Punitive Ordinances in El Paso County Are Driving Up Homelessness While Shelter Beds Decline
Homelessness is growing rapidly across one county in southern Colorado despite its efforts to criminalize the issue.
According to El Paso County’s latest Point-in-Time Count, there were more than 1,700 people experiencing homelessness last year. That figure is the most ever counted in the county, the data shows.
Experts from the Pikes Peak Continuum of Care cautioned that the Point in Time Count results are “likely an undercount” given the limitations of the survey.
“The number of people counted each year depends largely on external factors like the number of volunteer surveyors and the weather on the night of the PIT count,” the report states.
Even so, the report points to the failures of policies that criminalize homelessness. For instance, Colorado Springs, which is the largest city in the county, expanded the boundary for its sit-lie ordinance to prohibit anyone from blocking alleys, roads, and other public rights-of-way. The city initially passed the law in 2016, and it has been the subject of fierce debate between local advocates and elected officials.
From ‘Tough Love’ to Tougher Outcomes
When the ordinance was passed in January, local elected officials claimed it would help connect unhoused folks with services and shelter. Multiple city council members in Colorado Springs told The Colorado Springs Gazette that the “tough love” approach to homelessness gives police officers “what they need to really go after this problem.” The Colorado Springs police force has also written more than 1,000 tickets for illegal camping over the last 18 months.
But the approach has not yet yielded significant reductions in homelessness. As of 2024, more than 6,800 people in the Pikes Peak region accessed homeless services, according to data from the Homeless Management Information System. About 25% of the people who accessed services were chronically homeless, which is down about 3% since 2022.
However, the number of homeless veterans and people experiencing unsheltered homelessness have skyrocketed, according to the data. In 2022, there were 54 veterans and 283 people sleeping unsheltered in the Pikes Peak region. Two years later, those populations grew to 710 and 522 people, respectively.
Criminalizing homelessness in El Paso County also appears to have given local officials a reason to stop investing in shelters. Federal data shows the total number of shelter beds has declined by 10.5% to just over 2,100 beds as of 2024. That includes a more than 39% reduction in the number of shelter beds for chronically homeless individuals, a 23% reduction in beds available for youths experiencing homelessness, and a 16% reduction in beds for families who are homeless.
The Hidden Costs of Criminalization
El Paso County is not the only jurisdiction in Colorado that is criminalizing homelessness. Still, its experience using the police to address the issue provides an instructive example for other elected officials.
Criminalizing homelessness has never been proven to reduce cases of homelessness. Instead, the approach moves unhoused people around a city until they are completely disconnected from service providers and their community. It also encourages police officers to arrest or ticket unhoused people, which makes it more difficult for them to qualify for services, jobs, and housing placements.
Criminalization also has detrimental impacts on local unhoused populations. For instance, laws criminalizing homelessness can worsen sleep deprivation among unhoused people because the policy increases contacts with police officers. Sleep deprivation can lead to several additional health issues, such as heart disease, high blood pressure, and depression.
Laws that criminalize homelessness also contribute to the violence that people who are homeless experience, according to Will Knight of the National Homelessness Law Center.
“The political rhetoric that goes along with criminalization, especially right now during our current political climate, contributes to a cultural view of homeless people as less than or other, or both,” Knight told Invisible People. “This contributes to a view that homeless people are dangerous, which is incorrect. It also contributes to a view of homeless people as disposable, which, in turn, increases violence against them.”
A Growing National Trend
Despite overwhelming evidence that criminalization does not work, a growing number of cities are passing laws that restrict where homeless people can be in public. According to data from NHLC, over 300 cities have passed new laws criminalizing acts associated with homelessness since 2024 when the Supreme Court handed down the disastrous Grants Pass v. Johnson decision.
Grants Pass v. Johnson allowed cities to use punitive punishments like fines and arrests to address homelessness when no shelter is available. The court argued that these practices do not violate the Eighth Amendment protections against cruel and unusual punishment because many cities already use the tactics.
Experts say that criminalizing homelessness allows cities to more effectively hide the scale of homelessness, but it does not help them address the root causes of the crisis. The primary root cause of homelessness in America is a lack of affordable housing, not laws that allow people to survive outside when they have nowhere else to go.
“Instead of passing the buck and placing blame on people living outside, politicians must fund housing and support, not tax cuts for billionaires and handcuffs for the poor,” reads a report from NHLC. “Homelessness will never be solved by making it illegal to live outside, because homelessness is not a legal issue.”
How You Can Push Back
Many communities have laws that criminalize activities homeless people need to do in public to survive, including:
- Sitting or lying down
- Loitering or loafing
- Eating or sharing food
- Asking for money or panhandling
- Sleeping in cars, outside, or camping
Not only is the cost of criminalizing homelessness high, but it does nothing to solve homelessness and violates human rights. Anti-homeless legislation leads to homeless people being arrested or fined, which makes it harder to find housing and jobs and access social services. Additionally, studies have found that sweeps are counterproductive and harmful to homeless people’s health.
Contact your legislators and demand they stop supporting legislation that criminalizes homelessness, like sweeps. Instead, they should support policies that invest in Housing First, a proven, successful approach to solving homelessness.