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S.F. sued over homeless camp sweeps: city charged with criminalizing unsheltered

sfchronicle.com

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Re: S.F. sued over homeless camp sweeps: city charged with criminalizing unsheltered

#11

Post by blacksmith_tb »

bergenty wrote: post #4

Screw that, clean the homeless up. Can’t believe we have let the problem get so bad.

Well, the problem there is that simply being homeless isn't a crime (which I will say seems to me to be reasonable - the alternative is things like the Victorian Poorhouses). Throwing trash all over the place (since there are no public trash services to speak of in most cities, and homeless people don't have service from trash haulers) is a crime, but if they were issued citations, they couldn't pay, and still don't have any way to get rid of their trash... I would think that using public money to haul away trash would have a pretty good return on investment for everyone concerned.

Re: S.F. sued over homeless camp sweeps: city charged with criminalizing unsheltered

#12

Post by dirtmerchant »

bergenty wrote: post #4

Screw that, clean the homeless up. Can’t believe we have let the problem get so bad.

Please enlighten us. What do you mean by "clean up"? Keep in mind, we're all engineers here, so details matter.

I'll wait.

Re: S.F. sued over homeless camp sweeps: city charged with criminalizing unsheltered

#13

Post by jelliclesfarm »

abeppu wrote: post #3

I think in the context of a legal action, the term "charged" in the current title ("S.F. sued over homeless camp sweeps: city charged with criminalizing unsheltered") is confusing, and doesn't match the Chronicle title.

They literally changed the title on the website. Lol.

The original title was : “S.F. sued over homeless camp sweeps activists charge city with criminalizing unsheltered” that I edited due to limits on title length on HN submission.

Re: S.F. sued over homeless camp sweeps: city charged with criminalizing unsheltered

#14

Post by crhulls »

olivermarks wrote: post #10

'Unsheltered' is a propaganda word and a fig leaf for the very sad reality that we have a chronic opioid and meth crisis which tips many people over into serious mental illness. Giving these individuals expensive housing is not going to solve anything. California is a magnet for substance abuse casualties and as then SF mayor Newsom found at the end of his grandiose plan to 'end homelessness' ever more people arrived…

Why is this comment getting downvoted? I understand in progressive circles this statement maybe controversial, but I've always admired hacker news for being slightly more sensible when it comes to shunning people for statements that are not politically correct.

Re: S.F. sued over homeless camp sweeps: city charged with criminalizing unsheltered

#15

Post by ska »

bergenty wrote: post #8
ska wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> clean the homeless up I'm curious - what do you imagine that looks like?

Moving them to the shelters and telling them to stay off the street. If there’s no room in the shelter, providing them housing outside the city. If you have a shelter/provided housing it’s a crime to sleep on the streets. Alternatively start up workhouses and sanitariums again. Government work in exchange for a safe, clean place to sleep and food for the day. Mental sanitariums for those people that are too far gone.…

So, a form of incarceration?

An observation: most of the "simple answer" approaches to this seem to have failed badly in practice when/where they are attempted. There has to be some complexity, no?

Re: S.F. sued over homeless camp sweeps: city charged with criminalizing unsheltered

#16

Post by rtkwe »

bergenty wrote: post #8
ska wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> clean the homeless up I'm curious - what do you imagine that looks like?

Moving them to the shelters and telling them to stay off the street. If there’s no room in the shelter, providing them housing outside the city. If you have a shelter/provided housing it’s a crime to sleep on the streets. Alternatively start up workhouses and sanitariums again. Government work in exchange for a safe, clean place to sleep and food for the day. Mental sanitariums for those people that are too far gone.…

The whole area is one massive housing crisis there's barely space to put people with money for livable rates much less trying to house the entire homeless population.

Re: S.F. sued over homeless camp sweeps: city charged with criminalizing unsheltered

#17

Post by jelliclesfarm »

olivermarks wrote: post #10

'Unsheltered' is a propaganda word and a fig leaf for the very sad reality that we have a chronic opioid and meth crisis which tips many people over into serious mental illness. Giving these individuals expensive housing is not going to solve anything. California is a magnet for substance abuse casualties and as then SF mayor Newsom found at the end of his grandiose plan to 'end homelessness' ever more people arrived…

I bet many would like to sue the city as tax payers for not fixing the unsafe and unsanitary streets that are part of the commons. Parks, streets and even public transport hubs are unusable for the tax paying citizenry.

Re: S.F. sued over homeless camp sweeps: city charged with criminalizing unsheltered

#18

Post by gamblor956 »

California has enough shelter space and housing for the true (involuntary) homeless, meaning those who are homeless because they can't afford housing, or because they have a mental illness and can't maintain housing on their own. Almost all of our shelters are sober facilities, meaning no drugs or alcohol, which is what led to the formation of homeless camps: drug addicts don't have to get rid of their drugs if they set up camp on a sidewalk.

The point of the sweeps is to make the camps an undesirable option compared to shelters, or moving back home, by increasing the friction and hassle of camping vs the alternatives.

Most of CA's homeless aren't local to SF, LA, or SD, or even to California. For example, LAT reporting on the subject has confirmed that as much as 75% of Hollywood's homeless may be from the Midwest. Several Midwestern states (specifically, Texas and Oklahoma) openly brag about shipping their homeless to CA to avoid dealing with the costs of caring for their own residents. Moreover, the great majority of the drug-addicted homeless population is comprised of out-of-state residents, and drug addicts are more than half of California's homeless.

Camp sweeps are a good thing. They disincentivize drug hotspots, get the mentally ill into shelters where they can be treated, and improve safety for everyone else.

Re: S.F. sued over homeless camp sweeps: city charged with criminalizing unsheltered

#20

Post by cultofmetatron »

dirtmerchant wrote: post #12
bergenty wrote: post #4

Screw that, clean the homeless up. Can’t believe we have let the problem get so bad.

Please enlighten us. What do you mean by "clean up"? Keep in mind, we're all engineers here, so details matter. I'll wait.

undefined behavior. implementation details left to discretion of implementer
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