GUEST EDITORIAL | Summit County Continuum of Care
Homelessness is at its highest level on record, and many communities — including Akron — are seeing an increase as more people struggle to afford sky high rents. Homelessness is a crisis that demands urgent action from all levels of government, but too often, elected officials turn to responses that are politically expedient, but proven to be ineffective and inhumane, rather than real solutions. And now, a case before the U.S. Supreme Court could make it easier for politicians to rely on harmful approaches.
On April 22, the Supreme Court heard the case of City of Grants Pass, Oregon v. Johnson, the most significant Supreme Court case about the rights of people experiencing homelessness in decades. Amidst the worsening affordable housing crisis, the Supreme Court will determine whether a local government can arrest or fine people for sleeping outside when adequate shelter is not available.
Criminalization is not a solution to homelessness. Arrests, fines, jail time and criminal records make it more difficult for individuals experiencing homelessness to access the affordable housing, health services and employment necessary to exit homelessness. Because of systemic racism in housing and other sectors, Black and Indigenous people experience homelessness at far higher rates than white individuals, and they are most likely to be harmed by criminalization.