In June, the Supreme Court ruled that cities can arrest or ticket people for sleeping outdoors. The ruling comes as homelessness rates continue to rise across the U.S. and many advocates fear that the high court’s decision will make it easier for cities to criminalize people experiencing homelessness.
Cathy Alderman, chief communications and public policy officer for the Colorado Coalition for the Homeless, told CPR News that even before the Supreme Court ruling, “Colorado was very far behind in addressing homelessness.”
“The state doesn't have a long-term strategy for addressing homelessness, and it's been left on the shoulders of local communities,” Alderman said. “So local communities are kind of scrambling and often find that it's easier to push the problem elsewhere than dealing with it in their own community with their own resources.”
CPR reporters looked into how cities around the state are responding.
The Front Range
Boulder
Many cities along the Front Range were cracking down on homeless camping even before the Supreme Court ruling in June.
In Boulder, a local lawsuit was filed against the city over two years ago by the ACLU of Colorado on behalf of a local nonprofit, Feet Forward, local taxpayers, and a few individuals experiencing homelessness. The lawsuit alleged that the City of Boulder violated protections against cruel and unusual punishment in the Colorado Constitution by issuing citations to people who had no option but to sleep in public spaces, among other claims.
A few weeks ago, the City of Boulder asked the judge to dismiss the lawsuit.
“The [Supreme Court] decision does not impact the city’s current operations,” Sarah Huntley, Director of Communication and Engagement for the City of Boulder, told CPR News in a statement. “...The ordinances that guide the city’s Safe and Managed Public Spaces work are enforceable across all members of the community, regardless of their status, and the city has a robust homelessness response system.”
But Andy McNulty, a civil rights attorney representing the plaintiffs, says that the city’s “robust homelessness response system” is flawed. According to McNulty, Boulder is particularly hard on the unhoused compared to other municipalities throughout the state.
“Instead of trying to solve this issue with the way that we know solves it, which is providing people with a place to go and stable housing and wraparound services to help them transition from the streets into housing; cities are pouring money into their police departments and criminalizing people instead, which only exacerbates the problem even more.”
The plaintiffs have until Sept. 6 to reply to the city’s motion to dismiss, and McNulty confirmed they intend to do so.
“We don't believe that a Colorado court or the Colorado Supreme Court would follow the — frankly — wrong decision of the United States Supreme Court,” McNulty told CPR News. “So we're asking that the court allow our lawsuit to go forward based on a bunch of precedent from the Colorado Courts on the Colorado Constitution.”
Denver
In comparison, Denver Mayor Mike Johnston's office stated the high court's decision will have no effect on Denver's execution of its homeless policy.
During the first six months of his term, Mayor Johnston prioritized working to end visible homelessness in the city center. But according to McNulty, the number of arrests and citations for “anti-houseless ordinances,” increased by 50 percent under Johnston.
“The Johnston administration is at least putting forward a face of trying to house people. They're at least putting in the lip service to do that and putting some resources towards it, whereas you don't see that as much in Boulder,” McNulty said. “... But the approach is still similar; criminalization is still the priority.”
Aurora
Earlier this year, Aurora City Council members enacted multiple plans to end homelessness — the city’s Mayor Mike Coffman referred to the proposals as a "tough love" approach.
“These encampments, in Aurora, have been a threat to public health and safety, and they cannot be tolerated any longer,” Coffman wrote in a Facebook post in April. “What the unsheltered homeless can't get from panhandling they steal to survive, they start dangerous fires to stay warm, and their behaviors put their own lives at risk.”
One of the proposals toughened the city’s already existing camping bans, particularly along the Interstate 225 corridor.
Another proposal suggested the city create a specialized court — called the H.E.A.R.T. Court (Housing, Employment, Addiction, Recovery, and Teamwork) — that would handle low-level offenses by people who are experiencing homelessness. Coffman said on Facebook the goal of these proposals “is to make it untenable for our unsheltered homeless to stay on the streets and, at the same time, make the necessary resources available to help them via the new court.”
Alderman with the Colorado Coalition for the Homeless said that while Aurora was already ramping up measures on homelessness before the Supreme Court ruling, she believes that the high court’s decision will only worsen the city’s “tough love” approach.
“Prior to the Supreme Court decision, there was this kind of delicate balance,” Alderman told CPR News. “But now I think cities no longer have any reasons to provide notice or services to people because they can just enforce the camping ban and tell people to move along without telling them where to move to along to… with absolutely no resolution for the people experiencing homelessness.”
In a statement, Coffman told CPR News that the high court’s decision will have “no impact” on the city’s camping ban policies “because we’ve always believed that we should have a shelter option available whenever we abate an encampment.”
Colorado Springs
In the last few years, Colorado Springs has also intensified law enforcement efforts to carry out camping bans throughout the city.
“We have police who are pretty aggressive in enforcing those things,” said Max Kronstadt, lead organizer with the Colorado Springs Pro-Housing Partnership. “It’s not helping at all and it’s actively making people's lives a lot worse and making it a lot harder for them to exit homelessness.”
Kronstadt — who also facilitated the founding of the Colorado Springs Homeless Union late last year — says that while he is worried about what the Supreme Court ruling will mean for future ordinances, right now he is primarily concerned with the general attitude and stigmatization surrounding homelessness.
“I think there's a worrying just broader trend that the Supreme Court case is a part of, which is away from housing and supportive services and towards law enforcement and criminalization.”
The Colorado Springs City Council did not respond to CPR News’ request to comment.
The Western Slope
On the Western Slope, there’s a more pronounced embrace of the Supreme Court decision.
Avon
The small resort town of Avon has had the same codes related to homelessness for 45 years. Town Manager Eric Heil explained that the recent Supreme Court ruling gave the town an opportunity to revisit its laws, but that local leaders are still trying to take a measured approach.
“We are not looking to criminalize homelessness,” Heil said.
Instead, Heil envisions the town will clarify what’s allowed and not on public and private property, with any possible changes likely being mulled later this year or early next.
Home to only about 6,000 people, Avon doesn’t have the ability to offer resources like shelters, though there are several food pantries in town. Instead, Eagle County offers the bulk of services for unhoused residents.
Grand Junction
Two hours west, Grand Junction has about 10 times the population of Avon — and one of the highest instances of homelessness in the state. City leaders say June’s ruling didn’t directly change their rules surrounding unhoused residents, but the city has been making some big changes around the issue.
In May, before the ruling, the city council banned the daytime use of tents in city parks. Overnight camping was already banned, but several encampments had popped up in the downtown area in recent years. After the tent ban was announced, police began issuing more tickets for illegal camping, with a twofold increase between June and July. A downtown park, which is essentially a grassy highway median, went from being a congregating spot for unhoused residents to becoming mostly empty.
This all followed the 2023 closure of a much larger downtown park that had become the center of the unhoused community, where people would both camp and receive meals from volunteers. After the city closed the park with little notice, outrage from local activists helped spur the city and a local nonprofit to open a downtown day shelter, where unhoused residents could receive resources like food and referrals for housing and other services.
Late last month, Grand Junction also approved a new plan for interim housing in the form of prefabricated shelters, but the city council did not include tents or safe parking in the plans due to safety concerns.
