Wealthy NJ city rethinks law that could jail homeless people, after public outcry

City councilmembers in Summit, New Jersey, may be backing down from a controversial proposal to ban homeless encampments in public spaces, which critics say would have allowed police to jail homeless people.

The council in Summit, one of New Jersey’s wealthiest communities, last month introduced an ordinance stating that anyone sleeping or camping on public land could be jailed for up to 90 days and fined $2,000. The proposal set off a firestorm in the community. Many residents voiced concerns at a crowded city council hearing in late April, arguing the measure criminalizes homelessness. Some warned Summit lawmakers that the ordinance violated the state constitution.

Summit’s council is scheduled to vote on the proposal at a meeting Tuesday night. But following the backlash, lawmakers will also be introducing an amended ordinance that will “prevent any penalization of involuntary homelessness,” according to a summary published by the council. The revised ordinance also states that anyone who has no access to “available indoor housing” cannot be subject to prosecution under the new law.

Residents will have an opportunity to speak on the matter at Tuesday’s meeting. Public testimony on the camping ban at a council hearing last month went on for nearly four hours, and the hearing stretched into the early morning of the following day.

Attorney Jeff Wild, a founder of the nonprofit New Jersey Coalition to End Homelessness, told Gothamist he had been in active discussions with elected officials in Summit on how to revise the proposal since he offered to advise them at last month’s hearing. He said the original ordinance would have violated a person’s right to pursue and obtain safety as outlined in the New Jersey Constitution. The city council delayed its vote in April so it could seek legal counsel on the measure.

“There's no legal basis for giving an unhoused person a summons, fining them, putting them in jail when their only ‘crime’ is that they can't afford to live indoors,” Wild said in an interview.

Summit is one of at least four New Jersey municipalities that have either enacted or considered public camping bans this year. The changes to local laws come in the wake of the 2024 U.S. Supreme Court decision upholding a similar law in Grants Pass, Oregon, banning homeless people from using blankets, pillows and cardboard boxes for shelter and protection.

Summit’s proposed ban is unique compared to the other New Jersey towns in that the city recently received national recognition for its efforts to find housing for those in the community who need it. In 2024, Mayor Elizabeth Fagan established a homelessness task force of nonprofits from the community, first responders and elected officials who all coordinate to get people rehoused or into a rehabilitation program.

Rich Uniacke, president of Bridges Outreach, a homelessness service provider working with the task force, said the efforts have lowered the number of unhoused living on the streets in Summit to the single digits.

“We started with 35 names,” he said. “Over the past year, we’ve reduced it to five or six.”

Some residents accused councilmembers of turning their backs on the task force’s approach by supporting the ordinance at a time when service providers were working on the final, hardest-to-reach cases.

“ We've got resources in this town. We've got a lot of smart people. Let's fix that last mile,” said Jesse Reyes, a Summit resident who pleaded with lawmakers to vote down the proposal at last month’s hearing.

But Republican Summit Councilmember Jamel Boyer, who introduced the ordinance, said it was needed to keep Summit’s homeless population from increasing in the future.

“ It will continue," he told Gothamist. "So it's not just about the five. It's about the next five, or the next five after that."

Boyer proposed the measure a few weeks after he said his 11-year-old daughter was among a group of children who were allegedly accosted by a homeless man with a knife on Springfield Avenue in downtown Summit.