The trash, and furniture along the roads.....it’s never been this bad. (Portland: hotel, neighborhood)

[MaltCueOur]

Originally Posted by redguard57

An easy solution to the homeless problem would be to just build a place for them to be, then illegalize vagrancy, delinquency, etc.., with the sentence being, you have to live to at the campus. Buy some acreage, a few hundred to a few thousand, outside every city that has homeless, build some buildings, put them there. How much would it cost, maybe a few billion? That's nothing.

Of course it sounds a little concentration camp-like.

Sounds good to me!

[StealthRabbit]

Well, siince the homeless and thier city council advocates would not even consider a brand new, never used, refurbished jail, with beds, toilets and commercial kitchen. (All heated, dry, and ready).... Unlikely a concentration camp will suffice (tho a reasonable and rational alternative.)

I would make it fully self contained (FSC) with no public transportation downtown, and internal legal, banking, jail, food, clothing,, grocery carts, cardboard, medical.... There will be some freed up military bases soon, and plenty abandoned ones available now.

[redguard57]

Originally Posted by StealthRabbit

Well, siince the homeless and thier city council advocates would not even consider a brand new, never used, refurbished jail, with beds, toilets and commercial kitchen. (All heated, dry, and ready).... Unlikely a concentration camp will suffice (tho a reasonable and rational alternative.)

I would make it fully self contained (FSC) with no public transportation downtown, and internal legal, banking, jail, food, clothing,, grocery carts, cardboard, medical.... There will be some freed up military bases soon, and plenty abandoned ones available now.

What I usually hear them say in response is that it's unethical to criminalize poverty. They haven't done anything wrong besides being poor and existing with nowhere to go

Of course, the consequence of that is somebody somewhere has to live with these people, and it sucks if it's around your house or business.

I find it kind of hard to believe we can't just fix it. There are about 750k homeless around the country. We could rent them nice apartments at 1500/mo. for $13.5 Billion. How much would the initial construction cost? 50? 100 Billion? In the context of just having spent 2 Trillion, I find it hard to believe that money is the problem here that is preventing us with dealing with the homeless.

[StealthRabbit]

This is a universal issue in USa, but don't expect the government to find a solution. They are eating like fat cats. No incentive or capability to solve. They have never missed a meal.

NGO's are doing the heavy lifting / lion's share of efforts to assist. But it requires enormous capital and access to available properties and permitting agencies and gov entities to launch such a project. Government could simply do it.... They should create or seek a volunteer staffed agency similar to WPA / CCC and empower it to be nimble to suit local needs. There is so much free competent and available professionals in early retirees / families taking gap years / mis-apportioned gov workers, this would be very easy to pull off. But only with buy-in from gov and clients. Both are very complex, so ez, becomes impossible, until the right leader emerges. Those getting hurt the most (downtown businesses) do not have time, interest, or expertise to solve homeless issue AND run their business.

[skeddy]

throw some money at it and the problem will go away.!....lmao....

[redguard57]

Originally Posted by skeddy

throw some money at it and the problem will go away.!....lmao....

It seems to me that if the problem is that they're home-less, then just buy and/or build them homes. Problem solved. Some countries have taken housing-first approaches with success.

https://archive.thinkprogress.org/fo...-a2a43e2cc396/

https://www.theguardian.com/cities/2...o-homelessness

Otherwise, we can just live with the homeless on our streets. Could try to give them rehab but that is even more expensive.

[oregonwoodsmoke]

Originally Posted by redguard57

....... We could rent them nice apartments at 1500/mo. .......

You can't rent them nice apartments because the landlords who own those apartments won't rent to them, and for very good reasons.


The government could build and own the nice apartments for about 10 times the cost of privately owned apartments,but if they filled those nice apartments with homeless, they wouldn't be nice for very long. The government got out of low income housing because the costs of maintaining the property became too high. That's why the government privatized low income housing and put the costs onto the private sector.


Another problem with proving nice housing for the homeless is that it tempts other low income folks who are hanging on and supporting themselves to stop working so that they will qualify for the free government provided nice housing. It's a very good and efficient way to greatly increase the number of homeless.


If you spread a lot of free food, you don't have a few nicely fed stray cats. You bring in every stray cat for miles around. They come in for the free food,. It's exactly the same principle for the homeless. Treat them extremely well and you don't get a few well cared for homeless. You bring in homeless from all over the country. And now that the border has been opened, you will be bringing in homeless from all over the world..


