SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — Homeless people who reject three offers of shelter could be arrested under a controversial proposal before the city council of the most populous city in California’s Silicon Valley on Tuesday.
The proposal being pushed by San Jose Mayor Matt Mahon is eye-opening because it comes from a liberal city headed by a Democrat in the left-leaning San Francisco Bay Area. It is among the stricter anti-encampment deterrents proposed by elected officials since the Supreme Court in 2023 made it easier to ban homeless people from camping on public property.
And it’s another sign of just how frustrated people have become with squalid tents lining sidewalks and riverbanks, and erratic behavior of those using drugs or in distress in a state with an estimated 187,000 homeless people. California is home to roughly a quarter of all homeless people in the country…