Written by Wiliam Goodwin
Dear Governor Beshear,
Kentucky’s homelessness crisis is in dire need of fixing, but our laws are moving in the wrong direction. Instead of directly addressing the causes of homelessness, recent policies have made it easier to punish people for being homeless, rather than helping them. The Supreme Court’s 2024 decision in Grants Pass v. Johnson allowed cities and states to fine or jail people for sleeping outside, even when they have nowhere else to go. Kentucky has already followed the lead, and the results are alarming.
Legal scholar Hannah Kieschnick (2018) argues that anti‑homeless ordinances directly violates the Eighth Amendment’s ban on cruel and unusual punishment. These laws criminalize unavoidable activities like resting or camping in public that homeless people must perform simply to survive. Kieschnick explains these laws are unconstitutional and morally wrong. Her argument makes it imperative that homelessness should be treated as a social condition, not a crime.
But Kentucky’s new Safer Kentucky Act does exactly what Kieschnick warned against. As Casey Parker‑Bell (2025) reports in the Kentucky Law Journal, the law bans “unlawful camping” and has already led to dozens of citations, including one issued to a woman in labor. Meanwhile, homelessness in Kentucky rose 9 percent statewide and 26 percent in Lexington last year. This evidence shows that criminalization doesn’t solve homelessness it only hides it from the public. People are being fined and displaced while affordable housing remains out of reach for the homeless.
In fact, in a personal interview with Ericka Huff, a homeless coordinator working under the McKinney-Vento Act for the river city area for Bellevue, Dayton, and Southgate, she was strongly opposed to the Safer Kentucky Act. With over six years of hands-on experience working with homeless individuals, Huff repeatedly described the Act as a negate influence on homelessness. Her insight makes it clear that the law should be revised to better address the struggles of homeless individuals.
The Grants Pass ruling may have made punishment legal, but it did not make it right. Kentucky should lead with compassion and support, not enforcement. Criminalizing homelessness wastes resources, burdens courts, and hurts the population. Real solutions require investment in housing, treatment, and long‑term support, not citations and jail time.
Some solutions that your administration could act on are reconsidering enforcement of the Safer Kentucky Act and suspending penalties for “unlawful camping”, since you’re essentially punishing homeless people from unavoidable survival behaviors. You could also redirect funding towards affordable housing and outreach programs that connect people to helpful resources.
The Grants Pass verdict gave cities permission to punish; Kentucky can choose to help instead. By reforming these laws, we can uphold constitutional principles, restore humility, and focus on housing and support. There’s absolutely no reason why we should criminalize homeless people, we should instead become better individuals by supporting our fellow citizens.
Sincerely,
Wiliam Goodwin
5/4/2026
Works Cited:
Kieschnick, Hannah. “A Cruel and Unusual Way to Regulate the Homeless: Extending the Status Crimes Doctrine to Anti-Homeless Ordinances.” Stanford Law Review, vol. 70, no. 5, May 2018, pp. 1569–621. EBSCOhost, https://libproxy.kctcs.edu/Gateway?url=https://research.ebsco.com/linkprocessor/plink?id=957a26b5-dbe9-3f41-b362-4a535acb02fa
Parker-Bell, Casey “Homelessness in Kentucky After Grants Pass.” Kentucky Law Journal, Vol. 113, March 2025. https://www.kentuckylawjournal.org/blog/homelessness-in-kentucky-after-grants-pass
Huff, Ericka. Personal interview. 1 April 2026