Homeless - a new problem?

Discussion in 'General Discussion' started by DKR, Nov 27, 2017.


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  1. DKR

    DKR Raconteur of the first stripe

    Not really. Before there was Obama, there was Hoover and before that....

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    New York (of course) in the 1880s.

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    even earlier, but to be fair, these were not the 'chronic inebriates' of today.

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    Seattle shanty town, actually neat (tidy) for the times.

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    A messy 'Hooverville' very much like we see today...

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    Colorado Springs, CO

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    Finally, a Seattle camp seen by air.

    In the old days, local authorities would just set fire to the camp and turn the dogs loose. Today, many places spend millions to house the 'new homeless'.

    I post this as it seems the Press has once again 'discovered' a homeless problem. I don't know if the problem today is as bad as during the Depression, but I don't see that it is any better.

    These size camps (shown above in Seattle) dot (swarm) all over the US.

    Q.
    Is there a 'homeless problem' (large camps) in your AO?

    Q
    What, if anything, are the local pols doing to deal with it?

    I am curious if any place has had any success.....
     
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  2. ghrit

    ghrit Bad company Administrator Founding Member

    "Homeless" in this state is really confined to the cities, oddly enough, donkey strongholds. Few enough are actually concentrated in "camps" per se, but there is some doorway huddling. Out here in the sticks, the climate is incompatible in more ways than weather.
     
  3. HK_User

    HK_User A Productive Monkey is a Happy Monkey

    Limited homeless, more just passing through that need a warm dry place to sleep. No Hobo Camps. After all, tax payers would move them on down the road or offer a job. Problem solved.

    Just who's land are those camps on?
     
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  4. Seawolf1090

    Seawolf1090 Retired Curmudgeonly IT Monkey Founding Member

    No camps here, per se. But some homeless occasionally camp out in the wooded patch behind one of our malls. The cops go through periodically and move them out. Later some return.
     
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  5. chelloveck

    chelloveck Diabolus Causidicus

    There was also Reagan,


    Reading the OP, one might mistakenly be given the impression that homelessness was a peculiarly Democrat created issue.....whereas, regardless of whether Democrat or Republican administrations are in power, homelessness has been an enduring phenomenon in American history.

    upload_2017-11-28_10-8-12.

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    The Great Eliminator: How Ronald Reagan Made Homelessness Permanent - By - June 29, 2016 - SF Weekly

    Reagan on Homelessness: Many Choose to Live in the Streets

    Homelessness Swelled In the Reagan 80's

    [​IMG]

    In Sydney, as elsewhere, there is a homelessness problem. Yes, there are small encampments which get moved along by local authorities, but much of the homelessness is of the itinerant couch surfing kind. The most active times for homelessness street clearance is in the lead up, and during major public events in the international spotlight, such as the Sydney Olympic games, and during Commonwealth Games being held at major capital city venues.


    https://www.hb.edu/uploaded/Institute_for_21st_Century_Education/CCE/BlumerFurthPart1.pdf

    https://fas.org/sgp/crs/misc/RL34024.pdf

    And then, there is Trump....

    What will Trump mean for the USA's half a million homeless?

    Trump hasn't said much about homelessness—and that's making a lot of people nervous
     
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  6. HK_User

    HK_User A Productive Monkey is a Happy Monkey

    I first saw homeless or near homeless aka squatters in England. There they were known by what they consumed, that being public monies aka On the Dole.
     
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  7. BTPost

    BTPost Stumpy Old Fart,Deadman Walking, Snow Monkey Moderator

    We got one Homeless Girl, out here... Well not exactly Homeless, but has no other place to go, so she lives with her Uncle Tommy, a Vietnam Seal... She is slowly Drying Out, and weining off the Drugs, and getting her act together... If she wasn’t here, she would be in Town working for a NoGood Pimp, who kept her stoned, Drunk, and broke... Thank the Maker, for Uncle Tommy...
     
