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Trends in the San Francisco (mostly dog?) poop crisis

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Re: Trends in the San Francisco (mostly dog?) poop crisis

#201

Post by danschumann »

jessaustin wrote: post #198
danschumann wrote: post #149

Earlier quoted context omitted.

if you "shipped" them somewhere, they'd be in an asylum/shelter/jail facility which is set up to handle them, not in a back yard, not downtown, not IN THE STREETS.

Sure, I suggested local jails upthread. You as thread parent suggested "outside the city limits". SF is a "city and county", so it's not possible to have a local jail outside city limits. You're going to have to bribe some other county to take care of the homeless you've charged with crimes. That's not going to be cheap! It's not cheap even if you manage to get all your jails built in Sunset or some other backwater.…

Some people "just want to watch the world burn" and will mess up anything you try to give them, and those people need law enforcement to stop them, because they won't stop themselves. It's unrealistic to think you can solve the problem with only the carrot.

Re: Trends in the San Francisco (mostly dog?) poop crisis

#202

Post by indemnity »

larnmar wrote: post #199
supernova87a wrote: post #164

I echo the point that this is merely a symptom of SF's inability to be a little bit more hardnosed and solve its problems. As an example: I called 311/911 to report a trio of homeless guys, operating a bike chop shop in broad daylight on a Saturday in downtown (and blocking the sidewalk, and creating piles of junk). The operator said that she would report this to the "neighborhood outreach / management team" or somet…

This. And yet, in a sort of collective Gell-Mann amnesia, I’m pretty sure that tomorrow I’ll load up HN, there’ll be an article on prisons, and people will be upvoted for solemnly intoning how terrible it is that so many Americans are in prison, with dissenters greyed out and soon shadowbanned. So let me take this opportunity to say: there are far too few Anericans in prison. The number should be much higher. Prison…

Even if what you are proposing doesn’t work, in the sense that recidivism remains high, the alternative proposed by Western countries seems to be just to give up on enforcing any kind of punishment.

Rehabilitation as practised in the Scandinavian countries works for the homogenous populations they have.

In countries like New Zealand they are “addressing” the issue of overrepresentation of certain demographics in the crime stats by arresting them less. Yep.

All I know is, I have never felt as safe as I have in Japan, South Korea and Singapore, with conviction rates of 99%, in the US and other Anglophile countries I’m always worried shit is going to go down, it does, and I have seen it go down several times.

And in the non-US Anglo countries, the cops are basically useless and want the crime to happen with physical evidence, before they do jack about it.

I want the criminals to shit bricks when the cops come, not laugh and outgun them.

Re: Trends in the San Francisco (mostly dog?) poop crisis

#203

Post by Keverw »

umeshunni wrote: post #157
paulddraper wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> state-level or national problems Sincere question: Why does San Francisco seem to be the only one with those news stories (not NYC, LA, Chicago, Miami, etc.)?

While the problems are more global in nature, they have affected San Francisco disproportionately worse than other cities. Some cities have been better at patching these issues than San Francisco has - e.g Austin, TX is forcibly removing homeless encampments from their streets. Seattle have revised zoning and is building new housing to offset housing shortages even though the local NIMBYs oppose muh gentrification. S…

Yeah I seen that the governor was going after the mayor about Austin. Wonder what the solution is though? Actually try to help homeless or just tell them to move elsewhere? I know Key West, FL and Nashville, TN has a busing program to send homeless people to Colorado.

I know even here there's a huge heroin problem. Seen recently that the county sheriff and city police joined together kicking out a bunch of homeless in the woods, and then everytime you go to the supermarket people with signs. Sad, but I know there's been cases of people faking homeless to panhandle so don't know who's real or not. It seems like we have so many resources, and one of the richest nations yet we still have homelessness.

I know in some cities it's illegal to even sit on the sidewalk, what if someone is older or disabled needing to take a break and no benches to sit? Then some cities it's illegal to sleep in your car even if legally parked, but I know there's been challences over that. Some area even put spikes to prevent people from sitting down too. Just seems like instead of dealing with it, they rather want them to move along.

Re: Trends in the San Francisco (mostly dog?) poop crisis

#204

Post by rcoveson »

altShiftDev wrote: post #194
dagav wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That Onion headline rubs me the wrong way... Just because a problem is unique to a country doesn't make that problem easily preventable.

Yes, actually it does. You simply have to act like other countries in which it isn't a problem.

As long as we're calling out answers that are really easy to come up with but impossible to implement, I'd like to offer a few:

* For mass shootings: Un-invent guns

* For poop in the streets: Devise a zero-waste diet that obviates defecation

* For both problems: Simply make all the bad people act like the good people

Re: Trends in the San Francisco (mostly dog?) poop crisis

#205

Post by Keverw »

VectorLock wrote: post #28
Animats wrote: post #12

SF needs the Portland Loo.[1][2] The homeless-resistant public toilet. Not enough privacy for a drug deal. Water faucet on the outside, not the inside. Prison-grade stainless. [1] https://www.latimes.com/world/la-xpm-2012-aug-29-la-na-08-29... [2] https://portlandloo.com/

If its private enough to poop in its not private enough to do a drug deal in? So you can see multiple people's legs that's going to stop things?

Interesting on multiple people's legs. I know the news says our own area has a drug problem but I guess I haven't seen much of it in person...

There's someone I know that worked as a caregiver for a man that had dementia, and instead of keeping him inside all day decided to take him to the park. Well his adult diaper needed changed, so he went to the bathroom to do that, and a park ranger started banging on the door accusing them of smoking weed wanting them to open the door now! Banging on it, then while finishing up changing the state park ranger started accusing them of being homosexuals.

