WHERE DO WE GO BERKELEY V. CALTRANS, No. 21-16790 (9th Cir. 2022)
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The California Department of Transportation (“Caltrans”) coordinates and works with other government services before clearing homeless encampments. When Caltrans planned to clear high-risk encampments along the freeway, Plaintiff campers sought an injunction. The district court required Caltrans to give Plaintiffs six months to relocate and find housing before clearing the encampments.
The Ninth Circuit vacated the district court’s order finding "there is no serious question" that the ADA requires such a lengthy delay. The court also held that the district court abused its discretion when evaluating the harm the injunction caused to Caltrans and the attendant public safety concerns, and thus erred in balancing the equities.
Caltrans argued that clearing the encampments involves no ADA obligation because its properties are not open to the public. The ADA requires “only ‘reasonable modifications' that would not fundamentally alter the nature of the service provided.” Here, the court found that a six-month delay is a fundamental alteration of Caltrans’s programs, which provide for expedient clearing of level 1 encampments and include, when possible, 72 hours’ notice and coordination with local partners.
The court also held that the district court erred by incorrectly mitigating the hardships caused by the injunction. When evaluating the balance of equities, the district court noted that Plaintiffs’ potential injury was “exacerbated by the public health concerns of disbanding homeless encampments during the COVID-19 pandemic.”
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