My theory is that all humans have a tendency to addiction. The question is only what we get addicted to.
Those that get addicted to work and money tend to be admired, while those addicted to drugs or petty theft are looked down upon. But both are addicts.
–Peter <== probably addicted to internet discussion boards.
Power in politicians is an opiate. It can be a sickness. Often. Using power to hurt most people and entire states by stipulating ignorance is a goal in our nation. The brain’s opiate motivates the rationals.
Marcy Landolfo opened Rains PDX in Northeast Portland in September 2019. But now, 3 years later, the store is permanently closed because crime in the area has gotten to be too much, she said. “Due to the constant and unrelenting criminal behavior coupled with escalating safety issues for our employees, we’ve decided to permanently close,” a sign on the front door of their store at 77 NE Grand Avenue read, in part…
Landolfo told KOIN 6 News the break-ins at the store began during the 2020 riots but the vandalism and theft ramped up recently…She said it started spiraling, including instances where people who were either on drugs or in some kind of mental health crisis would come in and exhibit “unsafe, criminal behavior” and become enraged…
Some of the windows have been replaced from what she called “vandalism and senseless crime.” After several claims, though, her insurance was dropped.
DB2
It really is sad at what has happened in Portland. If you ever get there, Go visit Jakes Famous Crawfish. It is a great restaurant that has been around for over 100 years.
To put all of this in perspective, Portland is safer than 3 percent of the cities in the United States. A really terrible stat.
Andy
I must have missed in SafeWise where it talked about Portland, OR.
In List of United States cities by crime rate - Wikipedia, which is based on the most recently available FBU Uniform Crime Report from 2019, it indicates Portland, OR is on the safer side of major cities in most categories.
https://www.bizjournals.com/portland/news/2022/11/01/portland-crime-rates-2022.html has more recent data, which is in line with the Wikipedia statistics.
A big problem is that one of the two major political parties in the US has decided to make urban crime into an electoral issue. Which would be great, if it resulted in a more informed population and good policy changes. It hasn’t though, and it has produced a lot bad analysis and anecdata.
Well, I’m not sure how much ‘import’ I would give to the source. I visited the link and found that the safest city was Strafford, NH (we’re #1) - which is 10 miles from me and is essentially a forest where the squirrels outnumber the people. How does that make it on a list of ‘cities’? I can just imagine the diaspora moving to Strafford to flee crime. Bring a tent and an espresso machine.
JimA
“These New Yorkers and hundreds of others like them are in urgent need of treatment, yet often refuse it when offered,” Mayor Eric Adams said at a news conference, noting the pervasive problem of mental illness has long been out in the open.
“No more walking by or looking away,” the mayor said, calling it “a moral obligation to act.”
The mayor’s directive marks the latest attempt to ease a crisis decades in the making. It would give outreach workers, city hospitals and first responders, including police, discretion to involuntarily hospitalize anyone they deem a danger to themselves or unable to care for themselves.
DB2
Thanks DrBob,
It is good to see someone trying to find an answer.
Andy
I’m not sure this program will last long. It is sure to end up in the courts.
DB2
You are probably correct but I do like people at least trying different avenue’s. The only way to solve it is going to be trying different methods.
Andy
A big part of the problem started ~50 years ago in the courts … when they decided that institutionalized people had the right to leave. Even if they didn’t have the skills necessary to live outside the institution. At the time I lived near one of the largest institutions and watched it almost completely empty out over the next 3 decades. Then it stood empty for a decade, and later was converted into a college campus.
On PBS news yesterday they were calling on social workers to make the contacts rather than police. Many cities already do that. Adding the ability to force treatment and not allow refusal is a plus.
A good idea. Probably will evolve with experience.
Homelessness has been declining in the US for the past decade (probably reflecting the aging US population), but has been increasing sharply in the major cities. This suggests that the problem may have a lot to do with housing costs and the inability/unwillingness of people to move to places where housing is more affordable and jobs more available
This is consistent with long-term declines in geographic mobility, particularly among renters, who may be more susceptible to homelessness.
The solution may be to facilitate geographic and worker mobility.
