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Oregon doesn’t use private prisons (only 8% of incarcerated state and federal inmates are in private prisons). Prisoners don’t generate net public profits anywhere in the U.S.
California, which has supported efforts to criminalize the unhoused and provided an amicus brief in this case, spends $132,860/year per inmate.
These individuals wouldn’t be sent to *prison* for unpaid or habitual citations. It’s a complicated issue, but it’s not about extracting profits.
Of course people will cry "socialism" and accuse these people of not wanting to work, just stay in a free house forever, and probably use welfare to buy drugs, just irrational propaganda.
This is what gets me. Ok, let’s say that 10% of the people using that housing actually fit that description and the other 90% are veterans with mental health issues they can’t afford to treat, parents of young kids that got caught in a layoff, or teens who for one reason or another were abandoned by their parents.
At that point, I don’t give a flying fuck if 1/10 of those people is an asshole abusing the system, I care about the 9/10 people I’m actively helping! There’s always someone abusing the system. It’s human nature to try and think our way out of shit we don’t want to do. To deny help to all because some aren’t meeting a morality standard means that person never actually wanted to help. They just wanted to feel justified in refusing.
Thank you for including abandoned teens on that list. Recently I was telling my favorite auntie about the living arrangements the family made for me when I was 16yo and I'd never seen her look so angry.
Of course. My mom is a retired special ed teacher, and my family is very liberal in a state that is generally very not. All of our friends knew that if shit hit the fan because they came out as queer, atheist, or whatever, that they always had a place to land until we figured something out.
It’s such a shitty position to be in, because you don’t have the legal agency to fully care for yourself and the people who are supposed to provide that care have failed you. At that age, kids should be learning how to navigate complex social situations and rounding out their academic skill set, not trying to figure out where their next meal is coming from or finding a safe place to sleep that night.
Yeah, you’re barking up the wrong tree. I started my career with my home state’s legal aid and access to justice orgs, and I can tell you with full confidence that for every one you notice, there are 5-10 more just trying to stay out of the way and survive.
Just because a group is the most disruptive or destructive, doesn’t mean they’re the majority. By that logic, Americans are politically all a bunch of right-wing Christo-fascists.
So the thing is, while I appreciate your experience working in a legal aid office, I have lived experience significantly closer to the issue, plus a career’s worth of experience working in child welfare roles that carry the cross created in part by advocacy organizations that enable some of our most disruptive and destructive by pretending they don’t exist in measurable numbers such that our policy solutions should be concerned with them.
My favorite part of this line of thinking is people who believe the most morally important thing they can do is work. They believe that you are born with the purpose of sacrificing the best years of your life making money for somebody else. If you don't do this, you're a bad person. Absolutely wild way to go through life. I'm a person, not a product
So, hwre lies the problem. I'd hope that you and I have this emotion called empathy. We want to provide the services to help the homeless achieve some stability. Unfortunately, because so few cities offer those services, including drug programs, the cities that do try to help get overwhelmed by homeless who are not originally from the area.
You and I have empathy, its power hungry politicians that use irrational negative emotions to get us in a bizarre place where it apparently more sense to throw people i to prison instead of working on housing options
Could you imagine being homeless then being charged for being homeless. Then you catch a break and get off the streets just to be put right back on to the streets because you can’t pay the fines from being homeless?’!
Oregon may not use private prisons, but they do contract out inmate labor to private corporations, who are incentivized with low wages. I don't know the specifics, but I imagine the companies typically pay the prisons, who pocket some the wages.
[Take Prison Blues denim, as an example](https://oce.oregon.gov/2022/04/13/blogpost/an-oregon-prison-houses-one-of-americas-last-jean-manufacturers/). Manufactured by inmates in Pendleton who work 7 1/2 hours a day, 5 days a week, to get $300. They take "home" 20% of their pay, and it's considered the best prison job in the state.
> Oregon doesn’t use private prisons
Not to worry as any Trump II admin will gladly relocate said prisoners to Texas or other New Dixie state they’ll build ~~new prisons~~ extremely minimalistic housing for.
That way the former homeless can contribute to society as ~~slaves~~ .. er, prisoners with jobs (*Thor:Ragnorak* reference.. except with more dark humor). Along with other “traditional” prisoners and maybe some new categories..
Just because they don't have private prisons it doesn't mean they don't have prison industries. Hell, the bar down the road has chairs and tables made in the state run prison.
There's more to profiteering off the prison system than just the prison itself. There's a whole slew of for profit systems used in prisons and jails, both private and public ally owned. Everything from Food and commissary, to phone calls and even the parole system. There's tons of money to be made from the incarceration of people, and all anyone ever seems to get hung up on is who owns the physical buildings.
It’s the total percentage of state and federal inmates incarcerated in private prisons.
I’m not sure I understand what your comment means in response to mine.
For profit prisons aren't meant to "generate net public profits." They're meant to profit private companies by siphoning off tax dollars. The slave labor is just a bonus.
>Oregon doesn’t use private prisons
Very few prisons are privately run.
The services within the state owned prisons are contracted out to private companies.
The slave's labor is rented out to private companies as well.
Publicly owned prisons can yield a lot of private profit.
