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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

#171

Post by talldayo »

fragmede wrote: post #168
Supermancho wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What if just all municipalities forbid homeless encampments? If all municipalities did this instantly and provided transportation to the homeless - either unincorporated parts of a state, or jail, most would choose jail. Nobody wants to try to survive in the wilderness.

You might not, but nobody? There are those that do. There are even TV shows, multiple reality shows for watching people do just that. It’s not easy living for sure but getting a cabin out in the woods and trying to live off the land is totally a thing people do. For a real world example, you don’t go to the woods outside of Seattle because there are unhoused people living there and it's dangerous to go there.

Nobody does. Bear Grylls wouldn't be popular if the overwhelming majority of the planet didn't choose lounging on the couch watching TV over survivalist practice.

> but getting a cabin out in the woods and trying to live off the land is totally a thing people do.

And not a realistic option for the homeless unless you can afford land to live on. What kind of bizzaro country do you live in where this is remotely realistic or legal? The real world isn't Minecraft.

Re: US Supreme Court allows cities to ban homeless camps

#172

Post by spankalee »

polski-g wrote: post #121
alan-hn wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you realize we are discussing people who own no property at all?

Why is that relevant? People who do own things do not get to trespass; people who do not own things, likewise, do not get to trespass.

But where do they sleep?!!

It's relevant because there are people with nowhere to sleep. It's not possible for them to not sleep.

Is your solution to jail them all, so that they sleep in jail?

Re: US Supreme Court allows cities to ban homeless camps

#173

Post by toast0 »

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…

I don't think it's a good plan, but if you incarcerate the homeless, you're housing them and meeting their basic needs. At least until the prisons become overcrowded.

There's lots of reasons why it's not a good solution, but having encampments in public parks isn't a good solution either.

But I think this ruling allows governments to disrupt encampments without providing shelter or incarceration. Forcing people to disperse from an encampment with nowhere in particular to disperse to, is probably a worse result for the people in the camps, and is likely not to be effective for the communities impacted by the camps; the camps may move around more often, but they'll likely start up again with the same few places in rotation.

Re: US Supreme Court allows cities to ban homeless camps

#174

Post by pseudalopex »

SeanAnderson wrote: post #97

I don't really understand how it could be any other way. If you envision a hypothetical city which has too many unhoused persons relative to the city's financial ability to support those people - then what? The unhoused just die in the street unable to be moved somewhere that has sufficient resources to support them? I get that there's a lot more nuance to this problem and that the ruling can be abused/used to enforc…

What cities say they have the resources to support other cities' homeless people?

Re: US Supreme Court allows cities to ban homeless camps

#175

Post by IncreasePosts »

jjk166 wrote: post #163
IncreasePosts wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes. It is what ultimatum means, because they can no longer flout the law without punishment. They are "members of the public". That doesn't mean they can unilaterally dictate the laws of society. If they were "the public", then they could just change the law. I wonder why they can't? Because most people don't want anyone setting up their household in a public park.

They weren't unilaterally dictating the laws of society, until 5 hours ago it was the US constitution which said this was the law in this country. 6 people unilaterally dictated the new law of society that enables the mob to ignore the rights of the few. Enjoy your park.

Believe it or not, but the legitimacy of our institutions aren't in question after a ruling you dislike.

And I will enjoy my park. Maybe the rate at which I have been hearing stories about children getting pricked with dirty needles will lessen with this ruling.

Re: US Supreme Court allows cities to ban homeless camps

#176

Post by SkyPuncher »

pseudalopex wrote: post #151
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…

> 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. Most homeless people are working age and homeless under a year. Costs of living are the strongest correlates of homelessness rates.

I suspect there’s a bimodal distribution between shorter and chronic homelessness

Re: US Supreme Court allows cities to ban homeless camps

#177

Post by floxy »

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…

>The solutions are institutionalization

Isn't there a lot of rose-colored glasses around institutionalization of the mentally ill? The reason we got rid of it is because it is essentially imprisonment, with all sorts of abuses and not some sort of all-inclusive luxury resort.

Re: US Supreme Court allows cities to ban homeless camps

#178

Post by cwillu »

fragmede wrote: post #168
Supermancho wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What if just all municipalities forbid homeless encampments? If all municipalities did this instantly and provided transportation to the homeless - either unincorporated parts of a state, or jail, most would choose jail. Nobody wants to try to survive in the wilderness.

You might not, but nobody? There are those that do. There are even TV shows, multiple reality shows for watching people do just that. It’s not easy living for sure but getting a cabin out in the woods and trying to live off the land is totally a thing people do. For a real world example, you don’t go to the woods outside of Seattle because there are unhoused people living there and it's dangerous to go there.

You know what all of those shows have in common? The protagonist has thousands or tens of thousands to spend on setting up the basic infrastructure needed.

Re: US Supreme Court allows cities to ban homeless camps

#179

Post by diogenescynic »

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…

>I feel like the outcome of this is unilaterally bad.

As a resident of California, I wholeheartedly disagree. The status quo could not continue. We need law and order. We can't have people just sleeping and camping wherever they want like California has been allowing. Many many public parks and open spaces are now taken over by open drug scenes (homeless camps) where crime thrives.

Re: US Supreme Court allows cities to ban homeless camps

#180

Post by diogenescynic »

pseudalopex wrote: post #151
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…

> 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. Most homeless people are working age and homeless under a year. Costs of living are the strongest correlates of homelessness rates.

>Costs of living are the strongest correlates of homelessness rates.

I suspect this is strongly skewed by half of all homeless living in California where they seem to be mostly from out of state and coming here for the weather, lenient drug laws, and many social benefits. You can just ask them and they will tell you--most of them are from red states where they'd be locked up for what they do here. As such, they came to California because they can get away with it and it's the easiest place to survive on the bottom as a drug user since you have temperate weather and lots of social programs giving you money, clothes, tends, and food. Why be homeless in California rather than move somewhere you can actually afford? It's the drug laws like Prop 47 that decriminalized hard drugs and theft up to $950 per incident (not even per day).

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