Orange County can now arrest and fine unhoused individuals immediately for camping along flood control channels, in county parks or on other county-owned land. The new policy was approved by the O.C. Board of Supervisors on Tuesday by a 4-1 vote, despite concerns Santa Ana could be forced to contend with an increase in unhoused people booked and released from the county’s main jail.

It marks a shift in addressing homelessness that has been echoed in cities and counties across California and the West since a major Supreme Court ruling last year. That ruling, Grants Pass v. Johnson , reversed a ban on criminalizing people for sleeping in public places if no adequate shelter bed was available.

Orange County’s new policy also reverses some parts of a 2019 legal settlement, which has

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