9th Circuit extends stay on order to clear LA homeless camp

9th Circuit extends stay on order to clear LA homeless camps

A stay on the city and county of Los Angeles being required to house all skid row's homeless population was extended by the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Thursday.

Oral argument for the appeal is set for July 7 in Hawaii. "We look forward to the hearing on the merits," Skip Miller of Miller Barondess LLP, an attorney for the county, said Thursday. The 9th Circuit initially issued an administrative stay until June 15.

The appeal stems from a sweeping 110-page preliminary injunction U.S. District Judge David O. Carter of the Central District of California issued on April 20 in litigation brought by a group of business and property owners and homeless people. The judge ordered the city to place into escrow nearly $1 billion to be used for permanent housing, and to halt transfers or sales of city properties. He gave officials until October to clear the streets of homeless encampments. LA Alliance for Human Rights v. City of Los Angeles et al., 2:20-CV-2291 (C.D. Cal., filed March 10, 2020).

The city and county contend that Carter is overstepping his role in trying to address a policy issue that is the purview of elected officials.

Carter's order blamed historical and structural racism for the growing homeless problem and for what he described as elected officials' seeming inability to address it.

Elizabeth A. Mitchell and Matthew D. Umhofer of Spertus Landes & Umhofer LLP are representing the plaintiffs, LA Alliance for Human Rights.

-- Gina Kim