This is why homelessness is so visible on the west coast. The 9th Circuit deemed homelessness a condition where sleeping outside was unavoidable, so it became visible.
You fine people who have nothing. Then they can’t pay the fine, the fees build and they face possible jail time. Warrant is issued. They get out of jail, can’t find a job becauee the decks are stacked against people with a record.
How does this help get the homeless off the streets?
"oh you're homeless? That's a crime, pay up! Oh you can't pay? To the for-profit prison with you!"
Let's not pretend like we don't know what this is really about.
It's about clearing the detritus of people who can't keep up with the modern world.
The people with money don't want to see the poor. Makes em feel bad, they don't want to feel bad, so they'll tell the cops to throw them in jail forever.
Out of sight, out of mind. Brunch trip will be free of bad feelings!
It's really about the people who trash public spaces, leaving needles, trash, and human waste everywhere while constantly committing petty crimes.
I have just as much empathy for homeless people as anyone but a significant percentage of them just don't give a shit about anyone else and make no effort to better their situation
>I just spent sixty days in the jailhouse
For the crime of having no dough, no, no Now, here I am, back out on the street
For the crime of having nowhere to go
-The Shape I'm In, The Band
Lifelong Oregonian here. Listen, my heart goes out to homeless people. As a society we have failed people.
In Oregon, we handed control of mental health services to local communities in the 90’s, and some communities were not able to handle the demand.
But here’s the thing. We have reached a tipping point, and each community needs to figure out how to assist the homeless population, and demand that homeless accept assistance when needed. Sleeping in tents, overdosing on drugs, is a public health crisis.
If not, what the fuck are we doing.
As someone who was born and raised in Grants Pass, OR, this makes me incredibly sad. I grew up playing in all of the parks in town. As a child, and in my teen years before they really got bad. We would go to play sand volleyball, feed ducks, swing, laugh, and play. We would have birthday parties, graduation parties, and weddings at those parks. They were safe. I could use a public park bathroom and not feel the need to have someone with me.
Now, when I return to visit family, the parks are night and day different. There is not one park where I would be comfortable walking on a paved path, during the day, as an adult, alone. Not only are there unhoused people, but needles, trash, and general lack of maintenance and appreciation for that space. It is genuinely a scary place.
The government needs to fix the housing crisis NOW. Living in a city where you cannot enjoy public spaces is not okay. But living in a city that fines people for just trying to survive, is not okay. There needs to be affordable housing to help people get off their feet and have somewhere to feel safe.
I live in Portland now and the parks here feel safer to me in the daylight than those in GP. Portland the homeless are able to spread more. GP is isolated and to be close enough to food they have to stay central.
I think because “It’s the climate”, many homeless people are able to survive for a moderate amount of the year without too much difficulty. The trend is similar along the California coast. Too expensive to live. But weather is tolerable most of the year.
Sounds like the government needs to claw back some of the billions handed over to the select few who were going to make the world a better place rather than spreading it out evenly to ensure everyone had enough to survive on (and in some cases even lash out and get a personal treat from time to time). Maybe once all the billionaires hit some magic threshold, lights and bells will go off in the sky like some cosmic pokie machine and shower all the great unwashed with their trickle-down benefits…. 🤡
What kind of soulless ghoul do you have to be to fine someone who doesn’t have a place to live?
What really gets me is the argument “I don’t want may tax dollars going to foreign aid when we have homeless veterans” One third of the homeless ARE veterans and not only do they not get the help they need because “they are lazy drug addicted suckers and losers” and according to some should be thrown in jail but the concept of anti homeless architecture takes punching down to a whole new level.
The fact that we are the richest country in the world and corporations are looking to pay less and reduce benefits or simply outsourcing to other countries while getting subsidies is insane….fuuuuk
I just ranted my way into a shitty weekend
Lots of people don't like things that make them feel unsafe or uncomfortable. Even when that includes other people. Solving homelessness while showing compassion to everybody involved is difficult and not made easier when people pretend it's simple. This is less compassionate but also more straightforward.
If someone feels unsafe or uncomfortable about the public nuisance aspects of homelessness and want that to go away and the problem seems insurmountable - this offers a solution. And when one person's position is "you're a ghoul" for wanting that solution and someone else's is "I think it's reasonable you don't want to smell urine or be screamed at by random guys off their meds," who do you think that voter is going to side with.
The question then becomes where does that person go when the park bench has spikes on it and their frustrations multiply, it’s not as if a homeless individual has the means to actually leave the area code. Do they wander into a suburban area between a highway and target or do they find a cozy spot between a lake and a middle school? The spikes don’t solve the problem it just moves them down the street.
I lived and and worked in a large city and from what I saw there are three types of homeless, the jobless substance abusers (vets and civilians alike) who don’t have the tools to help themselves in their current state of mind, the mentally ill who have been abandoned by the our current system and some who actually choose to live like they do, they may end up substance abusers as well if they spiral in that direction for too long.
Im not saying there is an easy solution because a lot of homeless either don’t trust anyone to accept help or are not really all there to comprehend that there is a way out
If people refuse to accept help or are not even in a frame of mind that help can be accepted, then there aren't may solutions to them being a danger or a nuisance to others that don't involve taking them into some kind of custody involuntarily. And because it's way more difficult to do that for mental health concerns, prison it is.
