Keep focus on Waikiki for ‘sit-lie’ ban

The Honolulu City Council is getting ahead of itself by attempting to expand the scope of a proposed anti-loitering ordinance that wisely would limit initial enforcement to the Waikiki Special District.

Bill 42, proposed by Mayor Kirk Caldwell, would ban routinely sitting or lying down on public sidewalks in Waikiki 24 hours a day, seven days a week, except during permitted activities such as parades or protests.

It’s important right now to craft an anti-loitering law that can stand up in court, since "sit-lie" ordinances like the one Caldwell has proposed, and which councilmembers seek to expand, are routinely challenged by homeless people and their legal advocates.

Geographic or time-period limits on enforcement, as well as the general availability of shelter and services for the homeless, are important elements, lest the proposed sit-lie ordinance be overturned as a status offense that criminalizes poverty and homelessness.

With the combination of its new Housing First program and existing emergency shelter services on Oahu, the city will have a better chance of persuading a judge that no one sleeping on the streets of Waikiki has to be there.

But that’s not true if all of Oahu is included in the ban — the island’s total homeless population outstrips the available bed space; some of these folks truly have no place else to go.

Councilmembers are correct, of course, that homelessness also impacts Oahu neighborhoods outside Waikiki. Prohibiting people from dominating public sidewalks only in the special district could make things worse for adjacent areas, as people now sleeping on the streets of Waikiki pick up and move elsewhere.

Caldwell’s larger plan, though, is that "elsewhere" will be permanent apartments, for Waikiki’s chronically homeless, including the mentally ill, or at the very least, respite in emergency or transitional shelters, which are not filled to capacity at the moment. That combination of housing options would help the Waikiki homeless population that would be the most immediately and directly affected by the sit-lie law.

The secondary hope is that as Honolulu enacts stricter laws, fewer itinerant homeless people will come here to live — ultimately there should be fewer street people shifting from block to block.

There’s also the question of resource allocation: Unlike the existing stored-property ordinance, which has city work crews removing homeless people’s possessions that block the right-of-way on public sidewalks, the sit-lie ban would be enforced by Honolulu police. We must be realistic about the amount of time and effort police officers can devote to this issue, while simultaneously keeping a handle on more serious crime.

Given all these considerations, the Council should back off the competing, expanded bills and instead focus on passing Bill 42, which is modeled on a Seattle law that has been upheld by the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.

Waikiki is the economic engine of our state’s tourist economy and is disproportionately affected by homelessness. Rolling out a sit-lie ban there makes the most sense, even though it provides but a partial solution.