Anchorage Superior Court Judge Adolf Zeman on Tuesday sided with lawyers for the Municipality of Anchorage over three plaintiffs who are homeless, allowing city officials to tear down an encampment in the North Star neighborhood.
The fast-moving case will likely affect how the state’s largest city handles homeless encampments going forward.
The encampment at the center of the case is on a slice of public land atop a steep, wooded embankment at the corner of Arctic Boulevard and Fireweed Lane. Camps have stood at the site for years, with a few large, sprawling improvised structures set up at the top of the hill, along with mounds of trash, lumber, tents and bicycle parts. At the end of January, city officials posted notices there, as well as in two other nearby areas, that campers had 10 days to clear out and find somewhere else to go.
On behalf of plaintiffs Damen Aguila, Mario Lanza Dyer and Jamie Scarborough, the ACLU of Alaska asked the court to block the city’s abatement, arguing that pushing the campers out would cause them irreparable harm and would be cruel and unusual. They also argued that camp abatements amount to “unreasonable seizure” of belongings.
Zeman rejected those arguments, denying a request for a temporary restraining order against the city’s abatement efforts and the plaintiffs’ request for an injunction.
“The court finds that the harm suffered would not be irreparable,” Zeman said at Tuesday’s hearing. “I can certainly appreciate the difficulty that poses for them, however with the notice it appears they had sufficient time to gather their belongings.”
Zeman recited figures submitted by city attorneys about thousands of pounds of trash municipal crews had cleared away from the site, increased calls to police in the area, and regular fires burning in and around camp structures. That, he said, was a convincing part of the LaFrance administration’s reasoning for opting to clear this particular encampment, even as others around the city are left alone.
The LaFrance administration had also argued the encampment is near an elementary school.
“The municipality makes case-by-case decisions about when a prohibited campsite should be abated,” Zeman said.
City crews began clearing trash and material from the hillside site on Monday. The ruling means they can dismantle some of the large structures belonging to the plaintiffs on Wednesday.
“The court is not naive about recognizing what will likely happen here,” Zeman said. “In all likelihood the plaintiffs will find another area to set up camp. And while not ideal, it does not ‘banish’ them from Anchorage and it does not subject them to penalties.”
In its court filing, the ACLU of Alaska noted that Anchorage shelters this winter have consistently been full.
According to the mayor’s office, the city has abated 17 camps since July, when LaFrance was sworn in.
Last summer, the U.S. Supreme Court struck down a lower court’s decision that prevented local governments clearing homeless camps on public lands. Since then, local governments all over the West Coast, including in Anchorage, have been trying to balance civil rights protections for individual campers with demands from the public to address entrenched encampments that many view as hazards to public health and safety.