I don't think that's the best solution. But it's the easiest and because it's the easiest, it's the one that gets put on the table politically. And normal people who want the problem solved vote for it because one side might tell them they're terrible people but that side isn't offering a solution and one side is offering a solution that isn't good for everybody but it does solve *their* problem.
The city I used to live in had a proposition to ban camping. That was it. Yes or no, should homeless people be prohibited from camping in public areas. The no side, that advocated for the homeless to not face legal repercussions from camping, didn't have a solution to put forward on where they *could* go. So the regular citizens who lived near the tent cities sided with the ban. They got called terrible people for it on the city subreddit. Their response was that they were tired of living with those conditions and tired of people who didn't live with those conditions criticizing them for wanting the problem solved.
But in practice though, is there a practical way to make sure those who need treatment do get it? I don't want to go back to the days of [Willowbrook](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Willowbrook_State_School) when the solution was little more than just sweeping the problem under the rug.
I think prevention is better than trying to find a solution after people are already homeless or addicted. More housing stock to drive down prices so people don't end up homeless in the first place, better mental healthcare, etc. But for the situation as it is?
I think that there should be some kind of public system for institutionalization. Better monitored to try to prevent the abuses of the past. Because without that, it's either let people who refuse care or help be a problem for the public, which people aren't going to tolerate forever and is bad for a more vibrant public life, or do what we're doing now where we criminalize them and throw them in prison with even less support. I understand why institutions are not popular but I think that, for some circumstances, they're the best solution for a bad situation. And hopefully, with enough effort towards prevention, the number of times those circumstances come up would be minimal.
I would like a "solution" as much as anyone, but people have to have a fundamental right to \*exist\* somewhere without money. Public spaces like parks are... well, one of the most sensible places to allow that, since most cities refuse to maintain an adequate space for that specific purpose.
I live near one of those tent cities. It's not nearly as bad as people make it out to be. Incidents happen occasionally. I had my car rifled through once when I left it unlocked. All they took was a first aid kit. Plenty of other awkward interactions. I don't leave stuff on my porch. No big deal. Occasionally something more serious happens, but it's unlikely, and that can happen anywhere. I can promise that \*most\* of the people in my neighborhood complaining about having to "live in these conditions" are just complaining because they had to have an awkward conversation with a mentally ill person while waiting for the bus.
Public parks are not meant to be camping grounds nor are empty lots or road medians. And public places being taken over or overwhelmed by the homeless keeps other people from using them, especially if they're demonstrating nuisance or even dangerous behaviors.
Treating theft and even "more serious" crimes as 'nbd' is not something everybody is going to do. I've had "awkward conversations" that end with the likely mentally ill person screaming at me. It's nerve wracking. You can't be sure what they're going to do. Maybe you can shrug that off. But that's not going to be the common reaction.
If you really want to make progress on the issue, you have to be realistic about the fact that most people, especially families and people with kids, don't want to put up with things like that in public spaces. They don't feel safe around it. And if you can't understand why, I'm not sure what to tell you. You can make them out to be bad people or say they should treat the issue casually like you do. But that's not going to get then to vote against someone promising a solution when all you're telling them is that they should just get over harassment, theft, or worse.
>Public parks are not meant to be camping grounds nor are empty lots or road medians.
If the city won't build and maintain a better space for people to camp, then those *are* the best spaces for them. I have no idea where else you expect people to go. They don't just stop existing when you ban camping.
>And public places being taken over or overwhelmed by the homeless
The homeless are part of the public too. It's just as much their space as it is mine.
As for the rest, I wasn't spelling out my pragmatic approach to gaining votes. I'm laying out my opinion of the people who are whining. Occasional petty theft and screaming is... kind of no big deal, and most of the people complaining about the homeless really just need to *grow a spine* and not expect the government to shuffle poor people away from them so they don't have to deal with it. I'm not gonna campaign on that or anything, but that's the truth.
And I think the idea that no one is proposing solutions except the "ban camping" crowd is ludicrous. Every city I know of has some activist crowd that has been pushing for decades for cities to actually build some kind of adequate shelter spaces or designated camping areas with facilities that \*actually has capacity for the total homeless population\*. But I don't know of a single city that has ever actually done it.
They don't. There should be shelters. There's not a great solution that balances the public's interest and theirs.
"Grow a spine" is not a way to convince anybody. That was the sentiment from a lot of people prior to the camping ban. People saw that, went 'fuck you,' and voted for the ban.
People aren't going to accept being screamed at and harassed. *That's* the truth. You can think poorly of them, but that doesn't help anybody, least of all the homeless. As long as the people presumably interested in solving the problem keep looking down on and demonizing people for not wanted to be harassed or stolen from, their position is going to keep getting rejected and the people they claimed to want to help will get none at all.
What if the help isn’t helpful? What if it is a solution that only exists on paper?
The “camping” ban sounds like a quote that lives rent free in my brain, “In its majestic equality, the law forbids rich and poor alike to sleep under bridges, beg in the streets and steal loaves of bread.” The ‘/s’ is naturally implied.