  8. Seepalaces

    Seepalaces Monkey+++

    I nearly always disagree with you Chel, but I really appreciate your input. I hope you don't start to feel marginalized.
    Homelessness is a very complicated topic and Reagan was spot on, a large number of people choose to be homeless. That is a serious over simplification, but it is true to some extent. According to world bank, if you make more than $38k per year and live in the US, you are in the one percent worldwide. The reason that matters is that in many liberal strongholds, you can easily pay $38k annually in rent alone. When we lived in San Francisco fifteen years ago, you couldn't rent a one bedroom apartment within an hour of the city for less than $2k a month. There are low wage workers (usually illegal aliens) who rent garages and live together with no facilities for a few hundred a month. To put this in perspective, we own a half acre within walking distance of downtown in somewhere else USA and paid less than 125k. My brother in law's family live on a tenth of an acre that is thirty miles from his work in a manufactured home in a large city in CA that cost them $450k. Obviously there is a giant housing shortage in the most dense areas of the US. Obviously no government entity could afford to fix it. People could choose to locate to an area they could afford, but they would be leaving family, and, more importantly, job opportunities. Part of the problem is that many of these areas refuse to allow further growth, so the housing costs go up because the population goes up. The only state I'm aware of that is currently touting a successful program for dealing with this is Utah. It doesn't surprise me because Utah has the highest level of income mobility in the country according to freakonomics. They have been highly successful at moving populations from quintile to quintile. Utah also has the luxury of having a lot of room to grow and limited eco regulation to deal with. The reason I'm really skeptical of their program is that they took it from a prototype in New York City. Homelessness in NYC reached levels of homelessness that haven't been seen in the US since the great depression. It started under Obama, and hasn't abated under Trump (yet?). In fairness, they have the same issues California is dealing with: limited space, high cost housing, and over restrictive eco regulation. Is anyone aware of a conservative area with a giant homeless issue?
     
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  9. Cruisin Sloth

    Cruisin Sloth Special & Slow

    Thank the Maker, for Uncle Tommy...!!!
    We need more Uncle Tommy's !! Hard Luv .

    In Arlington WA my Buddy's took me to see .
    WOW , and many are on drugs .
    Up here in the wet coast of BC , rural farm land with bears cats coons etc , they seem to be feeding the wildlife . So none around here .
    I see them with cardboard signs in the city's / towns ..I live in a village of 1900
    Sloth
     
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  10. oil pan 4

    oil pan 4 Monkey+++

    Seems dem cities have concentrated the undesirables to these camps.
    Only if these camps had a catchy name...
     
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  11. HK_User

    HK_User A Productive Monkey is a Happy Monkey

    It's "make work" for the Snow Flakes. Make a problem, then fix it then on to the next mistake, and so it goes.
     
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  12. arleigh

    arleigh Goophy monkey

    If you've never been home less may be you should try it some time ,for at least a year or two. Get a real feel of what it's like.
     
  13. chelloveck

    chelloveck Diabolus Causidicus

    I have been homeless, briefly, twice, for some months. Have lived in hostel accommodation for some months. Have slept rough, and have dumpster dived for food; and have at times eaten in charitable soup kitchens. I have never begged, nor panhandled. I once gave temporary, emergency accommodation to a transgender man who was sleeping rough, until he got on his feet, and made his way again under his own steam. I understand he presently lives in America somewhere.

    Homelessness is a complicated issue, and it isn't simply a matter of lazy folk only interested in getting free stuff (courtesy of hard working tax payers). Many folk in Australia and America are only 4 paychecks, or an abusive spouse away from the street, or who have parents who would kick their child out to the street because the child doesn't conform to the parent's religious ideals of sexuality or gender identity. The lived experience of homelessness, can be a real eye opener.
     
    Last edited: Nov 30, 2017
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  14. HK_User

    HK_User A Productive Monkey is a Happy Monkey

    In case I did not explain myself fully then it goes like this.
    Snow Flakes think they can solve all social ills with Tax Payers money.
    So they do "Make Work" of building camps.
    When they have completed their view of a job well done they move onto "correct" yet another item they consider in need of their minuscule brain's talents.
    But the last problem they think they solved still exist and is often worse or is longer lived for the true problem was not addressed.

