Civic Center Homeless Counseled to Decamp : Law: Replace tents and shanties with bedrolls to comply with ‘reasonable’ Santa Ana camping ban, Legal Aid lawyers advise.

Homeless people living in the Santa Ana Civic Center have been advised by their lawyers to dismantle their tents and shanties and replace them with bedrolls and backpacks to cooperate with a new law that bans camping throughout the city.

During a meeting Tuesday with more than a dozen homeless people, attorneys from the Legal Aid Society of Orange County and two in private practice who have represented the homeless in previous legal battles against the city, conceded that a ban against tents in the Civic Center “is reasonable,” but that barring sleeping in the open throughout the city is not.

“But you do have the right to live,” Legal Aid Director Robert Cohen told the homeless. “We’re going to work out a balance so that there is no harassment.”

Irvine attorney Lloyd A. Charton added that while the city could ban structures, it could not legally prevent the homeless from lying on a sleeping bag if they have no other place to go.

“The law of necessity says that when your physical health is so endangered by the threat of exhaustion and you have conditions which are beyond your control--conditions which exist in Santa Ana because you have no place to go to go to sleep--rather than fall down, you have the right . . . to use a sleeping bag,” Charton said.

The meeting was called to outline steps the attorneys plan to take against Santa Ana, Fullerton and Orange, the three municipalities that have approved ordinances designed to force the homeless from their cities.

Officials in both Fullerton and Santa Ana said they believe that their ordinances would withstand constitutional scrutiny. Santa Ana officials said enforcement, which would come mainly through the issuing of citations, would begin shortly.

For their part, the lawyers for the homeless said their multifaceted attack on efforts to turn homelessness into a crime would include:

* The filing of lawsuits within the next few weeks challenging the validity of the new ordinances in Fullerton and Orange, where council members approved the new laws Tuesday.

Legal Aid attorney Harry Simon said Fullerton’s law, for example, is seriously flawed because it bans camping on public property without defining what it means by camping .

* Continued study of its case against Santa Ana, which could be handled through a new lawsuit, or following up on an existing court order that bars officials from purposefully driving the homeless out of the city. Santa Ana officials have argued that the ordinance applies to everyone, not just the homeless.

* A fund-raising drive to purchase sleeping bags and backpacks for the homeless. Charton kicked off the drive by donating 50 sleeping bags.

* The distribution of employment applications to the homeless combined with a plea to employers to help the homeless get back on their feet.

“Everyone of us needs a leg up; we just need a start,” said Maurice Moore, 30, who moved to the Civic Center a few weeks ago.

Later on Tuesday, the city managers of Santa Ana and Fullerton expressed confidence that their laws would not be thrown out by the state or federal courts.

“We certainly plan to enforce the ordinance to the fullest extent of our ability,” Santa Ana City Manager David N. Ream said. “I would anticipate that these types of ordinances will eventually find their way to at least the appellate court level.”

Because the city is not expected to have its own jail space to hold misdemeanor violators until fall, Ream said the ordinance would be enforced through the issuance of citations.

Fullerton City Manager William C. Winter said his City Council “felt it was appropriate to adopt the ordinance, but the problem is not a huge problem . . . and no special (enforcement) action is planned at this time.”

The group of attorneys and homeless residents said they have a meeting with police officials scheduled next week to work out a peaceful coexistence while the laws are tested in the courts.

“(The laws) are too broad and too threatening to the homeless community,” Legal Aid attorney Simon said. “It cannot simply be a crime to be homeless.”

As written, the attorneys said, the laws violate basic constitutionally guaranteed freedoms, such as the rights to travel, assemble and even sleep.

“It is our intention to fight any case where a person is cited for simply lying down because he has no other place to go to sleep,” Charton said. “And we will fight everyone of those cases by way of a jury trial if we have to.”

Past coordinated efforts by Legal Aid and private attorneys in defense of the constitutional rights of the homeless have resulted in Santa Ana’s paying at least $500,000 in lawsuit settlements.

Attorney Christopher B. Mears, who has been involved in several cases against the city, said public officials should treat the homeless issue comprehensively, instead of through law enforcement.

“Once society makes the commitment and the decision to recognize these people as human beings who are deserving of dignity and who are deserving of assistance in restoring their self-confidence in life, only then will we find the various paths out of this dilemma,” Mears said.