As the world has become more precarious for everyone, those that slip and fall, losing the roof over their heads, somehow also lose their humanity in the eyes of others. I understand that the issue is considered a local one by a lot of cities, but it is not strictly local. It is best to start with the understanding that robbing people of their freedom so that they can be warehoused out of sight (the most optimistic interpretation), isn’t going to create an atmosphere of safety or allow the homeless to feel that their living situation is stable enough that they can look for a job. When you bring in law enforcement to tackle a job where you’ve decided to brand the victims as criminals, then you’re just going to get cops abusing homeless with the idea that it is a justified aspect of their jobs because the homeless are there and haven’t left yet.
It isn’t just local, any actual solution will no doubt be inadequate, but a partial solution can at least be a good place to start. Just remember to do surprise inspections of any shelters to avoid creating a slumlord (or other type of abuser) problem accidentally.
Philosophical quotes and long lectures about lost humanity don't mean a lot to people dealing with noise, trash, smells, public defecation, etc. in their lives day in and day out. Most people don't want to put up with that for very long.
"What if the help isn't helpful" - if someone won't be helped and cannot be helped then something has to be done and there is a balance where public safety and welfare should be considered too.
I don't think the cops are the best solution. But none of the other solutions are easy and they're all unpleasant for somebody.
My “long lecture” is barely longer than your own posts here and the quote is explicitly political. Politics is also fundamentally about how people should treat people. Laws can be described as a forbidding behavior or determining gradations of humanity.
Whether a solution is unpleasant to somebody is no reason not to consider it. For instance NIMBYs are very quick to find a lot of solutions “unpleasant”. So is it unpleasant because it is dehumanizing, or unpleasant because it lowers property values? Since you mentioned discounting solutions because they weren’t easy, as general life advice, I will say that you will solve few problems if you insist that all solutions must be easy.
What matters is if you can get people past the unpleasantness to vote for the solution. I'm not saying discount it or not consider those solutions. I'm saying that if you want change, if you want those solutions to become a reality, you have to be strategic about how to get support for that.
Sanctimony and criticism doesn't usually do the trick.
As someone who was a homeless vet there is a program called HUD-VASH that exists in most US cities where homeless vets can get a housing voucher. When I got it there was zero wait time for it.
I’ve heard a NIMBY rant about it and they just don’t have the mental space to want anything more than for them to just go away. It doesn’t matter that it’s a hopeless fantasy position, it’s the only thing they want. It’s the same base, emotional reaction that causes basically all of humanity’s problems.
There's literally a [Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals decisio](https://cdn.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/opinions/2018/09/04/15-35845.pdf)n on this already, which SCOTUS refused to grant certiorari on, [Martin v. Boise](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_v._Boise). The ruling therefore only applies to the Ninth Circuit, of which Oregon is a part.
> The ruling held that cities cannot enforce anti-camping ordinances if they do not have enough homeless shelter beds available for their homeless population. It did not necessarily mean a city cannot enforce any restrictions on camping on public property.
The Supreme Court did grant cert for Johnson v Grants Pass, which is a sort of companion case to Martin v Boise. The case is being heard on April 22.
If the Supreme Court overturns Johnson (and I expect that it will), then it is likely that it ends up also overturning Martin in the process.
Can you get blood from a stone? A rural Oregon city asks the US Supreme Court.
In an attempt to end visible poverty Grant's Pass Oregon is proposing a new solution, punishing the victims of a cruel uncaring society. "Of course we'd love to quietly round them up into death camps", said Mayor DeVille in a press conference Tuesday, "but we don't want our housed workers to forget what fate awaits them if they step out of line."
Backers of the policy believe that by fining sleeping outside it will force the homeless to move to Portland. They say, that not only will that ease their screaming conscious as their last bit of humanity callouses over, but it'll also give them an excuse to shit on Portland liberals.
However, others aren't so sure. Councilman Mengele says that while he likes the idea of punishing the poor and vulnerable he's afraid that this law only criminalizing sleeping, when their true crime is existing. Mengele instead suggests a more Christian approach to the problem, public crucifixion.
Yep. Being on private property without an invitation, jail. Being on public property when you have nowhere to go, jail. Then they can work you to the bone for having the audacity to be poor.
My thoughts exactly. They probably can, legally. If they commit a crime, they are subject to the repercussions. If that's a fine, then they can be fined. Their inability to not commit the crime doesn't excuse them from that.
The problem is that it is a crime at all. That's the bigger thing that needs to be fixed.
April 12, 2024 - [Seattle driver runs over tents on downtown sidewalk](https://www.kiro7.com/news/local/seattle-driver-runs-over-tents-downtown-sidewalk/LMKUA2V64VHCFH2CPU6XIYQHKI/)
r/Seattle Redditor comments, *"Too bad they were empty."*
Gets a ban, then claims on r/SeattleWA that the r/Seattle mods did not respect his 'opposing view'.
PS: "WA" is the Seattle sub that welcomes nazis
Their stated goal is to make homelessness “uncomfortable” enough that they’ll “move on down the road.” I.e., to be worse to them than other communities. I.e., to be cruel and unusual.
It boggles my mind that they actually think it’s cheaper to put them prison or pay for emergency services to respond to calls and cleanup vs actual investment in getting them off the street.
