`Camping' ban makes it a crime to be human - Austin AmericanStatesman (TX) - January 25, 1996 - page A11
January 25, 1996   Austin American-Statesman (TX)   Lars Eighner   Page A11

Austin's new law against camping in public places is in effect, and today, if all goes as announced,
enforcement ofthe law will begin. Although this is called a ``camping'' ban, it prohibits sleeping or
preparing to sleep in public places as well as setting up lean-tos or tents.
T respassing on private property already is a crime. Every place is either public property or private
property, and a law higher than that of city ordinances requires human beings to sleep. So in effect,
the new law isa law against being homeless. As virtually everyone who is homeless would rather
have a home, the law is against people's existences. T he homeless become criminals by being
alive.
In the '90s, a war on poverty is a war against the poor.
Nothing is new in the attempt to outlaw poverty. Many societies have tried it. Central T exas owes
most of its German population to the attempts of German princes to eradicate poverty by exiling
the poor. T his, and other experiments in transporting the poor, showed that the poor's only fault
was lack of opportunity, but the world has run out of places to send the poor. Now, in the view of
the City Council, the place to send the poor is jail.
Hardly any measure in Western law has been so harsh. Yes, England had its debtors' prisons, but
one had to do something, namely fail to pay a contracted debt, to be committed to debtors'
prison. T he Austin ordinance seems like the premise of a science fiction movie: Don't sleep, or go
to jail. How long can a person live without sleep? How long can a person stay awake? T his is a law
with which people cannot comply, no matter how much they may try.
Yet, the City Council must want homeless people, since so many of their actions create more
homeless people. Every big tax break and subsidy given to big corporations to entice them to
move to Austin must be paid for by someone, and the tenants of Austin pay the increased taxes.
When rents go up, those who have barely managed to pay rent are forced onto the streets.already
here -- and a person with a minimum-wage job already is priced out ofthe Austin housing market.
T he better-paying jobs are filled from out of town; the out-of-towners move here, bid Austinites
out of the housing market, and more Austinites become homeless. Growing the Austin economy,
as the City Council does it, requires that some of our citizens be sacrificed to homelessness. What
is hard to understand is why those who have been sacrificed for the sake of the economy are
hated so much that it must now be made a crime for them to sleep.
Callousness, though hardly admirable, is understandable. But this new law is beyond callous. It is
smug, kick-'em-while-they're-down sadism, and now it is not only policy but also the law in the City
of Austin.

 Is it madness or method? No doubt, baiting homeless people serves to distract those who are hurt
by the council's policies but remain housed, but it raises the question: Who or what will be next as
the misery index in Austin rises? T he more IBMs or Motorolas or Sematechs or Samsungs or 3Ms
lured to Austin with its inadequate housing base, the more homeless there will be. How much jail
space does the City Council think it has? When the city runs out of jail space, can concentration
camps be long incoming? Indeed, official camps for the homeless are being proposed.
T he 20th century is replete with examples of societies that have gone down this road of making
people criminals, not for anything they do, but for what they are. T he City of Austin has taken a
step down that road. We know when a society goes far enough down that road, it cannot find the
resolve within itself to turn back. Now, the City of Austin still can turn back. Will it turn back? Or will it
take the next step?
Lars Eighner's memoir of homelessness in Austin is ``T ravels with Lizbeth.'' His first novel is
``Pawn to Queen Four.''
Copyrig ht (c) 1996 Austin American-Statesman