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Boise is why L.A. can’t legally clear its streets of homeless encampments

latimes.com

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Re: Boise is why L.A. can’t legally clear its streets of homeless encampments

#81

Post by GauntletWizard »

big_chungus wrote: post #78
tppiotrowski wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have heard the hundreds of dirty needles sentiment from people but have never encountered a neighborhood in LA where there are hundreds of dirty needles on the ground. Is there any photos of this phenomenon online you could point me to or is this mostly hyperbole?

"Thousands of pounds of human waste, close to 14,000 hypodermic needles cleaned out from Santa Ana River homeless encampments" - https://www.ocregister.com/2018/03/08/thousands-of-pounds-of... They will also need to remove a few inches of topsoil to clean it up. This is the sort of procedure that is used to clean up toxic chemical spills, high levels of pollution, and nuclear waste.

Don't forget actual toxic chemical spills, caused by looting: https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/homeless/the-city-...

Re: Boise is why L.A. can’t legally clear its streets of homeless encampments

#82

Post by playeren »

romaaeterna wrote: post #56
crooked-v wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unless, of course, those women and children are homeless.

No. If there are children in any of these encampments, I would say that they need to especially be broken up. Homelessness in modern America is to a great degree elective. People need to be harassed off the streets and into shelters for their own welfare -- especially children -- or involuntarily committed.

> Homelessness in modern America is to a great degree elective

How did you determine that?

Re: Boise is why L.A. can’t legally clear its streets of homeless encampments

#83

Post by jMyles »

sweeneyrod wrote: post #39
jMyles wrote: post #23

One thing that I have never understood about this discussion is why it always seems to avoid the following question: What about people who want to be homeless? Why have we built a society in which anybody who doesn't accept the lifestyle of sleeping in a static, hardened structure, and working to pay rent or a mortgage so as to have the right to do so, is diagnosed with some kind of illness? Isn't it quite clear that…

Because people like you are incredibly uncommon. I do not believe at all that there are millions of people like that in the US.

You interact with us all the time, every day, and you have no idea.

Re: Boise is why L.A. can’t legally clear its streets of homeless encampments

#85

Post by AtlasBarfed »

lotsofpulp wrote: post #25
AtlasBarfed wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe.... give them a place to stay... OFF the street? Of course all urban centers are so starved of entry level housing that anything good enough to minimally get a homeless person off the street (bathroom, place to sleep, maybe kitchenette) would also be swamped by everyone from the poor and working, college students, immigrants, etc. Suppressing this housing is all done in the name of maintaining and increasing ho…

It’s also done to keep people who can only afford lower priced housing out.

Certainly encampments are a bigger eyesore/property value killer than making some habitable closets for them?

Re: Boise is why L.A. can’t legally clear its streets of homeless encampments

#86

Post by AtlasBarfed »

sweeneyrod wrote: post #37
AtlasBarfed wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe.... give them a place to stay... OFF the street? Of course all urban centers are so starved of entry level housing that anything good enough to minimally get a homeless person off the street (bathroom, place to sleep, maybe kitchenette) would also be swamped by everyone from the poor and working, college students, immigrants, etc. Suppressing this housing is all done in the name of maintaining and increasing ho…

> Of course all urban centers are so starved of entry level housing that anything good enough to minimally get a homeless person off the street (bathroom, place to sleep, maybe kitchenette) would also be swamped by everyone from the poor and working, college students, immigrants, etc. I doubt it; one of the reasons that homelessness is a difficult problem is that some homeless people are very unpleasant to live with,…

I'm talking about basically a 10x10 room for privacy for each, uh, non-inmate. It sounds like prison though.

Re: Boise is why L.A. can’t legally clear its streets of homeless encampments

#87

Post by freehunter »

ImNoSuperman wrote: post #60
freehunter wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And the military to stop destroying young men and then sending them out onto the streets with no useful support.

This was mostly during the vietnam era the government has been better about that but doctors freely prescribing drugs that destroy lives is a much bigger issue. Pooling data from 2002 to 2012, the incidence of heroin initiation was 19 times higher among those who reported prior nonmedical pain reliever use than among those who did not. A survey by the United States Conference of Mayors found that 68 percent of cities…

It's not an either/or. It's often both. 11% of the homeless population is US military veterans [1], often returning home with undiagnosed or untreated mental illnesses. They're failed by our healthcare system (same as opioid abusers) and sent out onto the streets. I'm sure there is significant overlap with prescription drug abuse and homeless veterans as well.