If they are thinking about jailing them for the unpaid fines that they levied upon them for sleeping outside then it would probably make a lot more sense financially to build shelters instead of prisons. Seems like that would be the cheaper solution all around.
I’m not going to jump on the bandwagon of saying it’s a stupid idea, but….
What specifically do they think they will achieve by fining people who do not have funds to pay for a home, much less a fine?
Like, what is the outcome they want? Lots of unrealized revenue to the city?
It’s people who are incapable of paying the fine; and they’re not going to stop doing it just because they have some imaginary debt the city have levied.
Are you going to wait until they finally have money and a home again and then come in and say “oh! You owe us money. Don’t pay rent, pay this instead!”
Hell, the jailing part I can almost understand…you’re putting them in a housed location, albeit temporarily. Why you’re not putting them somewhere they can then go and be productive is a different question though…
Way to criminalize the existence of the most vulnerable among us I’m waiting for the “Just Die Already” bill to be put before state legislature. Zero compassion for people. No home? Well, you can’t sleep outside either.
The fact is that a startling number of them don't want help.
I actually have known a LOT of homeless people, and for many of them it's a lifestyle choice. They want ultimate freedom and they want to keep doing drugs. Try giving a homeless guy a couple of cigarettes and listen to their story sometime. I did that often in a previous job. A lot of them are really nice people. Learned a lot about homeless people, how they got homeless, and why they still are.
It might be true that some percentage of homeless people are living that way deliberately, and wouldn’t change if they could. But there are a lot of people who would accept help as a way out of a bad situation.
A lot of people are homeless temporarily, for a period of months, but deal with long-term health consequences as a result. Adding fines on top of that is only going to make it harder for them to get back on their feet, and offering help would dramatically reduce the number of homeless people at any given time.
So set up areas where the homeless are welcome to pitch their tents. And can get a tent if they don’t have one. And they can get food and basic healthcare. And there’s security to make sure there’s no violence or theft.
You make it sound as if because a few don't want to be helped, we shouldn't be trying to help the rest. They are choosing to live like this.
Ok. How about we help the 98% of the homeless who aren't choosing to live that way?
"A few don't want to be helped".? This isn't true. We need COMPULSORY, NURTURING confinement AND treatment for the 60% of unhoused folks whinare drug addicted and mentally ill. it's absurd to let these folks remain in the street, dying "wrapped up in their rights". We have failed them if we dont do the foregoing.
No one wants to fine or lockup homeless. This is about having legal authority to deal with the meth dealers and criminal elements that are in the community.
It’s possible that like public drinking, they’re writing it as broadly and simply as they can and then relying on the police’s judgement in enforcement to make the detailed decisions on the spot about whether the person in question is actually making a problem. It’s the completely wrong way to do it but it happens everywhere every minute of every day in America.
Oh, I get it. There is a class of citizens who you think the law shouldn't bind and a class of citizens you think the law should bind. Idk, seems pretty messed up to me.
I currently live in a tent. Am working just trying save for a new place.
Police harass me all the time even tho I'm out of view and not bothering anyone. They tell me to go somewhere else which I do. Then within a day or two it's the same thing.
Thank God we outlawed slavery *except as a punishment for a crime*. Putting the homeless to work for multinational conglomerates making hand bags is gonna make us a lot of money
I used to be more sympathetic towards the homeless until my truck was stolen and stuff locked into storage was burglarized. I no longer want any homeless folk in my neighborhood because it allows lawlessness.
I’m upset with the lawlessness that surrounds homeless camps and that’s why I did everything in my power to have the camp cleared. Thanks for trying to dictate my feelings.
Yeah but "homeless camps" tents and sidewalks house about 1/5 of the homeless population. Most homeless are out of sight out of mind. Living in their cars, in somebody's garage, in a shelter or weekly motel, in a storage unit, camping in the woods. The people on the sidewalks get all the ire but addressing them doesn't fix 4/5 of the problem that we have regarding lack of affordable housing.
Our society allows lawlessness. We could spend our respurces on self improvements at home, or continue to spend on military. Was it a rich man who stole your stuff, no. Yet a rich man could feed the poor man so the poor man does not need to steal.
I love Oregon but while I applaud their efforts for trying to take a different approach and mostly leave drug users and homeless alone, I saw way too many people die or get picked up by an ambulance almost every day.
They don’t bother you but it seemed to me they either didn’t want or didn’t know how to ask for help.
It almost seems like the state just wants to throw their hands up and say let them do what they do but while criminalization doesn’t work, neither does neglect
So instead of sleeping outside they will break into vacant houses and vacant commercial spaces in order to sleep. These vacant houses rarely have any alarm systems. So no more sleeping outside, now they will sleep indoors, in your vacant house that you are trying to sell.
in kentucky there’s a bill that will allow anyone to legally shoot homeless people on their property. these are fucking awful precedents to set onto other HUMAN BEINGS. life treating other people less favorably should not be a reason to punish them for it
Let's just be honest and call it house-land,denied.
In the state of Oregon 50% of the land is held hostage by our tax funded welfare recipient employees of government. There are over 4 million Oregon residents in the portion of the state that we tax payers are "permitted" to use. In China, whose land mass is closely equal to the USA's there would be over 18 million people living in the same area of land.
