Aurora OKs specialty court, accelerated sweeps for homeless campers

AURORA | Aurora’s City Council is moving forward with a speciality court program for homeless defendants as well as a companion ordinance that will allow the city to accelerate clearing camps, both policies that support Aurora Mayor Mike Coffman’s “work-first” plan to address homelessness.

Unlike the current policy for sweeping encampments in which city workers have to give a 72-hour warning prior to an abatement, the new policy will prohibit camping in certain areas, allowing abatements without the standard 72-hour warning.

Areas can be “closed” if the city has conducted a sweep within the past six months. Closures could occur for other reasons, including dangerous conditions, criminal activity, evidence of rodent infestation and “physically undermin(ing) or erod(ing) public infrastructure.” 

In addition, the Housing Employment Assistance Recovery Team, or HEART Program, will divert defendants charged with low-level misdemeanors, including trespassing, to a voluntary specialty court. Proponents of the program say defendants can choose a diversion program, allowing the court to connect defendants with city resources, such as addiction and mental health treatment, job training or temporary housing. 

Aurora’s City Council adopted both policies after weeks of discussion.

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If defendants choose not to participate in the HEART program they would go through the current legal process to address their charge, which could include fines or jail time, according to what is now city code. 

“Ultimately, we want people to accept services and help within our city, to become well, to experience healing and recovery, and ultimately to get back into society, and contribute,” Councilmember Steve Sundberg, who co-sponsored both policy proposals, said June 10.

The mayor’s work-first strategy was introduced in 2022 alongside Aurora’s camping ban and the city’s decision to invest in a central social services campus with the goal of helping people experiencing homelessness find employment and then housing.

Along the Interstate 225 corridor especially, the city has continued to see homeless encampments, which residents say they want addressed, said Curtis Gardner, who also co-sponsored both policies. He said the HEART Program would address residents’ concerns while acknowledging the unique challenges that people experiencing homelessness face. 

“It really focuses on meeting those individuals experiencing homelessness where they’re at,” Gardner said. “Not only does it help them address the criminal charges, but it also connects them with services.”

The intent of both the HEART Program and the sweeps ordinance is to alleviate the impacts of homelessness, according to bill sponsors and proponents. The question of how effective campsite sweeps and criminal charges are at reducing homelessness have become a topic of nationwide debate in recent months, as the U.S. Supreme Court prepared to deliver a ruling on City of Grants Pass v. Johnson. 

That court decision was expected to determine whether penalizing homeless people for camping on public property when shelters lack sufficient bed space violates Eighth Amendment protections against cruel and unusual punishment.

The high court ruled June 28 on the question, in what appeared Friday to allow Aurora the ability to carry out its approved plans.

 The Supreme Court decided on Friday that cities can enforce bans on homeless people sleeping outdoors, even in West Coast areas where shelter space is lacking.

In a 6-3 decision along ideological lines, the high court reversed a ruling by a San Francisco-based appeals court that found outdoor sleeping bans amount to cruel and unusual punishment.

The majority found that the Eighth Amendment prohibition does not extend to bans on outdoor sleeping bans.

“Homelessness is complex. Its causes are many. So may be the public policy responses required to address it,” Justice Neil Gorsuch wrote for the majority. “A handful of federal judges cannot begin to ‘match’ the collective wisdom the American people possess in deciding ‘how best to handle’ a pressing social question like homelessness.”

Concern for the enforceability of the sweeps ordinance was raised by Councilmember Alison Coombs during a May 6 study session. In response, deputy city attorney Jack Bajorek told Coombs that the program may have to be “tweaked” depending on the court’s ruling. Coombs ultimately voted against implementing expedited sweeps. 

“Obviously the result of that decision is going to certainly impact how we operate,” Gardener told the Sentinel.

A new start or a non-starter?

In an amicus brief submitted to the U.S. Supreme Court, 57 social scientists offered arguments against the practice of sweeping encampments based on personal experiences and peer-reviewed studies, including Dilara Yarbrough, an associate professor of criminal justice studies at San Francisco State University. 

“Policing, sweeps, and other forms of criminalization and punishment actually make homelessness worse,” Yarbrough wrote in an email. “Research shows that police responses to homelessness make unhoused people more vulnerable to violence by forcing them to move away from areas of relative safety and into more remote areas away from their social networks.”

In a 2020 article published in Social Problems, Yarbrough and amicus brief co-signatory Chris Herring reviewed surveys, interview and municipal data, which consistently indicated that move-along orders and similar laws shuffle people between neighborhoods and police jurisdictions rather than getting them into permanent housing.

In her work with the homeless community, Mile High Behavioral Healthcare’s director of business and public relations, Anna Miller, has seen the negative impacts sweeps have on people experiencing homelessness. 