[1] http://nchv.org/index.php/news/media/background_and_statisti...

Re: Boise is why L.A. can’t legally clear its streets of homeless encampments

#88

Post by notus »

drew-y wrote: post #9
dv_dt wrote: post #4

In the article, Boise is challenging a court ruling that cities cannot ticket or arrest the homeless if there are no shelter beds available. This begs the question how ticketing/arresting clears the streets? By shoving them elsewhere for another city to ticket? Or housing them in jail (at a much higher expense)? Later in the article it does mention that LA (correction from Boise) is also voiding millions of citations…

I think that is an error in the article. I live in Boise. The law allows ticketing if there IS room in shelters. People would not be ticketed if the shelters are full. Not saying it's a good law. But the article is wrong. Edit: Here is the relevant section of the actual code. > Enforcement: Law enforcement officers shall not enforce this camping section when the individual is on public property and there is no availa…

Hi Boise person, been thinking of visiting your city for the first time because I hear so many great things about it (except for this mayor), when is the best time to visit?

Re: Boise is why L.A. can’t legally clear its streets of homeless encampments

#89

Post by jMyles »

MisterTea wrote: post #53
jMyles wrote: post #23

One thing that I have never understood about this discussion is why it always seems to avoid the following question: What about people who want to be homeless? Why have we built a society in which anybody who doesn't accept the lifestyle of sleeping in a static, hardened structure, and working to pay rent or a mortgage so as to have the right to do so, is diagnosed with some kind of illness? Isn't it quite clear that…

> What about people who want to be homeless? I think you overestimate the number of homeless by choice vs homeless by circumstance. You also are sort of marginalizing the homeless who need help by painting them as happily homeless. Very naive take on the situation.

> I think you overestimate the number of homeless by choice vs homeless by circumstance.

Well, we can't really know the numbers here. But the discussion seems to never include this phenomenon, so I think it's fair to say that this particular constituency is under-represented in the discussion even if there were only a small number of people.

And again, I think there are many, many such people - I have personally met thousands without really trying. There are Rainbow Gatherings in every state, each with thousands or tens of thousands of such people, and this is just one gathering of one subset of this population.

> You also are sort of marginalizing the homeless who need help by painting them as happily homeless.

I don't mean to do that. I think that people who actually need help are being marginalized by casting such a wide net as to lose them. If people want help, why aren't we directing resources there? Instead of sending the police to arrest people who don't want help?

> Very naive take on the situation.

In a literally sense, I think it's not naive. I have been houseless for most of my adult life. How much of this phenomenon have you personally experienced?

Re: Boise is why L.A. can’t legally clear its streets of homeless encampments

#90

Post by jMyles »

seanmcdirmid wrote: post #62
jMyles wrote: post #23

One thing that I have never understood about this discussion is why it always seems to avoid the following question: What about people who want to be homeless? Why have we built a society in which anybody who doesn't accept the lifestyle of sleeping in a static, hardened structure, and working to pay rent or a mortgage so as to have the right to do so, is diagnosed with some kind of illness? Isn't it quite clear that…

There is a public nuisance aspect to people who are living on the street or in forests on land they don’t own/rent. Even mobile vehicles can be problematic if they are parked on the street without access to decent facilities. I don’t think many would have a problem with someone who lacked a permanent home but setup camp or their vehicle on a formal campground with reasonable hygiene facilities so they weren’t pooping…

> There is a public nuisance aspect to people who are living on the street or in forests on land they don’t own/rent.

I don't think there is a connection to property ownership and the presence of a nuisance caused by people.

So what if people are living on land that they don't own and rent? Who has decreed that land ownership must be the absolute fundamental social norm? What if people are instinctually disinclined to believe or participate in land ownership?

Why do we insist on being the only animal for which a subset charts the entire landmass of the earth into a grid, assigning ownership to every square inch? It's absurd.

People tenting under bridges, on bike trails, in forests, don't bother me. Rich people have stolen far more from my family than poor people have.

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