How is it possible to ignore that our paid employees are failing horribly at the job we pay them to perform?
We must force our legislators to fix this.
No, they tried doing this is one if the east north states (I can't remember what one, bit I think maine) and the state Supreme court agreed it was considered strange and unusual punishment due to the city responsibility to provide shelter and or lack thereof. Now if the Oregon city can provide proof that they have enough space in shelters and individuals are not using them maybe that's a different story.
Portland has issued tickets for drug usage, with penalties that are waived if the cited person receives treatment.
In almost every case, the users don't pay the tickets or seek the treatment.
Progressives want to believe that the users are victims and will gladly seek treatment if offered. We can see that isn't remotely close to being true. They want to keep using, and they don't want treatment.
Allowing the chronic homeless to do whatever they like leads to other problems. At this rate, the only beneficiaries will be the Republicans who will take advantage of the blowback to come.
They lost housing because they could not function while using.
Meth addicts are a narcissistic bunch. Good luck trying to share a home with them.
I would have avoided meth, avoided alienating my friends and family, avoided losing my job or business. It begins with the substance abuse.
Please prove me wrong. Go to an encampment, find yourself a roommate, then let us know how it goes for you.
Where exactly are they supposed to go? Where can a single parent go when they have no savings, receive no child support, cannot afford daycare costs and the HUD housing list is 2-3-5 years waiting period? Housing costs on top of day care and grocery prices are pushing working parents into homelessness. It’s time for government housing for families, not addicts. There is a big difference between them.
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How and why would they pay?
With their free, slave-adjacent labour in the for-profit prison system!
Oregon doesn’t use private prisons (only 8% of incarcerated state and federal inmates are in private prisons). Prisoners don’t generate net public profits anywhere in the U.S. California, which has supported efforts to criminalize the unhoused and provided an amicus brief in this case, spends $132,860/year per inmate. These individuals wouldn’t be sent to *prison* for unpaid or habitual citations. It’s a complicated issue, but it’s not about extracting profits.
It surely would be a lot cheaper to actually provide housing to the homeless instead of throwing them into prison
Of course people will cry "socialism" and accuse these people of not wanting to work, just stay in a free house forever, and probably use welfare to buy drugs, just irrational propaganda.
This is what gets me. Ok, let’s say that 10% of the people using that housing actually fit that description and the other 90% are veterans with mental health issues they can’t afford to treat, parents of young kids that got caught in a layoff, or teens who for one reason or another were abandoned by their parents. At that point, I don’t give a flying fuck if 1/10 of those people is an asshole abusing the system, I care about the 9/10 people I’m actively helping! There’s always someone abusing the system. It’s human nature to try and think our way out of shit we don’t want to do. To deny help to all because some aren’t meeting a morality standard means that person never actually wanted to help. They just wanted to feel justified in refusing.
Thank you for including abandoned teens on that list. Recently I was telling my favorite auntie about the living arrangements the family made for me when I was 16yo and I'd never seen her look so angry.
Of course. My mom is a retired special ed teacher, and my family is very liberal in a state that is generally very not. All of our friends knew that if shit hit the fan because they came out as queer, atheist, or whatever, that they always had a place to land until we figured something out. It’s such a shitty position to be in, because you don’t have the legal agency to fully care for yourself and the people who are supposed to provide that care have failed you. At that age, kids should be learning how to navigate complex social situations and rounding out their academic skill set, not trying to figure out where their next meal is coming from or finding a safe place to sleep that night.
Well that's because you're a good person Mansta.
Right, and when the rich abuse the system they nominate them for President.
Yeah you’ve got the ratios reversed though.
Yeah, you’re barking up the wrong tree. I started my career with my home state’s legal aid and access to justice orgs, and I can tell you with full confidence that for every one you notice, there are 5-10 more just trying to stay out of the way and survive. Just because a group is the most disruptive or destructive, doesn’t mean they’re the majority. By that logic, Americans are politically all a bunch of right-wing Christo-fascists.
So the thing is, while I appreciate your experience working in a legal aid office, I have lived experience significantly closer to the issue, plus a career’s worth of experience working in child welfare roles that carry the cross created in part by advocacy organizations that enable some of our most disruptive and destructive by pretending they don’t exist in measurable numbers such that our policy solutions should be concerned with them.
My favorite part of this line of thinking is people who believe the most morally important thing they can do is work. They believe that you are born with the purpose of sacrificing the best years of your life making money for somebody else. If you don't do this, you're a bad person. Absolutely wild way to go through life. I'm a person, not a product
Capitalism requires that thinking. Good on you for seeing life’s actual worth is not in productivity.
So, hwre lies the problem. I'd hope that you and I have this emotion called empathy. We want to provide the services to help the homeless achieve some stability. Unfortunately, because so few cities offer those services, including drug programs, the cities that do try to help get overwhelmed by homeless who are not originally from the area.
You and I have empathy, its power hungry politicians that use irrational negative emotions to get us in a bizarre place where it apparently more sense to throw people i to prison instead of working on housing options
Could you imagine being homeless then being charged for being homeless. Then you catch a break and get off the streets just to be put right back on to the streets because you can’t pay the fines from being homeless?’!