    I speak from experience in my AO. Some years back a number of Socialist in my AO decided to make a "Free Clinic"/ Clothing Store/ Food Pantry and a Free Lunch Program. Very advanced for the 60s and the do gooders patted themselves on the back sides.

    The off spring of the original family groups that numbered around 25 at the beginning have now multiplied.

    Now most all of this group were as physically capable as others in the tri-county area.
    The difference was that the problem of needs was not in the original plan. That is to say the families had ZERO requirements imposed on them for the free lunches.

    The group now numbers in the area of 300 families, most see no reason to become trained for any job and certainly I can count on two hands those who have even tried to obtain a degree. Why work when you get a free Lunch?

    I may work with some type of homeless each day, we do not give away free lunches we do provide counseling and a feed back system about any support we provide. In short if some one comes for help we discuss the problem, make suggestions and assist as possible. If they refuse our help then we close the books on them. We do not limit ourselves in what we might do, we do refuse hand outs to those who do not want to be a working part of our community.

    A melting pot works, a diversified community as some see it today is a zero sum in the accounting book of life.

    We do know that you can help those who are willing to try, you can only help those willing to change and repair their mistakes and life styles.

    In short we do not build camps and then walk away.
     
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  15. chelloveck

    chelloveck Diabolus Causidicus

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  16. Cruisin Sloth

    Cruisin Sloth Special & Slow

    Thats one way I don't know , Worked cutting grass,, paper routes till today @68 .
    So The farms here hire Mexicans & Jamaicans BECAUSE they can't get canuks to work !!
    The Workers are housed in farm housing .
    OK something is real wrong .

    Sloth
     
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  17. fedorthedog

    fedorthedog Monkey+++

    Off the top of my head, when I worked in San Francisco the homeless were everywhere. We had a resource sheet that we once added up the time in programs and figured a homeless person could spend 270 days in door before they ran out of services. I happened to work a walking beat in a bus station had a lot of homeless. When we talked to them at least 50 present chose to live that way by refusing to conform with the rules of shelters or programs. Most who wanted help could get it and try to recover, The remainder were mentally ill, most by their own hand from drugs or alcohol, a few by no cause of their own.

    I cleared camps of 50 people from under freeway overpasses and elevated roadways. They have always hidden in plain sight around cities.

    This problem will never be solved without first going back to a commitment system for the mentally ill and providing a safe regulated place for those who cannot control their medications, to live, with supervision.

    The ones who refuse to comply and want to live that way need to be cut off from all support.

    The remainder need to be helped up, but frankly there are not that many who will actually try to help themselves.
     
  18. ghrit

    ghrit Bad company Administrator Founding Member

    Therein lays the rub. Whatever put them on the streets in the first place has taken their minds and wills away from them. If/when they hit a bottom, they may find a will and a way to get back up. If they don't, potter's field is about it.
     
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  19. Ganado

    Ganado Monkey+++

    @fedorthedog hit the nail on the head with his assessment. And we have people who, for whatever reason, can't or don't want to conform to the 'rules of society' and they cant be mountain men anymore so the only outlet is homeless. The problem is that when there is overcrowding 'the rule following ppl' aka you and me dont like the smell and the mess the homeless make.
     
  20. Motomom34

    Motomom34 Monkey+++

    Denver has a homeless issue but due to the city trying to up-grade, city officials have decided to clean out the homeless spots. There was a park near the Denver Rescue mission; progress happened and high class condos were built so the homeless were dislocated. The city keeps pushing them further out which becomes a suburbia issue. Some community paths are dangerous because the homeless follow bike/walking paths from Denver to outlying areas. The city is currently being sued for stealing blankets and the possessions of the homeless.

    People blame the homeless issue in CO on our pot laws which is BS. @Seepalaces was correct when she mentioned the issue with cost of housing. Someone working a minimum wage job cannot afford to pay $1200 in rent monthly. I think that is why so many people live in their cars.
     
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