SACRAMENTO, Calif. — Sacramento County District Attorney Thien Ho sent a letter by email to Sacramento District 4 representative and councilmember Katie Valenzuela Friday requesting her to enforce city code and ordinance violations "consistently."
This comes just a day after a judge at the Sacramento County courthouse wrote a letter calling for more police presence around their facilities due to the homeless issue.
The letter goes on to detail some of the situations the DA's office has documented over the past year — a total of 86, according to Ho.
The instances range from allegations of assault and racial discrimination to arson, property damage and drug use.
"Unfortunately, significant public safety concerns are affecting the public, District Attorney employees, jurors called to fulfill their civic duty, defendants appearing on their cases, and victims of crime seeking justice," said Ho in the letter. "People are entitled to the fundamental right of fair and equal access to justice. But to obtain justice, members of our community require unfettered access to the Courthouse and the District Attorney's Office without threats to their safety or well-being."
Valenzuela responded to the letter saying this was the first and only time she had been asked for help dealing with public safety concerns around the DA's office building and the County Courthouse.
"[Sending this letter] is out of step with the inherent nature of collaboration outlined in the mutually agreed upon 'Homeless Services Partnership Agreement' adopted by the city and the county at the end of last year," said Valenzuela in the letter.
She goes on to detail how the homeless issue is not just something for the city to fix, but rather is a problem to be solved by working as partners.
Sacramento Mayor Darrell Steinberg responded to the sitting judge Michael G. Bowman's letter about the same topic Thursday by saying the following:
"The City of Sacramento is adding more safe camping spaces at Miller Park in July and continuing to push for more. We must be able to bring people from the sidewalk into safer spaces to connect them with the services they need while providing the relief that our streets and neighborhoods deserve. Downtown and around the Court will be first in line for these new spaces and for cleaning up in the next several weeks."
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