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Homeless, living in a tent and employed: The changing face of homelessness

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Re: Homeless, living in a tent and employed: The changing face of homelessness

#231

Post by karles »

wybiral wrote: post #178
sodiumjoe wrote: post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Portlander here, I used to work right by the food carts downtown on 10th and Alder. The hospital bracelet guy is one of regulars, he's been running that schtick for literally years. There's a cast off characters like him who are fixtures there. I'm not against compassion for the homeless, but after running into a few of these repeatedly, I tend to refrain from supporting them directly and give to local charities inst…

Here in Austin, Texas I encounter homeless people regularly and have become a bit numb to the stories after talking to people more and seeing their stories change. I've bought food and even pumped gas into portable gas cans for people, refusing to give them any cash, only to see their story unravel when they realize they won't get money from me. The original story about needing gas to pick up their paycheck morphs in…

I don't think giving them money should be about "getting people back on track" or anything similar. It's just to give them money for a beer, a burger or something to ease their day. Personally, I think there will always be people who doesn't fit into society. It's easier if we don't expect them to open a savings account with the 20 bucks we gave them, and just realize that it goes towards getting drunk/getting something to eat to numb the absolute mess their lives might be.

Re: Homeless, living in a tent and employed: The changing face of homelessness

#232

Post by xtracto »

justboxing wrote: post #87
berberous wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On the last bit, that was all over the news for a while. CA and NV had a big fight over it: http://www.sfexaminer.com/sf-reaches-400k-settlement-proposa...

Correct. This was literally nuts. Nevada bused in and dumped over 50 mentally ill patients onto the streets of San Francisco, and the consequence was that you couldn't walk in downtown San Francisco without encountering 1 of these patients acting crazy on the streets. It's somewhat lame that the City settled for a measly compensation of 400K. They should've all been rounded up and send back to Nevada, to the hospital…

Ohhh so that's why SF downtown is unbearable! As an international tourist there I hated my stay in San Francisco because of the amount of crazy people in the street.

I am ok with homeless and poor people, but having to dodge a crazy guy almost doubling my size throwing punches in the air is not a pleasant tourist experience. Or being robbed of my water bottle while I waited my wife just outside Sephora.

It was scary for me, and definitely left me with no desire to go back.

Re: Homeless, living in a tent and employed: The changing face of homelessness

#233

Post by imtringued »

throwaway2048 wrote: post #165
yonran wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Yet in capitalist America...? Restrictive zoning is the prohibition of creating housing capital, so it’s ironic and incorrect to blame capitalism for the housing shortages in restrictive metros such as the Bay Area. Landlordism or rentierism might be better words for the capital repression.

Its still an economic system in place, whatever you wish to call it that causes these issues.

If this was caused by the economic system you would see it in every city not just the wealthiest.

Re: Homeless, living in a tent and employed: The changing face of homelessness

#234

Post by imtringued »

debatem1 wrote: post #34
twblalock wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The people refusing shelter are refusing to throw away all of their remaining possessions for the promise of a few nights inside and then getting kicked out. That's true for some. But there are many who would not accept a guaranteed permanent shelter bed because they prefer the freedom of living on their own. If you won't accept the reality of that, you'll never solve the problem.

The solution is likely the same here as it is elsewhere: not a permanent shelter bed where you are stripped of dignity and any facsimile of a normal life, but real homes and real independent lives surrounded by real people and the social connections that make permanent escape from poverty possible. And all of it, ideally, before destitution rather than after. But that's expensive, so we will continue to see handwring…

Those shelters are only useful for sleeping (that's the only thing they were optimized for). The people that go there still don't have a place to call home. During the day the homeless go outside and will cause all the same issues that come with regular homelessness.

Re: Homeless, living in a tent and employed: The changing face of homelessness

#235

Post by grogenaut »

trashcan wrote: post #180
m_ke wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you honestly believe that throwing mentally ill and addicted people in jail is the right solution to this problem?

I do believe that when someone is slowly dying of addiction on the streets, that it might be more compassionate to help them cure that addiction, even if it is against their will (not like you normally get to decide you don't want to go to jail when you've comitted a crime anyway). I know it's not a one size fits all solution by any means, and has the potential for tons of liberty infringing issues, but it sounds bet…

The goal of Safe injection sites are specifically aimed at getting people care while letting them deal with their addictions, under monitoring. Whether they'll work here in the us or if we'll let them is a different question. They worked where the idea came from.

That's what gp didn't like. What do you think since you seem to want a better option. Is that better than jail as a default?

It's supposed to do what you want without prison.

Re: Homeless, living in a tent and employed: The changing face of homelessness

#236

Post by grogenaut »

Fellshard wrote: post #71
grogenaut wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Care to elaborate and point to specific policies? Are you referring to safe injection sites or something else?

