Last month, Tennessee arrested 10 unhoused people in Downtown Nashville for unauthorized camping, utilizing a 2022 law that makes sleeping on public property in certain situations a felony.
Arrests are not the way to solve homelessness. Contrary to popular belief, arresting people to force them into services is not a successful strategy. If it were, the United States would not see the numbers of outdoor homelessness it currently has. If it were, we probably would not have street homelessness in the United States.
On the contrary, arresting people who are in those public spaces mostly because they have no home to go to adds to their trauma, undermines trust in a system that should be focused on helping them, piles on more barriers to housing and essentially prevents some individuals from moving off the streets more easily. The consequences are that some people give up.
Here is a quick overview of what I know about these recent arrests:
A total of 10 people experiencing homelessness were arrested for camping on public property in Downtown Nashville between Oct. 29 and Nov. 20, 2024. Tennessee was the first state that made camping on public property a Class E Felony, which carries up to six years in prison, a $3,000 fine, and the loss of voting rights.
If you recall, that’s the legislation that even Gov. Bill Lee declined to sign. According to an article published in the Tennessee Lookout in June 2022, the governor said “he believes there’s a better solution for dealing with a complex problem.” Yet, he chose not to veto the bill.
While the arrest charges were for “unauthorized camping on state property,” the legislature deleted the language “state owned land” in Tennessee Code Annotated, Section 39-14-414(c), which is a part of the relevant section of the Code under which these arrests occurred. Instead, Tennessee substituted the language “public property.”
What this means is that any law enforcement officer in Tennessee has the discretion to arrest anyone who illegally camps on any public property. The locations of these 10 arrests were in Downtown Nashville, among them:
- the Public Square Park;
- Walk of Fame Park;
- Under the Pedestrian Bridge on Riverfront;
- At Riverfront by 1st Avenue and Broadway;
- Near the Ascend Amphitheater;
- Fort Nashborough; and
- 636 Lafayette Street, (which is the address of the Nashville Rescue Mission).
Since most of these arrests clearly were made on Metro property, I double checked with the Metro Nashville Police Department (MNPD) and Metro Parks and was able to confirm that Metro was not involved in these arrests. Rather, the arresting officers were state troopers of the Tennessee Highway Patrol.
The Mayor’s Office gave the following statement from Mayor Freddie O’Connell: “We were concerned about state law for this very reason and will continue to work to demonstrate the effectiveness of best practices as we seek to mitigate the impact of homelessness. We remain focused locally on housing and services and are excited to have opened Strobel House, seen major improvements to HMIS and to have made progress on availability of pallet shelters.”
I am aware of only one prior arrest under this law, which was dismissed at the request of the state in March 2023 — which raises the question of why these arrests happened?
Some advocates told me that they see increased arrests in the downtown area usually prior to a big event. The CMA Awards were held on Nov. 20, 2024, at the Bridgestone Arena.
State law defines camping under Tennessee Code Title 39, Chapter 14, Section 414 as follows (copy and pasted):
As used in this section, “camping” means:
- Any of the following at any time between ten o’clock p.m. (10:00 p.m.) and seven o’clock a.m. (7:00 a.m.):
- (A) Erecting, placing, maintaining, leaving, allowing to remain, or using a piece of furniture, tent, raised tarp, or other temporary shelter, structure, or furniture;
- (B) Placing or storing personal belongings for future use, including storing food for consumption; or
- (C) Carrying on cooking activities, whether by fire or use of artificial means, such as a propane stove or other heat-producing portable cooking equipment;
- Sleeping or making preparations to sleep, including laying down a sleeping bag, blanket, or other material used for bedding;
- Making a fire or preparing to make a fire; or
- Doing any digging or earth breaking.
I went to General Sessions Court on Nov. 22. When I tried to enter the courtroom, I was first denied access by a court officer, which I am unsure was even legal. Once I managed to get inside, it took me a couple of hours to figure out that no one except for the officials in charge knew what was happening at any given time.
It is very clear to me that if I were already in survival mode from living outdoors, I would be unable to gather enough to figure out in this courtroom chaos what’s happening to me, let alone be able to advocate for myself.
The District Attorney’s representative did not immediately dismiss the charges of the people who were arrested for unauthorized camping on public property. Rather, she released them after talking to some advocates but they have to be back in court at a later date. Her argument, as far as I could follow, was that she wanted to make sure that people are linked to housing and services. To do so, she was working closely with an outreach worker/case manager of the Office of Homeless Services (OHS) who was present at court.
The OHS worker appeared overwhelmed as he was meeting with some of the folks outside the courtroom. I heard him say he was working on setting people up for services. It was never defined what that entails. I also overheard one of the Tennessee Highway Patrol officers state that “so many people choose not to accept services.”
And this is the crux of the problem of criminalizing homelessness under the pretense that we want to link people to the services they need. Have you ever been told what to do and your instinctive reaction is, “Who are you to tell me what I should do?” You may not speak it out loud, but you still want to say it, right?
Think about it, how would you react if a stranger, possibly dressed in a uniform, would tell you what to do, especially when you are trying your best to just survive? I would likely tell them that I am doing just fine without their unsolicited advice. It is a reaction.
Now, how would you react if a person who has been checking in with you for a few weeks asked you what you need? I would be more inclined to tell them what would help me and over time start working with them more closely. In short, we tend to assume that people don’t want services. But it depends on who asks them and whether they know that person is serious about actually helping them.
Study after study has shown that criminalization and arrests do little to end homelessness or promote housing stability. On the contrary, they have the unintended effect of prolonging individuals’ homelessness. Yet, our society prefers to invest in more jails and prisons and lock people up to get them out of sight quickly rather than invest in sustainable resources that actually would solve homelessness.
If we want to truly end street homelessness, we need to invest in a coordinated system that at minimum provides people with access to:
- Highly trained street outreach staff who are compensated fairly for their extremely complex work. Currently, we have not enough well-trained staff on the ground in Nashville.
- Accessible low-income housing. While we need a wide variety of housing, when we talk about street homelessness, we often talk about chronic homelessness. Even if people have incomes and work, they are unable to pay rent in Nashville. Thus, we need government subsidies to supplement their incomes and help pay rent so that people with disabling conditions are able to remain in housing long-term.
- Accessible health care, mental health care, drug detox and other treatment options. A comprehensive support system often starts with addressing people’s health. Once they are able to stabilize, some of them are able to work on increasing their incomes through workforce development.
- Accessible case managers or coaches. I prefer to think of them as coaches, people who are there to help problem-solve and help people integrate into their new communities and neighborhoods.
Over the years, I have spoken with many frustrated neighborhood groups and business owners. More often than not, they are right in what they say. Homelessness can have negative effects on them. But one thing I always stick with is telling them the truth. We need to invest in permanent housing with support services and help people integrate into our neighborhoods and help them feel welcome like we would with other newcomers to the community. That’s ultimately the only solution to homelessness.
We need to stop arresting people for being in the wrong place at the wrong time without committing an actual crime.