find ways to protect existing leases and prevent evictions while protecting the rights of others.”

It also recommends a basic income program for residents in extreme poverty and voluntary, community-based mental health care for all people.