Epidemic of Homelessness in California

My hero?

 

certainly not mine

 

I live in LA. On top of having the highest taxes, 2 measures were recently passed to fund programs to help the homeless. We have many privately funded shelters. The problem is that the shelters don't allow drugs or alcohol, so many homeless prefer to live in tent encampments. They found 14000+ hypodermic needles cleaning up an encampment in OC.

When it comes down to it, neither the right nor the left knows what to do about the problem.

 

We're in danger of creating a permanent culture of poverty as inescapable as any chain or bond; a second and separate America, an America of lost dreams and stunted lives. The irony is that misguided welfare programs instituted in the name of compassion have actually helped turn a shrinking problem into a national tragedy. From the 1950's on, poverty in America was declining. American society, an opportunity society, was doing its wonders. Economic growth was providing a ladder for millions to climb up out of poverty and into prosperity. In 1964 the famous War on Poverty was declared and a funny thing happened. Poverty, as measured by dependency, stopped shrinking and then actually began to grow worse. I guess you could say, poverty won the war. Poverty won in part because instead of helping the poor, government programs ruptured the bonds holding poor families together...-> http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=36875

 

Or for shooting up in homeless encampments, apparently, based on all the used discarded needles (I wonder where this drug money comes from?). Or for public urination and deification. Or for the trash, garbage and general litter strewn all over homeless campsites.
Or for theft of shopping carts.

No, there is no crime in being poor. Or in turning large swathes of public land into filthy, disease riddled refuges for mentally ill, drug addicted
squatters.

 

So he must be mine, right?

 

So your solution would be putting the homeless in prison? Get too poor and try to survive, off to prison with you!

 

Sure. If you call shelters "prisons", which I guess you do. Or are you a fan of
discarded needles and poo for the kiddies to play with?

 

There are already shelters in California. They have limits on their use that push homeless into the streets.

Also the homeless can choose not to use them.

How would you force homeless to use them?

 

Well thanks to the lefties & the ACLU prisoners today get shelter, 3 meals a day, exercise, entertainment, & and education. What's not to like about prison?

 

Freedom must be so worthless to the Rightwing that you all do not consider its loss to be bad.

 

I would use public health and nuisance laws to clean up homeless clusters on sidewalks and in parks and force drug addicts and alcoholics into treatment. The mentally ill could hopefully be treated and vacant city land
could be used as homeless designated and monitored areas.

The idea that we simply have no choice but to suffer through filthy, disease ridden homeless gatherings is a lie.

 

And if they try to leave those areas? Arrested and forced back in? How is that different from a prison?

I assume you support the tax increases that would be necessary to build these shelters and pay for drug/mental health treatment programs, yes?

 

You can't "camp out" on the sidewalks and in parks. And you cannot decide to leave a prison. You can decide to leave a homeless shelter if you have some living arrangement that doesn't violate public laws however.

See how simple that is? Most cities have access to large vacant lots or buildings and public health funds and grants can always be obtained
to rehabilitate junkies and destructive drunks.

 

So why don’t those “grants” pay for all of the slots necessary to do rehab for all the current junkies that exist? You say they are easily acquired.

 

Wut? Can you rephrase that in a form of a sentence that makes sense.

 

You ask what’s not to like about prison. It says a lot about the Rightwing that a loss of freedom is something that one should like.

 

Reagan had to kill Carter's upward inflation spiral in 1981 and 1982. Interest rates were 20%. Once he had that under control, real economic growth occurred from 1983 to 1992.

 

The homeless are everywhere, but in very small numbers. The exception is California, where they are on every street.

 

you obviously havent been to ca. i even lived in huntington beach for a year, as well did work out there for 2 decades.

 

Don't blame Trump, because the homeless existed before he came in office.

But years of plunder and pillage by Wall Street, with financial and housing frauds and bubbles every 10 years or so are at least partly responsible for this.

Poor financial and domestic policy by the federal government for many long years.

 

I've been to SF and LA. My mother-in-law lived in Huntington Beach.

 

Because lack of money isn't the issue. They live in America, not Bangladesh.

 

Because ... as noted above, money ain't the problem.

 

No, they are living on the street due to terrible parents.