Seattle goes back to drawing board on homeless spending

[Catsumi]

Ferri, I am uncertain as to what your friend means when she says the situation worsened.
Did the free homes attract more of homeless also wanting free housing?
Did the homeless reject the free housing, preferring to live on streets?

87 million US dollars is about 100 million Cdn. THAT is a mountain of cash for one city to throw at the problem only to result in failure.

Does Seattle also fund the safe injection sites, revival kits and standby emergency medical care too, as we do?

[The Green Barbarian]

I was in Vernon yesterday and turned left at Polson Park. Suddenly to my right there appeared a large homeless encampment right on the side of the highway. Two people, obviously under the influence, wavered dangerously in front of my car as I weaved to avoid them.

I was speaking to someone who has worked with homeless shelters in the past, and in their opinion, there is a segment of society that just will never be able to support itself, no matter how much money is given to them or how much "job training" they get. They either have debilitating mental illnesses, or addictions to drugs and alcohol that have damaged their bodies and brains beyond repair. What do we do with these people? Is there anything you can do?

I met some people from San Fran while on a recent trip, and they told me that San Fran has become a giant toilet. There is human fecal matter on the streets everywhere. The city is just falling apart. They are getting out. What do you do?

[bob vernon]

People who traffic in hard drugs like Fentanyl, Carfentanyl, heroin, and crack should face the death penalty. No matter how often we send dealers to jail, there are always more to take their place. And the number who re-offend is huge. These dealers knowingly destroy these lives for profit. Addicts will sink to whatever level it takes to get their next hit. Only permanent removal of dealers will work.

[seewood]

People who traffic in hard drugs like Fentanyl, Carfentanyl, heroin, and crack should face the death penalty. No matter how often we send dealers to jail, there are always more to take their place. And the number who re-offend is huge. These dealers knowingly destroy these lives for profit. Addicts will sink to whatever level it takes to get their next hit. Only permanent removal of dealers will work.

Wonder if shipping them to the Philippines is an option?

[ferri]

Ferri, I am uncertain as to what your friend means when she says the situation worsened.
Did the free homes attract more of homeless also wanting free housing?
Did the homeless reject the free housing, preferring to live on streets?

87 million US dollars is about 100 million Cdn. THAT is a mountain of cash for one city to throw at the problem only to result in failure.

Does Seattle also fund the safe injection sites, revival kits and standby emergency medical care too, as we do?

Sorry it took so long to get back to you. I messaged her on facebook. Here's our conversation. :)

I sent your questions Catsumi, and she answered:

Yeah, the homeless are completely rejecting any type of assistance and doing drugs out in the open and SPD doesn't do anything about it!

So I said:

Wow. And they probably won't be leaving for winter. It sounds pretty unsafe, I would imagine crime is up.

Her answer:

Exactly, just for our corporate office in the past 3 months we've had to spend thousands of dollars just to increase security. We had four groups of different types of handy guys around the building working last Thursday.
Working on fencing, electricity, door locks, and new lighting for outside so our office now looks like a car lot at night.

[Catsumi]

Thanks Ferri for going the extra mile.

It would be crystal clear from the above reply and your link that burning 100 million Cdn trying to fix the problem is a complete and total waste.

The bandaid solution of providing security for folks while at work isn't protection for after hours. Those employed folks are on their own then.

After businesses close or move away and home owners do as well, will all N. American cities be abandoned to zombie-like creatures? What a horror.

It would be nice if the supply chain of illegal drugs was pinched off at source and dealer-wise. Political will and enforcements is just not there so I do think drug related problems will only get worse. Think, ten years from now .....yikes.

I'm sure we all got a chuckle at yesterdays news. 20 million bucks worth stashed into a banana shipment destined for a prison! Someone must have been pretty confident that the drugs would arrive safely, otherwise why commit such a huge dollar amount to a "first time" shipment. Also makes me wonder just who was to accept delivery, oversee distribution and collect payment for the products.

DEA just might be setting up chat time with kitchen staff. I certainly would.

Hand in glove.

[Queen K]

[quote="The Green Barbarian"]I was in Vernon yesterday and turned left at Polson Park. Suddenly to my right there appeared a large homeless encampment right on the side of the highway. Two people, obviously under the influence, wavered dangerously in front of my car as I weaved to avoid them.

I was speaking to someone who has worked with homeless shelters in the past, and in their opinion, there is a segment of society that just will never be able to support itself, no matter how much money is given to them or how much "job training" they get. They either have debilitating mental illnesses, or addictions to drugs and alcohol that have damaged their bodies and brains beyond repair. What do we do with these people? Is there anything you can do?

<snip>

Kelowna has houses for the mentally ill, they look like normal houses on the outside, you'd never know otherwise. No "job training" saves these guys, they don't even have to cut their own house lawn because workers are sent in to do it for them. No sense in putting tools in their hands.

