Several businesses, including wineries and breweries, are suing the city of Berkeley, California, alleging that the city has hurt their profits by failing to remove a homeless camp nearby.
The lawsuit was filed this week in Alameda County against the city of Berkeley by eight businesses, including Covenant Winery, Emily Winston of Vojczyk Bagels and Fieldwork Brewing.
The plaintiffs argue that the case concerns whether the City of Berkeley is required to follow the same nuisance laws that private property owners must follow, while at the same time owing a duty to its citizens to keep roads and other public rights-of-way clear and unobstructed.
The businesses argue that for the past few years, the city has allowed homeless encampments to remain on Harrison Street between Fifth, Sixth, Seventh, Eighth and Ninth Streets, along Codornices Creek and in the Lower Dwight neighborhood.
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The city of Berkeley, California, is being sued by several businesses for failing to remove homeless encampments. (Alameda County Superior Court, California)
The plaintiffs say in their lawsuit that they believe the city allowed the camping despite the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals “erring” in two cases, holding that cities cannot criminalize public camping when there is no alternative space for campers to move to.
Although the ruling does not permit or require the city to set up encampments that cause a nuisance to the public, the plaintiffs argue that the city allowed and invited the encampments to occur in Harrison and Lower Dwight, knowing that they would cause a nuisance to the public.
The city also allowed the encampment to continue despite the availability of shelter space.
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But in 2024, the U.S. Supreme Court overturned a ruling by the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals and said local governments are allowed to remove public campsites regardless of whether there is enough alternative space.
In their lawsuit, the businesses said they believe the city is refusing to act because it fears lawsuits from advocates for people living in campers and homeless people.
By filing the lawsuit, the businesses are asking the court to step in and force the city to comply with the law, remove the encampments and rid their neighborhoods of a public and private nuisance.
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The city of Berkeley, California, is being sued by several businesses for failing to remove homeless encampments. (Alameda County Superior Court, California)
Fox News Digital has reached out to the mayor and several of the companies suing for comment.
The companies are represented by Sacramento law firm Gavrilov & Brooks and Arizona-based Tully Bailey, the latter of which won a lawsuit in 2023 ordering the city of Phoenix to remove homeless camps within the city.
Ilan Wurman, an attorney at Tully Bailey LLP representing Berkeley in the lawsuit, told Fox News Digital that a Supreme Court ruling earlier this year that cities have the authority to remove homeless camps doesn't force the city to do so.
“It's clear that the city of Berkeley has no intention of doing anything about the encampments, even though they could provide shelter and their offers have always been rejected,” Wurman said. “Only a pollution lawsuit can force the city to do the right thing and clean up the city. This legal theory has been deployed successfully in Phoenix, and we are optimistic that it will work in Berkeley.”
FOX 2 in San Francisco spoke with Winston, who said he's been working with the city for years to manage the encampment near his store.
“It's awful. It's filthy. There's rubbish everywhere. It's horrible for customers to drive down this street. It's not safe for customers and it's not safe for staff,” Ms Winston said.
She also told the department she wants to ensure homeless residents have access to the shelter and medical treatment they need, but accused the city of failing to improve the situation, forcing her to take legal action.
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Governor Gavin Newsom works with a CalTrans cleanup team at an encampment near Paxton and Remick streets in Los Angeles as the state's Clean California initiative continues on August 8, 2024 in Los Angeles. (Jason Almond/Los Angeles Times via Getty Images)
“I had no desire to do this. This was not a fun time for me. I wish the city had just cleaned this up,” she said.
Homeless encampments are a serious problem across California.
Governor Gavin Newsom took to the streets of California in August to clean up trash left at homeless encampments, threatening local governments with losing state funding next year if they didn't clean up the encampments.
“I want to see the results,” Newsom said at the time. “I don't want to read about the results. I don't want to see the data. I want to see the results.”
Under Governor Newsom's leadership, California has seen a surge in homelessness. According to a 2024 point-in-time count of homelessness on any given night, the number of homeless people in California has increased to approximately 172,000. This is an increase from an estimated 131,000 people counted in 2018, when Governor Newsom took office.
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The city of Berkeley, California, is being sued by several businesses for failing to remove homeless encampments. (Alameda County Superior Court, California)
Earlier this year, Newsom's administration criticized counties and cities after a state audit report found his own homelessness task force failed to keep track of how billions of dollars were spent over the past five years to solve the crisis.
At the time, a senior spokesperson for the California Interagency Council on Homelessness (CICH), which coordinates the state's homelessness programs, told Fox News Digital the audit findings “highlight the great progress that has been made in addressing homelessness at the state level in recent years, including the completion of an evaluation of the statewide homelessness program.”
The audit concluded that over the past five years, CICH had not consistently tracked whether funding had actually improved conditions.
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The spokesperson added that local governments “have primary responsibility for implementing these programs and collecting data on outcomes that the state can use to evaluate the programs' effectiveness.”
California has spent more than $25 billion on homelessness since 2016, including state, local and federal funds allocated to further the state's “housing first” philosophy through a variety of programs that prioritize housing people before addressing mental illness or substance abuse issues.
Fox News' Jamie Joseph contributed to this report.
