Judge dismisses ACLU homeless encampment lawsuit against Minneapolis Park Board, city and Hennepin County

A group of formerly homeless people who had their belongings seized from encampments cleared in Minneapolis in 2020 do not have standing to sue for damages, a federal judge ruled.

U.S. District Court Judge Eric Tostrud dismissed a four-year lawsuit, rejecting all claims against the Minneapolis Park Board, city and Hennepin County this week.

After denying class certification for people who had lived in various park encampments in 2020, Tostrud decided that half a dozen formerly homeless clients of the American Civil Liberties Union lacked standing because they have gotten housing in the years since they were ejected from the parks, and in some cases had not produced sufficient evidence that their belongings were destroyed during camp closures.

“Plaintiffs argue they have standing despite not currently being unhoused because they are at danger of becoming homeless again,” Tostrud wrote. “But an allegation that Plaintiffs may one day again be homeless and may decide to live in an encampment in Minneapolis, that one or more Defendants may decide to disband that encampment and may accomplish that encampment closure without sufficient notice to residents, and that Plaintiffs might then lose property in the closure is just the sort of ‘conjectural or hypothetical’ threat of future injury that is ‘insufficient to confer standing.’”

City of Minneapolis spokesperson Jess Olstad said the decision shows the city has been working in good faith ”with government partners and service providers to support residents experiencing unsheltered homelessness ... We remain committed to expanding access to services and shelter in the most dignified, humane ways possible.”

ACLU Minnesota Legal Director Teresa Nelson said she and her clients are analyzing the decision and assessing whether or not to pursue an appeal.

“We are deeply disappointed by the court’s decision,” she said in a statement. “Our clients were the victims of horrific encampment sweeps, which took almost everything several of them owned. These sweeps upended their lives and put them in even more precarious situations.”

In March 2020, Gov. Tim Walz issued COVID-19 executive orders prohibiting the disbandment of encampments unless they threatened public safety. The Park Board then passed a resolution offering refuge to anyone experiencing homelessness, and hundreds of people moved into city parks. As encampments ballooned, the board quickly restricted them to certain parks and capped the number of people allowed to reside in each. Still, park officials could not control numerous late-night disturbances, fights, sexual assaults and shootings, Superintendent Al Bangoura wrote in court filings. Park police were ordered to forcibly clear encampments, which were officially banned from Minneapolis parks in 2021. The Park Board’s Community Connections and Violence Prevention department now responds to reports of tents on park property and refers occupants to service providers.

The formerly homeless plaintiffs of the ACLU lawsuit detailed how they wound up in parks after struggling with addiction, domestic abuse and full emergency shelters during the pandemic. They described being ordered out of their tents without notice and losing important identification documents, irreplaceable family mementos and survival gear in the scramble.

After encampments were pushed out of parks, they continued to proliferate across the city.

Former federal Judge Wilhelmina Wright presided over the case originally and gave hope to advocates of the unsheltered homeless population in 2022, when she allowed the lawsuit to survive defendants’ motions to dismiss. At the time, Wright reasoned that while government agencies had authority to disband encampments to maintain general safety, there was a difference between destroying personal property and confiscating it with the possibility of retrieval, such as when the government impounds an illegally parked car.

After Wright retired earlier this year, Tostrud took over the case. The judge had previously rejected attempts by residents of the roving Nenookaasi encampment to enjoin the city of Minneapolis from repeatedly sweeping them.

“The MPRB has consistently acknowledged that parks do not provide dignified shelter,” parks spokesperson Dawn Sommers said in a statement Wednesday. “Living outdoors in encampments poses significant safety risks to unsheltered people, park users and residents living near parks. The MPRB has always placed public safety as its top priority.”