There are ways to deal with the homeless problem, but not without hurting someone's feelings and hurting anyone's feelings is a severe crime in this country.

[ccjarider]

Originally Posted by oregonwoodsmoke

You can't rent them nice apartments because the landlords who own those apartments won't rent to them, and for very good reasons.


The government could build and own the nice apartments for about 10 times the cost of privately owned apartments,but if they filled those nice apartments with homeless, they wouldn't be nice for very long. The government got out of low income housing because the costs of maintaining the property became too high. That's why the government privatized low income housing and put the costs onto the private sector.


Another problem with proving nice housing for the homeless is that it tempts other low income folks who are hanging on and supporting themselves to stop working so that they will qualify for the free government provided nice housing. It's a very good and efficient way to greatly increase the number of homeless.


If you spread a lot of free food, you don't have a few nicely fed stray cats. You bring in every stray cat for miles around. They come in for the free food,. It's exactly the same principle for the homeless. Treat them extremely well and you don't get a few well cared for homeless. You bring in homeless from all over the country. And now that the border has been opened, you will be bringing in homeless from all over the world..


There are ways to deal with the homeless problem, but not without hurting someone's feelings and hurting anyone's feelings is a severe crime in this country.

Excellent analysis. Too bad Portland and many other Oregon voters do not see the obvious and continue to vote for exactly what you intelligently articulate is the wrong approach.

[redguard57]

Originally Posted by oregonwoodsmoke

You can't rent them nice apartments because the landlords who own those apartments won't rent to them, and for very good reasons.


The government could build and own the nice apartments for about 10 times the cost of privately owned apartments,but if they filled those nice apartments with homeless, they wouldn't be nice for very long. The government got out of low income housing because the costs of maintaining the property became too high. That's why the government privatized low income housing and put the costs onto the private sector.


Another problem with proving nice housing for the homeless is that it tempts other low income folks who are hanging on and supporting themselves to stop working so that they will qualify for the free government provided nice housing. It's a very good and efficient way to greatly increase the number of homeless.

As you said, living in the midst of a lot of marginal people is not what I would call nice. As a result, I don't think that would happen in high #s. But it would be better than having them in the street and I would gladly pay taxes toward such a project in order to enjoy clean streets & public spaces.

If you spread a lot of free food, you don't have a few nicely fed stray cats. You bring in every stray cat for miles around. They come in for the free food,. It's exactly the same principle for the homeless. Treat them extremely well and you don't get a few well cared for homeless. You bring in homeless from all over the country. And now that the border has been opened, you will be bringing in homeless from all over the world..


There are ways to deal with the homeless problem, but not without hurting someone's feelings and hurting anyone's feelings is a severe crime in this country.

Well Finland is not getting that and they have a housing-first policy.

My point, which you have confirmed, is that available money to deal with the problem is not precisely the issue here. There is plenty of money to fix this. The problem is more of a social one. The truth is, no one wants these people anywhere.

I suspect that what you mean by "hurting people's feelings" is treating the homeless as 3rd class. Also your characterization of the homeless as little better than stray cats, is indeed something that many people would find offensive. Feelings are not hurt; your disregard for human rights is disturbing.

We could put them into some kind of jail... which is kind of what the old mental hospitals used to be. But that would look... well for lack of a better word, fascist. Human rights do come into play here. I, for one, would be willing to trade some rights in return for cleaning up the streets. However, it's a bit terrifying to think that if I did for whatever reason become homeless, I might lose my rights and be put into some kind of concentration camp or institutionalized for nothing more than having had a run of bad luck. I don't think the public is ready ready for that, with good reason.

The other non-solution solution is to just have the cops kick them out of town and don't worry about what happens to them, as long as it's not your jurisdiction. That only kicks the problem down the road, however.

So in the absence of any coherent policy, here we are.

[StealthRabbit]

Or..."hurting people's feelings". Could just mean holding recipients and leaders responsible for living within the constraints of rules, such as contribution of labor, finances, cleanliness, community service... Or living within the social constraints of treating others with respect and safety.

Having lived and worked in countries with Housing First.... There are expected minimum requirements of behavior and contributions (financial and service). And quite serious repercussions of not complying. Which would be deemed abusive in the eyes of USA coddled / spoiled / entitled behaviors.

Beyond hurt feelings, there can be physical punishment. That's not gonna fly in Oregon.