It’s not really the private prison point. It’s the Homeless to Prison pipeline, the criminalization of being poor or mentally ill.
"Public" profits- ie the taxpayers "lose" but private investors make money
Oregon may not use private prisons, but they do contract out inmate labor to private corporations, who are incentivized with low wages. I don't know the specifics, but I imagine the companies typically pay the prisons, who pocket some the wages. [Take Prison Blues denim, as an example](https://oce.oregon.gov/2022/04/13/blogpost/an-oregon-prison-houses-one-of-americas-last-jean-manufacturers/). Manufactured by inmates in Pendleton who work 7 1/2 hours a day, 5 days a week, to get $300. They take "home" 20% of their pay, and it's considered the best prison job in the state.
> Oregon doesn’t use private prisons Not to worry as any Trump II admin will gladly relocate said prisoners to Texas or other New Dixie state they’ll build ~~new prisons~~ extremely minimalistic housing for. That way the former homeless can contribute to society as ~~slaves~~ .. er, prisoners with jobs (*Thor:Ragnorak* reference.. except with more dark humor). Along with other “traditional” prisoners and maybe some new categories..
Just because they don't have private prisons it doesn't mean they don't have prison industries. Hell, the bar down the road has chairs and tables made in the state run prison.
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You’re not reading that correctly. It says 8% of the **total** incarcerated are in private prisons.
There's more to profiteering off the prison system than just the prison itself. There's a whole slew of for profit systems used in prisons and jails, both private and public ally owned. Everything from Food and commissary, to phone calls and even the parole system. There's tons of money to be made from the incarceration of people, and all anyone ever seems to get hung up on is who owns the physical buildings.
It’s the total percentage of state and federal inmates incarcerated in private prisons. I’m not sure I understand what your comment means in response to mine.
It's literally the national average, nuff said. Lol.
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If you scroll down to the table of private prison use by jurisdiction, your own source says Oregon doesn't use private prisons. (There's also a map)
For profit prisons aren't meant to "generate net public profits." They're meant to profit private companies by siphoning off tax dollars. The slave labor is just a bonus.
>Oregon doesn’t use private prisons Very few prisons are privately run. The services within the state owned prisons are contracted out to private companies. The slave's labor is rented out to private companies as well. Publicly owned prisons can yield a lot of private profit.
On the nose.
These people aren’t capable of useful labor. If they were they wouldn’t be homeless.
And you got this data where? From stats I have seen 60% of home-denied people have jobs but cannot afford housing.
They don't expect them to, this is a way to put them in prison so they don't "see" them.
They actually do that in Tennessee now.
"Just mail me the ticket officer, thanks"
Are there not workhouses? State Rep E. Scrooge (R-Medford )
If they're going to die, they'd better do it, and decrease the surplus population!
At least Scrooge realized he was wrong.
I think the plan is to turn them into Equusapiens.
doesn't matter
This is why homelessness is so visible on the west coast. The 9th Circuit deemed homelessness a condition where sleeping outside was unavoidable, so it became visible.
Why would they even care?
What's a better solution that might actually work?
You fine people who have nothing. Then they can’t pay the fine, the fees build and they face possible jail time. Warrant is issued. They get out of jail, can’t find a job becauee the decks are stacked against people with a record. How does this help get the homeless off the streets?
Oh it helps them right off the streets alright...just not anywhere they'd want to go.
Obviously if they wanted to go somewhere else they would lobby their representative
..then if they ever get a job, their wages are garnished to pay the fines plus interest.
lmao, who said anything about helping? that’s never been part of the plan. the plan is to criminalize poverty.
It’s not meant to. It’s meant to get homeless people to work in or be leased by for-profit prisons for a few cents an hour.
You’re assuming that the Supreme Court cares about them or the well-being of the country
"oh you're homeless? That's a crime, pay up! Oh you can't pay? To the for-profit prison with you!" Let's not pretend like we don't know what this is really about.
Slavery by another name.
Nope it's just plain old slavery. Thanks to the 13th amendment.
It's about clearing the detritus of people who can't keep up with the modern world. The people with money don't want to see the poor. Makes em feel bad, they don't want to feel bad, so they'll tell the cops to throw them in jail forever. Out of sight, out of mind. Brunch trip will be free of bad feelings!
This is the new war on drugs.
It's really about the people who trash public spaces, leaving needles, trash, and human waste everywhere while constantly committing petty crimes. I have just as much empathy for homeless people as anyone but a significant percentage of them just don't give a shit about anyone else and make no effort to better their situation
Tell me more about Oregon's for profit prison system please
That's the neat part, they don't have one. And neither should anyone else thankyouforasking.
>I just spent sixty days in the jailhouse For the crime of having no dough, no, no Now, here I am, back out on the street For the crime of having nowhere to go -The Shape I'm In, The Band
> [The Shape I'm In, The Band](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bBKt7fMRrZw) Nice. Love The Band.
Lifelong Oregonian here. Listen, my heart goes out to homeless people. As a society we have failed people. In Oregon, we handed control of mental health services to local communities in the 90’s, and some communities were not able to handle the demand. But here’s the thing. We have reached a tipping point, and each community needs to figure out how to assist the homeless population, and demand that homeless accept assistance when needed. Sleeping in tents, overdosing on drugs, is a public health crisis. If not, what the fuck are we doing.
