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US Supreme Court allows cities to ban homeless camps

bbc.com

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Re: US Supreme Court allows cities to ban homeless camps

#111

Post by ydnaclementine »

Xylakant wrote: post #52
PessimalDecimal wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What about going to a homeless shelter, or to a municipality that does allow homeless encampments?

What if just all municipalities forbid homeless encampments? The result of this will be a race to the bottom, as more and more municipalities ban homeless camps, the negative effects will concentrate on fewer and fewer municipalities, making the issue worse and worse. This will in turn drive them to forbid camps as well.

> as more and more municipalities ban homeless camps if that's a possible endgame, the law should have been to ban being homeless

Re: US Supreme Court allows cities to ban homeless camps

#112

Post by EPWN3D »

notaustinpowers wrote: post #75
engineer_22 wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One city banned camping in public, it was challenged, SC said "yep, that's a fair law". After this decision other cities may also ban camping, while some cities may welcome public camping. The SC is leaving it to the lowest level of government to decide for themselves, upholding a democratic principle.

IDK man, I think arresting people for just existing in public who have nowhere else to go is a morally reprehensible act and has no right existing in a form of government that should operate under the best interest of it's citizens. But that's just me I guess.

There's no great answer here, unfortunately. Let's say the Supreme Court had ruled the other way and said "You cannot ban camping on public spaces if you don't have adequate shelter."

The effect would be that smaller towns with limited budgets would face a potential influx of homeless people, since they don't have the resources to build shelters and therefore cannot ban public camping.

Also, the proposed shelter constraint on the law is pretty dubious. Say a town builds a shelter and then it bans public camping. Does that law get nullified if a tornado destroys the shelter space? What if the shelter has 5 beds, but the homeless population grows to 100? At what point does that law become voided?

Re: US Supreme Court allows cities to ban homeless camps

#113

Post by EPWN3D »

engineer_22 wrote: post #95
notaustinpowers wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

IDK man, I think arresting people for just existing in public who have nowhere else to go is a morally reprehensible act and has no right existing in a form of government that should operate under the best interest of it's citizens. But that's just me I guess.

No problem, go to your municipal meetings and let them know you are in favor of allowing camping in public spaces in your municipality. If you vote in your local elections your representatives may also have similar opinions to yours. Talk to your friends and neighbors to ask how they feel about it too, maybe they agree. Democracy.

Now now, that would require the suburbanites who are eager to tut-tut and scold city-dwellers to put their money where their mouth is.

Re: US Supreme Court allows cities to ban homeless camps

#114

Post by crooked-v »

notaustinpowers wrote: post #14
wilg wrote: post #5

Dumb decision, but we really just gotta build more homes mainly. A good overview of why this is the best solution to homelessness: https://www.noahpinion.blog/p/everything-you-think-you-know-...

There are enough vacant homes in the US to give every homeless person 25 homes. That is not the root cause of the problem.

An empty home in a town with no jobs and no services doesn't help anybody.

If you look at the places that people actually want to live in the US, there are housing shortages in every major US metro area (https://www.fanniemae.com/research-and-insights/perspectives...).

Re: US Supreme Court allows cities to ban homeless camps

#115

Post by [deleted] »

speeralbert wrote: post #79
nimbius wrote: post #45

I feel like the outcome of this is unilaterally bad. Most homeless are elderly and mentally Ill. The solutions are institutionalization and retirement housing/pensions but no state did this after Reagan and instead made homelessness an issue to ignore. Faced with the ability to legally incarcerate nearly 600,000 people, states likely won't hesitate to do just that without a second thought. For a country that prides i…

Re: "Most homeless are elderly and mentally ill." Mentally ill, yes. Elderly, no.

[deleted]

Re: US Supreme Court allows cities to ban homeless camps

#116

Post by relaxing »

Terr_ wrote: post #26
wilg wrote: post #5

Dumb decision, but we really just gotta build more homes mainly. A good overview of why this is the best solution to homelessness: https://www.noahpinion.blog/p/everything-you-think-you-know-...

> Dumb decision Well, what's the alternative? Do you believe all local laws such as "FooBar park closes at dusk" are federally unconstitutional , and that actually enforcing any of them is "cruel and unusual punishment" against people who desire to camp there overnight? Remember: It's perfectly possible to say that certain situations are unlawful/unjust/immoral for other reasons, it's not like "I think it violates th…

Yeah man. Punishing someone for being is poor and living outside of society by making them poorer and pushing them further outside society is cruel and unusual.

The majority’s justification that it is fair because it applies to those whom it will never apply to is particularly craven.

Re: US Supreme Court allows cities to ban homeless camps

#117

Post by notaustinpowers »

crooked-v wrote: post #114
notaustinpowers wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are enough vacant homes in the US to give every homeless person 25 homes. That is not the root cause of the problem.

An empty home in a town with no jobs and no services doesn't help anybody. If you look at the places that people actually want to live in the US, there are housing shortages in every major US metro area ( https://www.fanniemae.com/research-and-insights/perspectives... ).

Copying from my other comment. My comment points out the failure of the "just build more homes" idea as a solution for homelessness.

"My comment on this is that the statement "just build more homes" is not an effective solution to this problem. We have enough homes. The issue is that as homes are viewed as an investment, rather than as a necessity to live a decent life, they must maintain scarcity. If there is not a scarcity, then it will be created. Interest rates have tripled, which should have dropped house prices. Construction is faster than it was before the 2007 Housing Crisis. Both of these factors should have drastically reduced housing costs, however, prices are still 40% higher than they were in 2020.

I'm not saying to confiscate homes. I'm not saying to force people to rent out their homes to homeless people.

>A large chunk of homeless people are drug addicts with serious mental health problems.

Only 26% of homeless people abuse drugs. A vast amount of homeless people are veterans who have complex mental health problems from their service in the military, elderly people who are trying to survive off of insufficient SSI payments, or LGBTQ youth who were kicked out of their homes.

This isn't a problem that can be solved with some witty one-sentence solution. This is a problem that takes layers of support systems ranging from health services, to public transportation, to subsidized housing, to job placement programs."

Re: US Supreme Court allows cities to ban homeless camps

#118

Post by jjav »

polski-g wrote: post #72
spankalee wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where should they sleep?

On property they own or property they have been granted permission to occupy.

> On property they own or property they have been granted permission to occupy.

By definition, the homeless don't have that.

Re: US Supreme Court allows cities to ban homeless camps

#119

Post by jjk166 »

IncreasePosts wrote: post #40
squidbeak wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Homeless people don't tend to have the mobility you imagine.

There is a charity run homeless shelter in the town where they were camping on public grounds.

Which requires people staying there to attend religious services.

Re: US Supreme Court allows cities to ban homeless camps

#120

Post by Terr_ »

legitster wrote: post #100
wilg wrote: post #5

Dumb decision, but we really just gotta build more homes mainly. A good overview of why this is the best solution to homelessness: https://www.noahpinion.blog/p/everything-you-think-you-know-...

In the last 30 years, we have lost ~1,000,000 SRO apartments: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Single-room_occupancy In that time homelessness has grown to 600,000. It's a pretty obvious correlation.

That's only assuming location is irrelevant, and that an abandoned shack on Bodie, California can help a homeless person in New York.
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