ACLU & Center For Justice file complaint to prevent State House encampment eviction
A hearing on the injunction request is scheduled to be heard tomorrow at 10am before Rhode Island Superior Court Judge David Cruise. There will be a protest outside the courtroom starting at 9:30am.
December 13, 2022, 7:16 pm
By Steve Ahlquist
Attorneys for the American Civil Liberties Union of Rhode Island and the Rhode Island Center for Justice have filed a complaint on behalf of two dozen homeless individuals to allow them to continue camping at the State House to protest the lack of adequate housing for individuals in Rhode Island.
A copy of the complaint filed today can be found here.
The complaint supplements one filed last week by attorney Richard Corley which led to the issuance of an order temporarily barring any action against the protesters pending a court hearing tomorrow. The supplemental complaint, filed in Rhode Island Superior Court by ACLU of RI cooperating attorney Lynette Labinger, the Center for Justice’s Jennifer Wood, and Corley, argues that attempts to remove the campers would violate their constitutional rights as well as the state’s Homeless Bill of Rights.
The complaint notes that any number of the plaintiffs selected the State House grounds to locate their tent because “they wish to convey a message that they are in need of and unable to access adequate shelter and they believe that the message is best conveyed by their continuing physical presence at the seat of Rhode Island government.” The suit argues that the “grounds of the State House are a traditional public forum where the Government’s ability to limit protected speech and expression is at its most constrained.”
“I’ve been at the State House, on and off, for the past couple of weeks due to the fact that I can’t ind housing due to [either] my criminal background or my credit,” said plaintiff Adam Northrop, pictured above. “It’s not that I can’t afford it. I work a full time job, but people don’t want to give people second chances.”
Northrop was key to introducing people sleeping at the encampment to the lawyers bringing the complaint.
While the notice to vacate given to the camping protesters stated that “camping/sleeping overnight at the State House grounds is prohibited,” the lawsuit points out that the State has not adopted any regulations to that effect in accordance with the Rhode Island Administrative Procedures Act, a law that requires state agency rules and policies affecting the public to be adopted in a process that allows for public input.
Last December, led by a state Senator and a Gubernatorial candidate Cynthia Mendes, tents were set up on the State House grounds to protest the housing crisis, but all those sleeping there were allowed to stay, and did so for more than two weeks until they voluntarily left. The suit alleges that they were left alone “because they were not homeless or unhoused but acting in their capacities as politicians or housing advocates.”
Initially, the Capitol Police notified Senator Mendes that she would be arrested if she attempted to pitch tents and sleep overnight in protest. However, when State Police arrived over 30 minutes later, they declined to arrest anyone and wished the Senator well.
Although the notice given the campers claimed that “a bed in an emergency shelter” would be provided to every person there, the suit claims that the State has not secured adequate housing for, or even been able to contact, all of them, even as officials seek to have the court eliminate the restraining order and allow them to remove or arrest the plaintiffs. In the meantime, many of the plaintiffs have been trying to work with the state to obtain adequate and appropriate shelter for their needs.
Uprise RI asked Plaintiffs Northrop if he had been offered a shelter bed by State House staff. “As far as me getting offered housing, I haven’t gotten offered anything.”
“The Governor’s staff told us that everyone has been offered housing and that’s not true?” said Uprise RI.
“Yes,” said Northrop.
During phone conversations with the Governor’s staff, Attorney Labinger was told that there were only four or five people sleeping outside. Later, attorneys went to the State House and met with over two dozen people. Yesterday Governor Daniel McKee admitted that there might be as many as 17 people at the encampment.
“Some of them might have been reached [by the Governor’s people],” said Attorney Labinger, “but when we spoke to them they said no we haven’t. [The Governor’e people] had our list, and they were not able to say that they had spoken to everyone on the list.”
The suit argues that the State’s actions violate the protesters’ First Amendment rights to speech and petition the government, their Fourth Amendment right against unreasonable searches and seizures, and the Homeless Bill of Rights, which generally bars discrimination against individuals on the basis of their housing status. The suit seeks a continued injunction to bar the state from “seizing or removing” the plaintiffs without their permission.
“The urgency of getting the plaintiffs who are staying at the State House appropriate shelter is what motivates this action,” said Rhode Island Center for Justice executive director Jennifer Wood. “The plaintiffs have worked with the state’s lawyers to facilitate getting people who are staying at the State House shelter and it is the goal of the lawsuit to ensure that these individuals and others who are experiencing homelessness in the winter access appropriate shelter.”
“Plaintiffs in this case are individual human beings who find themselves in the most vulnerable situation in the dead of winter,” said ACLU of RI cooperating attorney Lynette Labinger. “They have chosen to amplify their message of the inadequacy of housing for themselves and other unhoused individuals by presenting it at the seat of government. The law is clear: the government’s ability to interfere with individuals exercising their rights of free speech and to petition the government is at its most limited when that protest is at a public forum like the State House. Instead of taking the time and fulfilling its responsibility to consider, craft and publish narrowly tailored rules limiting the interference with these most basic and fundamental rights and applicable to all, the state has chosen to target this group with arrest and seizure of their property. We urge the State to reconsider its priorities and work with us to find safe and adequate shelter and housing for all of these people and to stop threatening them with expulsion and arrest until they do.”
“The protestors’ mere presence at the State House is intended as a symbolic statement to heighten public awareness concerning the existence of homelessness in Rhode Island,” said Attorney Rick Corley. “Their physical presence and perseverance to bravely remain vigilant throughout bitterly cold weather emphasize their message that appropriate housing should be a basic civil right.”