But we need about 100 more of them, maybe more. Sad isn't it?

[Catsumi]

As seen by above posts, throwing millions of dollars into trying to solve the problem just is NOT working.

[Ka-El]

As seen by above posts, throwing millions of dollars into trying to solve the problem just is NOT working.

It rarely does after the fact. It would be nice to see us invest more up front (education, family services, mental health and addiction) to address some of the issues that underlie and lead to homelessness (and other problems).

[Catsumi]

I agree that it would be a boon to head off problems before they become major societal and personal issues.

Unless you have a one to one minder for each young individual, how are we to pinpoint those who are going to be future problems? It is expensive all the way around. We already have costly social services and still wind up paying for the homeless, mentally ill and drug addicted in the end.

There seems no way out of this growing problem unless (as some wish) we spend even more; as Seattle example has shown, that isn't the answer either.

[Catsumi]

I was in Vernon yesterday and turned left at Polson Park. Suddenly to my right there appeared a large homeless encampment right on the side of the highway. Two people, obviously under the influence, wavered dangerously in front of my car as I weaved to avoid them.

I was speaking to someone who has worked with homeless shelters in the past, and in their opinion, there is a segment of society that just will never be able to support itself, no matter how much money is given to them or how much "job training" they get. They either have debilitating mental illnesses, or addictions to drugs and alcohol that have damaged their bodies and brains beyond repair. What do we do with these people? Is there anything you can do?

I met some people from San Fran while on a recent trip, and they told me that San Fran has become a giant toilet. There is human fecal matter on the streets everywhere. The city is just falling apart. They are getting out. What do you do?

Just now had time to view the link. Thanks for a heads up, GB. I was to attend a convention in San Francisco next Autumn but would rather spend my hard earned tourist bucks in Japan, a country that is safe, clean and Sane! (No shitte on streets, not even dogcrap, no grafitti or trash, no aimless folk shooting up.

One fellow in the video said he was from a third world country but not as bad as it is in SF. That says a lot.

As in Seattle, San Francisco and our own cities, throwing funds wildly about is NOT helping one little bit. Those who are in favor of doing so must be benefitting somehow in this gawd-awful fecal trail.

The video, if it could have been possible to air thirty years before, would have been decried and laughed at. Impossible to believe that our North American cities could have devolved into such sorry, pathetic sights.

Now, if only we could see thirty years into the future ....will it be even worse or will the problem be magically cured?

[honkonbobo]

City Manager Bruce Moore and Vice Mayor Kathy Webb of Little Rock want to give jobs to the Homeless:
Pilot project that engages with the homeless.

https://www.arkansasonline.com/news/201 ... ess-20180/

[Catsumi]

^^^^ good find, honkonbobo

We must keep an eye on Little Rock, Tulsa and Albuquerie as try outs for this idea.

It is simple enough work that has been posed on these threads many times, pick up garbage, litter, weeding etc. and in return, be paid for the effort. The cities are not forcing anyone to shift their tails but there is incentive for those who may be bored to death with street lifestyle.

It is a small ray of hope for American cities but would it work here? We have so many rights that they seem to be impediments to correcting our ills.

[Ka-El]

It is simple enough work that has been posed on these threads many times, pick up garbage, litter, weeding etc. and in return, be paid for the effort. The cities are not forcing anyone to shift their tails but there is incentive for those who may be bored to death with street lifestyle.

We had some very similar programs being delivered in our province at one time, that in addition to community benefiting work experience, also addressed participant’s barriers to employment and delivered lifes skills and employment preparation training. Our own research showed that after program costs we were providing the province with immediate significant savings by moving people off the welfare rolls. We presumed additional savings and benefits would be realized as these people eventually started contributing to the tax base, and via reduced crime and reduced health costs. Then a new government came in and this type of approach, in spite of its demonstrated benefits, didn’t fit with their ideology. It worked very well for the five years they lasted though and got hundreds of people who had been chronically unemployed off welfare.

[Catsumi]

I don't recall this program unless it was sometime around when Vanderzalm said "give them a shovel".

In any case it would seem it is about time to revive it, get folks off the street (at least part time), have them contribute something of value to society and most important, to themselves.

My age group (now senior) was taught by our parents that just giving endlessly to kids doesn't help them realize the effort that went into working to be able to purchase the desired items. At the time it seemed harsh to do chores, earn an allowance and be responsible. TV shows directed at kids were pretty much the same as now with endless ads showing us what to want next; TV parents were so generous with their TV children adding to the feeling of being done hard by. However, no regrets here. We know the price of everything and its value. Not many of us wound up on the streets whereas now it seems to be an epidemic.

Something went wrong in between generations of raising kids. Perhaps a root cause of streeting is parenting, or the lack of same. Values not taught? Just a thought.

In any case what we are doing now, isn't working very well. Maybe you, Ka-el could provide more details so that we can approach our political masters with the concept of working for pay to reduce streeting issues.