Thursday, October 1, 2026
The Tumwater City Council has decided to wait for the US Supreme Court’s decision on the Grants Pass case before resuming discussions about an ordinance that would suspend the prohibition of night-time loitering in public parks.
The local government of Grants Pass, Oregon has been appealing for a review of the Grant Pass v. Johnson decision which ruled that Grants Pass cannot enforce its anti-camping ordinances if there is no place for homeless people to go within the city.
The case was appealed to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, which it upheld, and has now reached the Supreme Court since the time that Tumwater’s ordinance was first discussed in November.
The Supreme Court is expected to make a ruling on June 30. Whatever ruling stands will have widespread impact on the reach of local governments in enforcing policies against people experiencing homelessness.
It was a concern among city staff and the council members that the Supreme Court’s eventual ruling would impact the city’s ordinance, thus the reason they ultimately decided to wait after discussing the issue on Tuesday, May 14.
The ordinance was largely about applying all 26 parks rules, contained in Tumwater Municipal Code 12.32.020, to all public properties.
“We were trying to create consistent expectations, help our staff with consistent enforcement, and to reduce confusion around how we handled people, how we manage people's behavior when it came to activities on city property,” City Administrator Lisa Parks told the council during the meeting.
The proposed ordinance also reduced the penalties of these rules to civil infractions, except if the violation in question is required by statute to be a criminal or gross misdemeanor.
The issue with the ordinance stemmed from a provision that suspended a rule prohibiting night-time loitering in public properties for individuals who are indigent or homeless.
The ordinance was placed on the council’s agenda in a November meeting last year but was pulled back. During that meeting, at least twelve people spoke about the ordinance to express their concerns if people were allowed to stay overnight in parks. The city administrator said that city staff has also received 60 emails about the ordinance since November.
Parks further explained that the controversial provision was made to comply with a federal case law, Martin v. Boise, which held that the “Eighth Amendment prohibits the imposition of criminal penalties for sitting, sleeping, or lying outside on public property for homeless individuals who cannot obtain shelter.” The Boise decision also served as the legal backdrop for the litigation against Grants Pass in Grant Pass v. Johnson.
As it currently is, night-time loitering is only prohibited in public parks. If all 26 park rules, including the one banning night-time loitering, were applied to all city properties, this would put the city at risk for being uncompliant with the Boise decision, according to Councilmember Michael Althauser, which City Attorney Karen Kirkpatrick concurred with.
During the May 14 council meeting, Parks advised the council that they could pass the original ordinance to comply with the Boise decision, modify the provision about night-time loitering, delete the said provision, or not adopt the ordinance at this point in time.
The council members had varying positions on the matter before they agreed to wait on the Grants Pass case.
Councilmember Angela Jefferson said that she preferred deleting the provision as it shifted the burden of enforcement to the police department which is already understaffed.
Councilmember Eileen Swarthout initially expressed that she was in favor of the modifications being proposed by city staff.
Parks said that the proposed modifications add language that even though there are no available shelter beds, certain areas like schools, childcare facilities, conservation lands, and environmentally sensitive areas are still off-limits to homeless campers. The city administrator said that the additional language addresses concerns previously raised by the public.
The council eventually decided to wait on the Grants Pass case after Althauser made a lengthy comment analyzing the issue.
Althauser said that changing the violations of park rules from criminal to civil made sense as it would allow the city to control what fines look like. He said that turning violations into civil infractions would satisfy the Boise decision but noted that the city would be uncompliant with Grants Pass if the Supreme Court’s ruling goes in favor of Grants Pass.
The council member also acknowledged that there is language in the proposed modification to allow flexibility if the Boise decision stands but was against adding language that is dependent on case law as it would be difficult to understand for the public.
“Odds are we're going to have to change more things. Like I think going through this big public process and adopting something and then having to come back within six weeks is not a fun process to put the community through,” Althauser said.
“What we have to do is manage risk as best we can and make the decisions based on our guiding compass to that degree. And I think that waiting is probably the way to have the least impactful public process the fewest amount of times that bears the least legal risk,” Althauser added.
Althauser also emphasized that regardless of the outcome, Tumwater needs to establish more shelters as the city is currently reliant on its neighbors.
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JW
"Whatever ruling stands will have widespread impact on the reach of local governments in enforcing policies against people experiencing homelessness"
"experiencing homelessness".
Can we cut it with this ridiculous new term? Experiencing homelessness makes it sound like experiencing the flu. Anyone can catch it, watch out! Oh wait, maybe it is actually predicated 99% of the time on being mentally ill, drug abusing, and a preference for criminality.
Maybe ---just maybe--- instead of glossing over these parts of it that no one seems to want to address, we start some tough "parenting" on these populations and actually make a difference. But that takes some commitment to things that people seem to find "not nice". What's nice is evidently firehosing money at non-profit corporations to try to keep people from "catching" homelessness and feeling so good about ourselves for being compassionate while leaving people to rot in the streets and victimize the rest of us.
Tuesday, May 21, 2024 Report this
Guccarelli
Or, JW, perhaps more should be done to address the nation's ongoing, decades-long housing crisis. I'm not sure what you mean by "tough parenting." Perhaps you could clarify that. If that means locking them up, then guess what: that costs money, too - a lot of money.
Tuesday, May 21, 2024 Report this
wildnature
POOF! Another homeless person is sent into the ether's by a law. Such a great invention for solving the problem of nowhere to go.
Tuesday, May 21, 2024 Report this
JW
Guccarelli, it's impossible to reasonably debate you when you seem to labor under the delusion that what we have on the streets is predominately the result of expensive housing and not untreated mental illness and rampant drug abuse. Affordable housing is a serious issue, yes, but giving housing to people that are mentally ill and abusing drugs with no real attempts to address those root causes is a lazy and unworkable approach.
Tough parenting would be forced rehab and treatment for sick people to actually help their root cause and then graduate them out into supportive housing and employment, if possible.
Tuesday, May 21, 2024 Report this
Guccarelli
JW, you seem to labor under the delusion that any proposal to address the various underlying issues drivimg homelessness aren't going to require significant investments. Treating mental illness and drug addiction, as well as addressing the housing crisis in this country, all cost money. Yes, we should have much better rehab facilities and programs for the mentally ill and those suffering with addiction, but like decent housing, good treatment centers and programs are woefully underfunded. "Tough parenting" requires resources.
Wednesday, May 22, 2024 Report this
JW
At what point did I say anything about not investing money into the problem? The only thing I criticized was the endless stream of taxpayer money currently being utterly wasted.
Wednesday, May 22, 2024 Report this