“They have to just have somewhere to go, and with limited resources, I think we will see increased violence, theft (and) substance misuse,” Miller said. “Unfortunately, it will happen. People will get more and more scared and frustrated when they don’t have resources or places to go … ​​They’re human beings. There has to be somewhere for people to go.” 

Ivory O’Roy has been sleeping on the streets of Aurora for the last nine months. Limited in his mobility, he uses a walker that doubles as a chair to get between bus stops and intersections. At night, his walker is also where he sleeps. 

“It started getting warm at night, so this (blanket) keeps me comfortable,” O’Roy said. 

Though the police have approached him several times, asking him to move or face criminal charges, he said he’s managed to maintain a clean record. 

“You have a good officer, and you’ve got a bad officer. One good officer will work with you; the other one will stand there and threaten you,” O’Roy said.

Participants in the HEART Program will have priority access to the housing that the city offers, giving them a place to go, Gardner said. He said that, because it is a court diversion program, they must be charged with a non-violent misdemeanor, like trespassing, to participate.

If O’Roy maintains his clean record, he wouldn’t have access to the HEART Program and its benefits, though that does not mean the program won’t impact him — limited resources such as shelter beds are already in high demand.

Comitis Crisis Center guest Frenchan Brooks has observed his peers waiting long periods of time to access shelter space during his three stays at the center. When people have to move out prior to finding permanent housing, he has observed them spend all of their savings on motel space waiting for the next available bed, only to start the cycle over again.

“I think the help (the city is) giving them is not the help they need,” Brooks said. “We’re giving them a place to lay down and go to sleep. But the people in (Comitis) have that and a job with no place to stay permanently.”

In the four years since he lost his sight, Frenchan Brooks has spent four months sleeping on the streets of Aurora. Though he’s had the jarring experience of being woken up by police and told to move, he avoids staying outside of established shelters at night and is trying to find permanent housing.

Prior to losing his sight, Brooks worked in construction and was a chef. Now, he receives disability benefits but still can’t afford rent. His sight comes and goes, and even if he were to get a job, maintaining the position would be difficult because he can’t guarantee that his sight will be at its best everyday.

“It’s not like I didn’t work, or I haven’t worked. It’s just I had a medical problem,” Brooks said.

It remains to be seen how disabled Aurorans like Brooks fit into what the city has presented as its comprehensive work-first strategy for addressing unsheltered homelessness, though Coffman has said no one who wants services or shelter will be denied a place at the navigation campus. A 2023 report released by the Colorado Coalition for the Homeless found that 65% of adults experiencing homelessness reported having at least one disabling condition.

The HEART Program has been influenced by similar programs in Fort Collins and Lakewood, as well as a program in Redondo Beach, Calif., Gardner said. He says the program is meant to be individualized with advisers who will assist participants in navigating their options. 

Once implemented, the city will be looking at the number of participants in comparison with graduates from the program as one of the metrics for success, Gardner said. He said they also will look at the number of encampments along the I-225 corridor. 

The sweeps will focus on areas that the police typically abate on a weekly basis. Additional funds have not been allocated for sweeps. At the council’s June 10 regular meeting, Coombs addressed concerns regarding the distribution of resources and limited funds for area closures and abatements. 

Residents have reached out to Coombs expressing concerns about encampments near their homes and businesses in areas that don’t receive weekly attention.

“I hear from folks that they don’t get the attention, that they don’t get the response, even when there are major safety issues,” Coombs told the Sentinel in reference to the current regimen of sweeps. “I think there’s inequitable enforcement across our city that is targeted at making this policy look more effective than it is.”

Aurora Police Department data shows that, in January of this year, 55% of police hours working abatements were spent near the intersection of I-225 and Parker Road as opposed to any other abatement location.

The sweeps ordinance could divert people to the HEART Program court after they’ve been charged with trespassing under the ordinance, an approach that Coffman has termed “tough love.”

“I think the ‘tough love’ approach is driven by the myth that unhoused people don’t want housing or care and must be forced into services,” Yarbrough wrote.

“But when we look more carefully, we see that there are long waiting lists for housing, shelter, and residential treatment across the U.S. Most people who are living unsheltered are in public space because they have nowhere else to go. Unhoused people need housing first.”

The Associated Press contributed June 28 Supreme Court decision reporting to this story.

Reporter Ivy Secrest is a recent graduate of Colorado State University’s journalism program and former content managing editor at the Rocky Mountain Collegian. She will continue her reporting career at the Cheyenne Wyoming Tribune Eagle as a crime reporter and has largely focused on social justice and environmentally-based reporting.