LAFAYETTE, IN — Dea Felty’s short hair glows a vibrant pink in the golden-hour sun, against the brown brick of the Lafayette Transitional Housing Center. She arrived too late for dinner and is so hungry she’s using her tear-stained fingers to fish orange powder from a mac n’ cheese packet.
Her husband left her for a man they met in high school, she says. It’s the reason she’s homeless. She says she’s not sure where she’ll spend the night.
When asked about a new law that goes into effect July 1 that would criminalize sleeping in public spaces, her lower lip buckles. “Am I not allowed to be here?” she asks.
Tears spill from behind her sunglasses, as she then asks: “When did we stop being human?”
Under Senate Enrolled Act 285, a person who declines to move from public land after a warning and a 48-hour transition period will be charged with a Class C misdemeanor, punishable by up to 60 days in jail and a $500 fine.
The law’s passage makes Indiana the latest of roughly eight states to enact a statewide ban on public camping, part of a wave triggered by the 2024 Supreme Court ruling in City of Grants Pass v. Johnson, which held that cities may criminalize sleeping outdoors even without shelter beds available. The new Indiana law offers no additional support for services or housing.
For community members, the objection is both moral and practical: At the end of the day, when someone leaves jail with a black mark on their record and a $500 fine they can’t pay, it is more difficult to find a new bed for them.
Wes Tillett, executive director of Lafayette Urban Ministry, says 20 to 25 people have been on his organization’s waitlist every day since the group closed its winter warming station in April.
“Locally, here, we were all against it, and still are,” he says of the law. “Show me the data. I don’t think there’s any good evidence that this approach actually helps people who are experiencing homelessness in a humane and effective way.”
Tillett says he’s also seen an increase in older people with disabilities seeking help.
“If you’re on a fixed income, everything’s more expensive due to inflation,” he says. “You just can’t keep up, and that’s pushing more people into homelessness.”
‘It’s changed me a lot’
Jennifer Layton, CEO of LTHC, sees the same pattern: “I’ve got a lot of senior citizens in here. We’ve got some folks that get $1,000 a month as their income. They can’t afford $1,100 rent.”
Pam Wagle, who’s in her 60s, falls into this category. She says finding a job and a place to live, or at least to shower and change clothes, is hard to do.
“I’m homeless, I got a disability; my age: three outs right there, you know. And I stink, so that’s another one,” she says. “I’m tired. I’ve aged a lot. It’s changed me a lot.”
Pam lives a transient life, ducking in and out of bars and libraries. Her clothes, curling iron, and stacks of coloring books, cocooned in a fraying blue tarp, are Tetrised into a wheelchair — a souvenir from one of several hospital stays. Not all of them have been voluntary. If she stays in one place for too long, she’ll be sent to jail under the new law.
The bill divided Republicans in Indiana. Nine senators voted against it, including Spencer Deery of District 23. Sen. Ron Alting of District 22, by contrast, voted to pass it despite calling it a “band-aid” and saying in 2025 that “the solution to homelessness is not incarceration.” Neither senator responded to requests for more information.
Layton says she doesn’t think lawmakers are acting in bad faith, but her conversations with them have been frustrating. “Their data is showing a different set of circumstances than what I know to be true.”
Though written by Republican Cyndi Carrasco, the bill’s source is model legislation from the Cicero Institute, an Austin-based policy group. Founded by Joe Lonsdale, a Palantir co-founder who holds private prison investments through his venture capital firm 8VC, Cicero supports incarceration as a tool to combat homelessness. It has also pushed back on Housing First, an approach overwhelmingly accepted by both established research and the homelessness advocacy community as the most effective way to find permanent housing.
Prosperity Indiana, a statewide socio-economic coalition, estimates that enforcing the law will cost the state $1 million to $2 million annually in jail and court costs, while creating no new housing and leaving those penalized with a record that makes it harder to find work or housing.
‘It’s the only place I got, you know’
Some people opt to live off the beaten path.
