Character count: 130
Word count: 22
Bianca Venkman, Assistant to the Delegate-Ambassador: Making the criminalisation of homeless people part of your strategy to eliminate homelessness is counterproductive and runs against our fundamental principles of... something.Word count: 22
OOC:
- Austin, TX, recently enacted Proposition B - which "create[d] a criminal offense and a penalty for sitting or lying down on a public sidewalk or sleeping outdoors in and near the Downtown area and the area around the University of Texas campus; create[d] a criminal offense and penalty for solicitation, defined as requesting money or another thing of value, at specific hours and locations or for solicitation in a public area that is deemed aggressive in manner; [and] create[d] a criminal offense and penalty for camping in any public area not designated by the Parks and Recreation Department" - over the opposition of its Democratic mayor, Steve Adler, with 57.1% support on a 19.8% turnout. (Draft 1 as written, however, predates Prop B.)
- In 2014, the Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination and the Human Rights Committee both issued exceedingly similar recommendations to the United States recommending that it decriminalise homelessness and withdraw federal funding from local governments that did so.
- In England, Wales and Northern Ireland, Section 3 of the Vagrancy Act 1824 - as extremely copiously amended but never repealed - continues to insist that "every person... placing himself or herself in any public place, street, highway, court, or passage, to beg or gather alms, or causing or procuring or encouraging any child or children so to do; shall be deemed an idle and disorderly person within the true intent and meaning of this Act; and, subject to section 70 of the Criminal Justice Act 1982," may be imprisoned for up to for one month... although that particular section of the CJA forbids imprisonment for doing so (but not fining).
- This is exactly one character shorter than Debtor Voting Rights.
Decriminalisation of homelessness
A resolution to improve worldwidehumansapient and civil rights.Category: Civil RightsStrength: MildProposed by: Tinhampton
No member state may arrest or punish any person simply for lying, sitting, begging, or otherwise being encamped in a public place.