Has anyone run a correlation between level of homelessness, and Shinyness of government policy? Do places with high levels of homelessness have a stronger support system: warming centers in the winter, soup kitchens, and such, while places with Shiny policies have none of those support systems, and give the homeless a lecture on “personal responsibility” instead?
The recent “theater” of shipping illegals to other cities is a vector of long standing programs of shipping the homeless to other cities.
Steve
You are suggesting that the homeless move to places that provide more support. However, the data seems to show that the homeless are not moving. They are staying place in cities like SF and NYC that have housing costs difficult for even the middle class to afford. Does that make any sense?
During the Dust Bowl there was a great migration to the West Coast to escape the poverty of the MidWest. Beginning in the early 1900s there was a great migration of African Americans from the poverty and prejudice of the south to the industrial opportunities of the north. This doesn’t seem to happen any longer. The unemployed coal miners of Appalachia stay put. The homeless of high priced areas like LA and SF stay put.
Again, overall homelessness in the US is in decline. The problem is primarily in the cities with the highest costs of living. I don’t think that is a coincidence. You can talk about shiny and unshiny all you want but it is mostly irrelevant to the problem.
True. However, they have no alternatives for employment. They are too old to effectively be retrained into other well-paying jobs. However, their children tend to leave because they have long careers ahead of them–and their opportunities are not in Appalachia.
“Homeless move to places with more support”
We already hear stories of homeless being moved from suburban or rural areas to big cities. Cities have better services for the homeless. More choices. More soup kitchens. More social workers etc.
Its no surprise that the homeless prefer cities. But higher housing costs are a paradox that feed the system with new homeless.
Are the places like SF and NYC, the places that offer more support for the homeless? In several articles I have seen, SF and NYC are among the proponents of giving the homeless one-way bus tickets to elsewhere. Detroit takes care of it’s homeless. When the weather is dangerously cold, the police will pick up people they see sleeping out and take them to a warming center. Soup kitchens are run by several churches in town. I was donating a lot of stuff to a local church thrift store some years ago, and mentioned that I had some old coats that were too worn to be saleable. The people at the store said bring them in, because they take them down to the 'hood and give them to the homeless. Why would the homeless leave Detroit?
Would the homeless stay in cities where there are no warming centers, no soup kitchens, no tolerance for camping out, where the local constabularies roust people sleeping in public with cattle prods daily?
Steve
*# roust *
to drive (as from bed) roughly or unceremoniously
Recent Examples on the Web Advocates for the homeless ardently protest efforts to roust the encampments, arguing that people have nowhere else to go. Los Angeles Times, 21 June 2022
I should have said the unemployed coal miners stayed put. Perhaps it would always have been that way but I wonder if in earlier decades there would have been more of an impetus to move to find better opportunities. Statistically Americans of past generations were more willing to move out of state than they are today.
Keep in mind that the majority of the homeless are of the transitional category. They became homeless because of a negative financial event. This group is not typically associated with mental illness or physical disabilities, they just had bad luck. One is much more likely to become homeless in a place like SF where over a third of your income is going to housing than in Lincoln, NE.
" Transitional homelessness is generally regarded by housing experts as the most common form of homelessness. Transitional homelessness is defined as a state of homelessness that’s a result of a major life change or catastrophic event. Those life events could include losing a job, a medical condition, divorce, domestic abuse, and more. People experiencing transitional homelessness have been homeless for less than a year.*
Individuals experiencing transitional homelessness are more likely to be young people and may enter a transitional housing system for a limited stay. This group also can include families that are temporarily homeless and sleeping in cars or outside. Oftentimes, these people still have jobs but they are unable to afford rent and other expenses."* What Are The 4 Types Of Homelessness?
An agency that helps these folks find jobs in lower cost areas would go a long way to relieving the homeless problem.
We should of course treat the homeless humanely. But I thought the point of this thread was to find a solution to homelessness.
The majority of the homeless are <50 years old and either recently lost a job or have a job that doesn’t pay enough to pay the rent. The latter isn’t all that surprising if one lives in SF, LA, NYC or many other big cities with high living costs. Helping these folks find jobs in areas with lower costs of living would solve a big chunk of the homelessness problem.