Deep in the woods near the Wabash River in West Lafayette, tent camps both abandoned and occupied sprawl scattered with food wrappers, busted bike pumps and tattered clothing. A fresh pair of brown lace-ups, filled with recent rainwater, sit end to end as if someone has just taken them off at the front door. After July 1, people in camps like these will have the choice to leave or face arrest.
Roger, a homeless man from Attica, gestures expressively with a lit cigarette. “I live in one of (the tents). It’s the only place I got, you know.” He plans to keep moving after the law comes into effect.
For other people like Pam, the new law means anxiety. She gives a gummy, humorless smile: A fall from a shelter bed knocked out her front teeth. It’s one reason she’s avoided shelters for the past two years.
During the warmer months, she catches snatches of sleep on benches downtown. In the cold months, she hops from foyer to library to overnight bus for a few fitful hours of rest. She often falls asleep on her feet.
Trying to meet their most basic needs — food, sleep, shelter — unhoused people become increasingly soft targets for exploitation and violence, Layton says.
“I certainly see our housed community prey upon people that are very vulnerable,” she says. “I’m talking about the sex trade, the drug trade.” She points to the 2023 sting arrest of a Purdue professor for soliciting homeless women outside LTHC.
‘The last thing we want is to put them in jail’
Law enforcement and aid organization officials in Tippecanoe County responded to the bill with dismay. They have been fighting similar legislation for several years and overwhelmingly agree the law is ineffective.
Sheriff Robert Goldsmith testified against the bill at the Statehouse, arguing that his deputies are not social workers.
“If we get called, we’ll obviously respond, but we don’t have a team of people that can go out and look for (the homeless),” he said after the law passed. “The last thing we want is to put them in jail.”
Both he and Lafayette Police Department officials say they will “prioritize alternatives before enforcement action is considered.”
West Lafayette Police Chief Adam Ferguson says he doesn’t anticipate much procedural change as a result of the law, except for the new requirement that law enforcement officials send data on arrests made under the law to the Indiana State Police. He also notes that a person warned has to move at least 300 meters from where the warning was issued, which will likely be difficult to measure.
Homelessness in Indiana is climbing. Indiana’s 2025 Point-in-Time Count, a single-day census, found that the number of people sleeping outside without shelter rose 123.6% since 2019. Overall, officials say the count identified 4,860 homeless Hoosiers statewide, up 24.5% over the same period — roughly 1,200 of them unsheltered. More than 300 of those people frequent the area LTHC serves.
Layton says the state’s own decisions have made the shortage worse. In 2025, Indiana eliminated its only rental-assistance line item: the Housing First initiative, a $1 million program.
“It really needed to be 30 times that,” she says. “Apparently now we only care about those who are worthy. It’s made very clear in the new priorities that are coming down the pipeline — really, federally, they’re shifting. The programs we do here at LTHC right now are at risk of loss because of the new initiatives coming from the federal government.”
Jason, 32, says he is staying at LUM for now, with plans to find a job and a place of his own.
“I was always a stable kid,” he says. He says he grew up in Westfield and became homeless after his stepfather, drunk, threw him through a wall and threatened to kill him. Jason lost his job and ended up on the street.
He’d heard about SB 285 at the start of the year, before any of this happened to him, and disagreed with it even then. Now he’s weighing his options.
“In certain areas, it’s best not to tell people you’re homeless, or they’ll treat you like dog food,” he says. He doesn’t see how jail changes anything. “If they arrest somebody for being homeless, what are they going to do after that person gets out? Arrest them again?”
Contact Meagan Hipsky at mhipsky@proton.me.
This article originally appeared on Lafayette Journal & Courier: ‘When did we stop being human?’: New law criminalizes sleeping in public
Reporting by Meagan Hipsky, Lafayette Journal & Courier / Lafayette Journal & Courier
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By Meagan Hipsky, Lafayette Journal & Courier | USA TODAY Network
