> ## Content Index > Fetch the complete content index at: https://www.smdp.com/llms.txt > Use this file to discover other available public pages before exploring further. # Suggested laws may get Santa Monica sued - URL: https://www.smdp.com/suggested-laws-may-get-santa-monica-sued/ - Published: 2002-09-24T15:00:00.000Z - Updated: 2026-10-23T00:45:05.000Z - Author: Andrew Fixmer - Tags: Government & Politics, Downtown, #archive-import, Homeless *Mayor calls proposed laws ‘thinly veiled’* If a pair of ordinances designed to curb public feedings and trespassing downtown is enacted by the city council tonight, a series of legal challenges will likely ensue. Officials with the Los Angeles chapter of the National Lawyers Guild said they will file suit against the city to protect the rights of Santa Monica’s homeless population, which would largely be affected by the proposed measures. “If it passes, it will be challenged,” said former city attorney Robert Myers, who is an active member of the guild. Myers was fired in 1992 by the city council for refusing to write laws that prohibited camping in public and limit public food distribution. The guild successfully defeated a similar city ordinance in 1993 that required a city permit for gatherings of more than 35 individuals in public parks. That ordinance was deemed unconstitutional by the courts for being vague and violating residents’ First Amendment right to freedom of speech and assembly. “It’s essentially the same thing,” Myers said. “But this seems far more sweeping than the last one.” The proposed public feeding program ordinance would require groups to get a permit from the Los Angeles County Health Department to hold their charitable food distributions in city parks. After the groups received the county’s blessing, they would still need to get permission from the city. The other ordinance would prohibit individuals from sitting or lying down in the doorway of a downtown business between the hours of 11 p.m. and 7 a.m. City officials said in a written staff report to the city council that the ordinance would not prohibit the food giveaways but require the charitable groups that run the programs to meet stringent Los Angeles County Health Department regulations. “The ordinance does not prohibit food distribution or assembly in public spaces,” a city staff report states. “Moreover, it does not impose new standards. Rather, it clarifies that persons wishing to distribute meals and food in parks and on the City Hall lawn must comply with state health standards and with (city law).” However, city officials also wrote the intended effect of the new ordinance would be to decrease the number of food programs, which officials said average between 20 and 30 a week. “Presumably, enforcement will diminish the number of projects and the number of distributions by each project because, among other things, project participants will be unwilling or unable to comply with the state and county requirements,” staff wrote. For more than a decade, Santa Monica has reformulated how it responds to its homeless population. Instead of providing immediate services, such as meals and clean clothes, it redirected $1.8 million in aid to community non-profit organizations that provide counseling, transitional housing and job training. Those social service agencies fill the immediate needs of the homeless community while also providing services intended to lift unhoused and unemployed residents off the streets. During the last decade, the number of homeless living in Santa Monica and seeking city-sponsored services has risen by 25-30 percent, which has climbed even higher since the recent downturn in the economy, officials said. The number of complaints from businesses, residents and tourists also have risen along with the increased numbers of homeless living in the city, officials said. In response, a number of groups have formed to lobby the city council to control the public feeding programs and enact stricter trespassing laws. However, Mayor Mike Feinstein said the two proposed ordinances that resulted from those groups are unconstitutional and would likely be struck down in court, despite the large sums the city would spend defending them. Feinstein said the city is thinly veiling its ordinance with health code requirements but the intended effect is to eliminate the programs. “The issue is a political issue not a health issue and the approach taken by the ordinance is trying to pretend we can resolve a political issue by resorting to a backdoor health argument,” he said. “I don’t believe that’s honest government.” > “The issue is a political issue not a health issue and the approach taken by the ordinance is trying to pretend we can resolve a political issue by resorting to a backdoor health argument. I don’t believe that’s honest government.” — — MIKE FEINSTEIN Santa Monica City Mayor Santa Cruz City Attorney John G. Barisone said he thinks Santa Monica is well within its right to enact such ordinances. Santa Cruz is dealing with many of the same issues Santa Monica is regarding transients and anti-social behavior. For several months, city leaders have been developing a package of new rules for its 10-block downtown core that is home to obnoxious sidewalk behavior by all types of people. Barisone recently wrote legislation enacted by the Santa Cruz City Council that forbids anyone from setting up tables or stands on public property. The ordinance is aimed at limiting problems associated with panhandling. “It’s completely within the city’s policing prerogative to enact ordinances to protect public safety, and that’s what Santa Monica sounds like it’s doing,” he said. “That’s the fundamental job of city government to ensure the public is safe.” *Originally published in the Santa Monica Daily Press print edition on September 24, 2002.* [Read the original PDF.](https://s3.us-east-1.amazonaws.com/smdp%5Fbackissues/092402.pdf?ref=smdp.com)