That's the primary example, yes. This in addition to curbing police enforcement of actual drug use and possession, from what I've heard in reporting and from officers themselves. One anecdote I've heard through my brother, who has been in law enforcement and monitors things in our old home region. He told me an officer he knew left the force because those types of restrictions were becoming untenable to deal with. Se…

Actual drug use is a loaded term now that weed is legal in wa. Care to ellaborate?

Re: Homeless, living in a tent and employed: The changing face of homelessness

#237

Post by dabockster »

sakopov wrote: post #40
cronix wrote: post #7

KOMO TV in Seattle recently (last Sunday) did a big report on this called "Seattle is Dying." Down south in Portland, it's the same thing. Down in San Francisco...same thing. Down further, same thing. This is spreading quite quickly, all over in the big cities. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b53uiRFq4Ds

Watched this last night. I live in Midwest and used to visit Seattle 2 or 3 times a year. Haven't been there in 6 years. I do remember seeing a lot of homeless people in the city, but I don't remember running into homeless camps, especially the middle of the city. So when I saw this in the documentary I was totally surprised it's become this bad. What in the world is happening there...

Made me dust off my HN account for this.

I’m a fourth generation resident of Tacoma, WA just south of Seattle, so I might be able to shed some light on what’s been happening. Please pardon spelling errors, I’m typing this on my phone.

Washignton state is very passive aggressive as a whole. You see it in the politics as well as the people themselves. In this case, Seattle does want to help the homeless but doesn’t want to make the effort to build a proper facility. We’re quick to jump in social issues like gay marriage, but will absolutely balk at anything that requires more money, time, or effort. So Seattle, in the most passive way possible, stops enforcing public camping laws.

There are other significant components to it as well. In the case of the Seattle Police, they just got shaken down by the Dept of Justice for corruption and racial profiling as well as by the WA State Supreme Court (the death penalty ban cites a Seattle prosecutor being openly racist on the record in King County Court). My guess is that the police is being super careful right now to avoid another legal confrontation, so a lot of grey area stuff (like homelessness - illegal to camp but they gotta sleep soemwhere) doesn’t get enforced. The freeway camps get even trickier since they’re on Department of Transportation land, which only the State Patrol has legal jurisdiction on under current law (city laws don’t affect highway land).

Re: Homeless, living in a tent and employed: The changing face of homelessness

#238

Post by crumpets »

gscott wrote: post #195
lotsofpulp wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would society want to reward people who go to great lengths to defraud others?

Someone needs to tell the homeless guy that with the right doctored up resume he'd be perfect for a Fortune 500 CEO position. The skills are the same.

I don’t think you understand what the role of a CEO of a company is. Despite your flippant implication, being an incredible liar isn’t even close to qualifying you for CEO of an F500.

Re: Homeless, living in a tent and employed: The changing face of homelessness

#239

Post by DegreeChamp »

f34 wrote: post #176
throwaway713 wrote: post #116

A little bit unrelated, but does anyone else get severe anxiety reading articles like this? I’m currently employed in a well-paying tech job, but it always seems like I’m just one giant disaster away from this kind of thing. Granted, I have a family “safety net” to fall back on in a worst case scenario, which I realize a lot of people don’t have, but it’s always in the back of my mind that the economy could crash, th…

I was wiped out back in 2017. I was a web developer living in Dallas and making 90K a year. My manager and I didn't get along and I eventually ended up on a PIP. After 30 days I realized I wasn't going to meet the PIP goals and resigned before being fired. I wasn't worried, I had about 50K in cash and 20K in credit, and I surly could find a job before it ran out. I was wrong. I got very few interviews and when I did,…

Just wanted to give 4 quick suggestions to help you get a job:

1) Add your email in your HN profile in the “about” section. I’m certain there’s a lot of people who really resonated with your story and potentially interested in hiring you, but have zero ways of contacting you. You have to do everything you can to increase your “luck quotient”.

2) Post in “Ask HN: Who wants to be hired” when it comes up again. Mention either remote or local depending on what you’re looking for. Be very honest with your story and what you’re looking for.

3) Reach out to founders in startups in the Oklahoma area if you want to work locally. I know a lot of founders and almost all of them are desperate to hire good developers. Even if your skills are "rusty" the smartest ones will realize it won’t take long for you to get up to speed.

4) Send me an email with a resume. I might be interested or know someone who is.

Re: Homeless, living in a tent and employed: The changing face of homelessness

#240

Post by crumpets »

barbecue_sauce wrote: post #140
jdavis703 wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sorry, but rounding up American citizens who didn’t commit any crime and shipping them somewhere else seems extremely un-American. This is the kind of thinking that has lead to some of the worst human rights abuses in the 20th century in countries like Germany with concentration camps, and in the US with internment camps.

The term "concentration camp" can be applied to the US camps as well.

Not if you abide by the definition.
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