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Bratton: Police Have Less Power Dealing With Homeless Than They Did Under Giuliani

NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) -- In what some saw as a stunning admission Wednesday, police Commissioner Bill Bratton said getting the homeless off the streets is more difficult now than when Rudolph Giuliani was mayor.

As CBS2 Political Reporter Marcia Kramer reported, Bratton – who also served as commissioner under Giuliani – said court rulings now tie officers' hands.

The pictures of the homeless on the streets are often upsetting and even gut-wrenching. People are seen lying zoned out on benches, bathing with soap in the fountain at Columbus Circle, and begging for change.

Kramer asked Bratton on Wednesday what he would say to people who think the city should be doing more to help the homeless or get them off the street.

Bratton started by saying there is no denying that there are more homeless, and he even sees them in his neighborhood. He said the number of
street homeless has been probably been growing for 10 or 15 years, WCBS 880's Alex Silverman reported.

Bratton: Police Have Less Power Dealing With Homeless Than They Did Under Giuliani

"It's reached a tipping point," Bratton said. "However, I think, to use that term, that they did become more visible this summer."

But Kramer said it was a stunner that Bratton said it was far easier to get the homeless off the streets when he served under Giuliani.

"Laws have changed in the last 20 years; the tools we had to work with when I worked with Mayor Giuliani," Bratton said.

For an example, the commissioner said, there is now a constitutional right to beg, 1010 WINS' Al Jones reported.

"Begging -- if it is not intimidating; if it's not creating fear – there is really no legal way we can deal with that person unless they create fear," Bratton said.

Bratton: Police Have Less Power Dealing With Homeless Than They Did Under Giuliani

Bratton said when he worked for Giuliani, he could also invoke a law that guaranteed free foot passage. Under that law, a homeless person sitting or lying on the street, or on a subway grate, could be cited.

Such is no longer the case.

"The courts in this state have determined that we no longer have that right. If you, the citizen, walking down the street can walk around them, then they're not obstructing your free foot passage. The obligation on you is to walk around them," Bratton said. "It doesn't seem quite right, but that's the limitation our officers have."

Bratton did say his department has identified dozens of homeless encampments and is moving to clean them out.

"Ten locations have been physically cleaned of structures, debris and bedding," said NYPD Chief of Patrol Carlos Gomez.

Meanwhile, Mayor Bill de Blasio got downright testy when asked about whether his deputy mayor, Lilliam Barrios-Paoli, was pushed out. Barrios-Paoli oversaw de Blasio's homeless policy, and is now leaving to become volunteer chairwoman of the board of the Health and Hospitals Corporation.

"This was the decision she made and I respect it," de Blasio said.

When a reporter asked if it was a surprise to him, de Blasio said: "Again, I just said it very clearly – we've spoken over months, and she made a decision. I respect it."

And after months of saying the media was overblowing the homeless problem, the mayor said there is now both a perception and a reality problem.

Sources told CBS2 the mayor made a private visit to a homeless encampment Wednesday on 150th Street and St. Ann's Avenue in the Parkchester section of the Bronx.

He went there to observe condition, and police did not close the encampment, sources said.

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