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Lawyers in Santa Ana River Trail homeless lawsuit seek suspension of local anti-camping and loitering ordinances

by in News

The attorneys representing homeless people who were displaced from tent encampments at the Santa Ana River Trail earlier this year are asking a federal judge for a temporary halt to local ordinances that allow police to issue tickets and arrest people who camp out or loiter in public spaces.

The amended complaint, filed Thursday, July 26, in the ongoing civil rights case before U.S. District Judge David O. Carter also seeks to establish a class action that would include perhaps as many as 1,500 homeless people displaced from the riverbed and from the Santa Ana Civic Center earlier this year.

The lawsuit initially named the county and the cities of Anaheim, Costa Mesa and Orange as defendants but, through actions initiated by the city of Santa Ana, now essentially engulfs all 34 cities in Orange County. As of Thursday, no new court date had been set.

The judge has been allowing the county and the cities time to come up with plans for expanding the number of emergency shelters.

In addition, the complaint requests that people in the proposed class be allowed to remain at and have continued access to emergency shelters, transitional programs, recuperative care, sober living facilities and other placements.

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