Document ID: ./input/supremecourt_opinions/opinions/23pdf/23-175_19m2.pdf
Page Number: 12

Cite as:  603 U. S. ____ (2024) 

7 

Opinion of the Court 

Cities are not alone in pursuing this approach.  The fed-
eral government also restricts “the storage of . . . sleeping 
bags,” as well as other “sleeping activities,” on park lands.
36  CFR  §§7.96(i),  (j)(1)  (2023).  And  it,  too,  has  exercised 
that authority to clear certain “dangerous” encampments. 
National Park Service, Record of Determination for Clear-
ing  the  Unsheltered  Encampment  at  McPherson  Square
and  Temporary  Park  Closure  for  Rehabilitation  (Feb.  13, 
2023).

Different  governments  may  use  these  laws  in  different
ways and to varying degrees.  See Cities Brief 11.  But many
broadly  agree  that  “policymakers  need  access  to  the  full 
panoply of tools in the policy toolbox” to “tackle the compli-
cated issues of housing and homelessness.”  California Gov-
ernor Brief 16; accord, Cities Brief 11; Oregon Cities Brief 
17. 

B 
Five years ago, the U. S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth
Circuit  took  one  of  those  tools  off  the  table.    In Martin  v. 
Boise, 920 F. 3d 584 (2019), that court considered a public-
camping ordinance in Boise, Idaho, that made it a misde-
meanor to use “streets, sidewalks, parks, or public places”
for “camping.”  Id., at 603 (internal quotation marks omit-
ted).   According  to  the  Ninth  Circuit,  the  Eighth  Amend-
ment’s  Cruel  and  Unusual  Punishments  Clause  barred 
Boise from enforcing its public-camping ordinance against 
homeless  individuals  who  lacked  “access  to  alternative 
shelter.”  Id., at 615.  That “access” was lacking, the court
said, whenever “ ‘there is a greater number of homeless in-
dividuals  in  a  jurisdiction  than  the  number  of  available 
beds in shelters.’ ”  Id., at 617 (alterations omitted).  Accord-
ing  to  the  Ninth  Circuit,  nearly  three  quarters  of  Boise’s 
shelter  beds  were  not  “practically  available”  because  the 
city’s charitable shelters had a “religious atmosphere.”  Id., 
at  609–610,  618.  Boise  was  thus  enjoined  from  enforcing