Fall asleep in public areas? Go to Jail in Louisiana

Louisiana Court proposed Homeless Program, “Streets to Success Act“

AB: I do not believe this is a “failure to communicate” law as much as a failure to provide a place for people to go, sleep, and make a living. What do you do at that point? The state and county put you to work in some manner to pay for your stay in jail or prison.

Quick take down of what the State of Louisiana is doing for homeless people who fall asleep in public areas. Typically, they do such as they have no place to go. Louisiana is taking care of the homeless part by sending them to jail and working the cost of their stay. The cost can range from $26/day to $107 a day. The former being county jail and later being the state prison. The state has dibs on all offenders. If over crowded, they will stay in county facilities. Louisiana is not giving them much of a hand to survive.

“Housing not Handcuffs” had this to say:

“In addition to making it a crime to sleep outside, this bill forces homeless people charged with a crime to make the false choice between jail and or at least one year of forced treatment. 

The Louisiana law passed by its House requires homeless people to pay for the treatment they are forced into. And if the person cannot pay the cost of treatment, this bill requires them to perform unpaid labor for the government or a community organization to pay off their debt. Louisiana has a long history – and present – of chain gangs, prison labor, and entrenched white supremacy. This bill evokes the return of debtor’s prisons, convict leasing, and the ugliest day of Jim Crow.”   Housing Not Handcuffs.

AB: I did copy and paste much of the bill so AB readers could get an understanding to what Louisiana is doing with homeless people sleeping in public areas and streets. The first part after the title is one of the longest sentences I have experienced yet. It is just mean . . .

Louisiana Legislative Fiscal Office: Provides relative to the creation, administration, and eligibility requirements of the Homelessness Court program.

“Homelessness Court Program, Streets to Success Act“

Text 1461578: “Authorizes each district court by rule to designate one or more divisions as a Homelessness Court program, and for its purpose, goals, creation, participation  eligibility, screening, assessments, and probationary conditions; provides for the right for a defendant to legal counsel, duties of the defendant, court and DA, and disposition of the defendant upon satisfactory completion of or failure to complete the program; creates the crime of unauthorized camping on public property and assesses six months imprisonment, or a fine of no more than $500, or both, on first conviction, and on second or subsequent conviction, a fine of no more than $1,000 and no less than one nor more than two years imprisonment, with or without hard labor; provides that an offender in violation of unauthorized camping on public property may be eligible for the program, if it is available in the jurisdiction and the offender meets requirements set forth for participation; provides that no political subdivision shall authorize any person to regularly engage in public camping on a public property; provides that a political subdivision may by majority vote of the political subdivision’s governing body, designate property owned by the political subdivision or municipality to be used for a continuous period of no longer than one year for public camping, subject to certain conditions, and that the political subdivision shall notify the department within 10 days of designating the property to be used for that purpose, subject to certain standards; provides for housing and services for homeless individuals; provides for its effective date.”

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• To the extent that offenders sustain a felony-grade conviction for violation of the proposed law, DPS&C-CS will sustain an indeterminable increase in expenditures. For those convicted, sentenced, and then subsequently housed in a state facility, DPS&C-CS will sustain expenditures of $107.60 per offender per day. For those housed in local facilities, DPS&C-CS will sustain expenditures of $26.39 per offender per day. DPS&C-CS advises that impacts on offender populations are anticipated to impact the number of offenders held in local facilities, and that in managing its offender population, it seeks to fill all beds in state facilities first, then assigns overflow offenders to local facilities.

• To the extent that offenders sustain a misdemeanor conviction for violation of the proposed law, local governing authorities will sustain Local Funds expenditures. The exact fiscal impact of the passage of this legislation to local governing authorities is indeterminable, since it is not known how many people will be convicted and incarcerated in local facilities, nor the length of the sentences assessed with those convictions as a result of its potential enactment. The maximum imprisonment term for unauthorized camping on public property is no more than two years.