This was somewhere in California, but I know he moved across the country after his patient passed away and decided to go on a different career path. So kinda interesting how people can see one little thing and then start assuming a bunch of stuff. But apparently the ranger realized he was in the wrong and apologize. Sounded like there could of even been a lawsuit out of it, but he didn't want to go that far and just wanted to move on. Probably embarrassing to deal with. This was back I guess before everyone carried cell phones with them though also.

Re: Trends in the San Francisco (mostly dog?) poop crisis

#206

Post by danieltillett »

lotsofpulp wrote: post #183
larnmar wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The ideal is to solve the problem with carrot and stick. Give them free housing of a sort, so that it’s an improvement over living on the street, but not so that currently-housed people would feel tempted to downgrade their status to homeless in order to get the free house. The ideal free housing camp is (a) away from major population centres, (b) fairly basic, and (c) compulsory for those who wind up homeless in maj…

Carrot and stick doesn’t work with someone who is mentally ill.

Yes it does - just not every time.

Re: Trends in the San Francisco (mostly dog?) poop crisis

#207

Post by gojomo »

LoSboccacc wrote: post #178
gojomo wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't "remember" what happened last time "we" culled cats, so what happened? (If you're alluding to the idea that the "black death" plagues were worsened by cat culls, that's an oft-repeated story but somewhat dubious with regard to verifiable facts. Cats themselves can carry the plague bacteria & transmit it to humans – eg https://www.nytimes.com/1994/04/08/us/house-cats-spread-huma... – and even regions where cat…

lol no first of all you have to control prey population because pests will balloon with the increased safety and consume resources, strangling the prey population. secondly if you can't control the whole area Predator population will follow the pest increase, often resulting in larger problems or an out of control spiral of environmental issues you don't have to go back to pre scientific anecdotes like the stories ar…

I still can't follow what you meant by the "last time we culled cats". Was that referring to some action by Australians? (Are they the "we"?) Is there a canonical reference to how extensive this "cull" was?

Which "prey" have to be controlled, or else which "pests" will balloon?

Is the capitalization of 'Predator' significant, indicating some sort of sovereignty on a scale matching that of your only other capitalized entities, 'Australia' and 'UK'?

Re: Trends in the San Francisco (mostly dog?) poop crisis

#208

Post by Proven »

dagav wrote: post #160
BurningFrog wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These arguments remind me of The Onion's classic "‘No Way To Prevent This,’ Says Only Nation Where This Regularly Happens" . Which is to say SF's problems are definitely a result of SF policies! For housing specifically, only SF is responsible for making construction in SF near impossible. The problems of the nation and state are of course also present there, but that doesn't change that SF is unique.

That Onion headline rubs me the wrong way... Just because a problem is unique to a country doesn't make that problem easily preventable.

No one said it's easily preventable.

A country could be split in two or 200 smaller entities and we'd know if the problem is unique to all of them, or if some can manage to solve it. Why should any individual have to listen to some theories rather than exercise their right to choose?

The People don't exist to benefit of the State or its (unionized!) employees.

Re: Trends in the San Francisco (mostly dog?) poop crisis

#209

Post by xnyan »

larnmar wrote: post #199
supernova87a wrote: post #164

I echo the point that this is merely a symptom of SF's inability to be a little bit more hardnosed and solve its problems. As an example: I called 311/911 to report a trio of homeless guys, operating a bike chop shop in broad daylight on a Saturday in downtown (and blocking the sidewalk, and creating piles of junk). The operator said that she would report this to the "neighborhood outreach / management team" or somet…

This. And yet, in a sort of collective Gell-Mann amnesia, I’m pretty sure that tomorrow I’ll load up HN, there’ll be an article on prisons, and people will be upvoted for solemnly intoning how terrible it is that so many Americans are in prison, with dissenters greyed out and soon shadowbanned. So let me take this opportunity to say: there are far too few Anericans in prison. The number should be much higher. Prison…

What makes you say too few in jail? Do you have any evidence that more people in jail=better outcomes? I’m willing to listen in good faith.

Re: Trends in the San Francisco (mostly dog?) poop crisis

#210

Post by DanBC »

frostyj wrote: post #39
forinti wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Give them a better place to do drugs; a place where they get free needles and can throw away the old ones properly (so they won't leave them lying about).

I can't really understand the attitude such as 'if they want to do drug, let them do it in a safe way at least'. It sounds compassionate and all, but isn't doing drug just, WRONG? I somehow feel this is an encouragement to them.

Taking drugs is wrong. It is wrong because it harms the person and the people around them and wider society.

Ideally we'd have no-one who becomes addicted to drugs.

But the existence of substance misuse disorders means we will always have addicts, and by definition addicts take drugs even when they know they are being harmed by those drugs. These people are not encouraged by safe injection spaces, because they were always going to be taking drugs.

How are those harms caused? How can we minimise those harms?

Some of those harms are caused by people not being able to access treatment to get off drugs; they cannot access drugs affordably so need to turn to crime to get money for drugs; they have to inject unsafely because safe injection places are not available.

A safe injection space means people are not sharing needles. People are helped to find better injection sites. Any infections can get medical attention before limbs need to be amputated. People can have drugs tested for purity. Ideally we'd be providing medical grade heroin so people aren't injecting contaminated drugs. People can be reminded about evidence-based drug rehabilitation (mostly substitution and therapy. For some reason the US has an over-reliance on abstinence retreats and 12 steps, which has little evidence of effectiveness).

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