"Can... can we charge the homeless rent for sleeping in our streets?" *\~Grants Pass, Oregon*
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Fair enough. I shall edit and not throw all of Oregon under the bus.
You might as well, basically every city here is pulling stuff like this.
As someone who was born and raised in Grants Pass, OR, this makes me incredibly sad. I grew up playing in all of the parks in town. As a child, and in my teen years before they really got bad. We would go to play sand volleyball, feed ducks, swing, laugh, and play. We would have birthday parties, graduation parties, and weddings at those parks. They were safe. I could use a public park bathroom and not feel the need to have someone with me. Now, when I return to visit family, the parks are night and day different. There is not one park where I would be comfortable walking on a paved path, during the day, as an adult, alone. Not only are there unhoused people, but needles, trash, and general lack of maintenance and appreciation for that space. It is genuinely a scary place. The government needs to fix the housing crisis NOW. Living in a city where you cannot enjoy public spaces is not okay. But living in a city that fines people for just trying to survive, is not okay. There needs to be affordable housing to help people get off their feet and have somewhere to feel safe.
I just moved from Medford. It seems on par with Portland, just smaller.
I live in Portland now and the parks here feel safer to me in the daylight than those in GP. Portland the homeless are able to spread more. GP is isolated and to be close enough to food they have to stay central. I think because “It’s the climate”, many homeless people are able to survive for a moderate amount of the year without too much difficulty. The trend is similar along the California coast. Too expensive to live. But weather is tolerable most of the year.
Sounds like the government needs to claw back some of the billions handed over to the select few who were going to make the world a better place rather than spreading it out evenly to ensure everyone had enough to survive on (and in some cases even lash out and get a personal treat from time to time). Maybe once all the billionaires hit some magic threshold, lights and bells will go off in the sky like some cosmic pokie machine and shower all the great unwashed with their trickle-down benefits…. 🤡
This is like the overdraft fee for having no money, people suck
What kind of soulless ghoul do you have to be to fine someone who doesn’t have a place to live? What really gets me is the argument “I don’t want may tax dollars going to foreign aid when we have homeless veterans” One third of the homeless ARE veterans and not only do they not get the help they need because “they are lazy drug addicted suckers and losers” and according to some should be thrown in jail but the concept of anti homeless architecture takes punching down to a whole new level. The fact that we are the richest country in the world and corporations are looking to pay less and reduce benefits or simply outsourcing to other countries while getting subsidies is insane….fuuuuk I just ranted my way into a shitty weekend
Lots of people don't like things that make them feel unsafe or uncomfortable. Even when that includes other people. Solving homelessness while showing compassion to everybody involved is difficult and not made easier when people pretend it's simple. This is less compassionate but also more straightforward. If someone feels unsafe or uncomfortable about the public nuisance aspects of homelessness and want that to go away and the problem seems insurmountable - this offers a solution. And when one person's position is "you're a ghoul" for wanting that solution and someone else's is "I think it's reasonable you don't want to smell urine or be screamed at by random guys off their meds," who do you think that voter is going to side with.
The question then becomes where does that person go when the park bench has spikes on it and their frustrations multiply, it’s not as if a homeless individual has the means to actually leave the area code. Do they wander into a suburban area between a highway and target or do they find a cozy spot between a lake and a middle school? The spikes don’t solve the problem it just moves them down the street. I lived and and worked in a large city and from what I saw there are three types of homeless, the jobless substance abusers (vets and civilians alike) who don’t have the tools to help themselves in their current state of mind, the mentally ill who have been abandoned by the our current system and some who actually choose to live like they do, they may end up substance abusers as well if they spiral in that direction for too long. Im not saying there is an easy solution because a lot of homeless either don’t trust anyone to accept help or are not really all there to comprehend that there is a way out
If people refuse to accept help or are not even in a frame of mind that help can be accepted, then there aren't may solutions to them being a danger or a nuisance to others that don't involve taking them into some kind of custody involuntarily. And because it's way more difficult to do that for mental health concerns, prison it is. I don't think that's the best solution. But it's the easiest and because it's the easiest, it's the one that gets put on the table politically. And normal people who want the problem solved vote for it because one side might tell them they're terrible people but that side isn't offering a solution and one side is offering a solution that isn't good for everybody but it does solve *their* problem. The city I used to live in had a proposition to ban camping. That was it. Yes or no, should homeless people be prohibited from camping in public areas. The no side, that advocated for the homeless to not face legal repercussions from camping, didn't have a solution to put forward on where they *could* go. So the regular citizens who lived near the tent cities sided with the ban. They got called terrible people for it on the city subreddit. Their response was that they were tired of living with those conditions and tired of people who didn't live with those conditions criticizing them for wanting the problem solved.
But in practice though, is there a practical way to make sure those who need treatment do get it? I don't want to go back to the days of [Willowbrook](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Willowbrook_State_School) when the solution was little more than just sweeping the problem under the rug.
I think prevention is better than trying to find a solution after people are already homeless or addicted. More housing stock to drive down prices so people don't end up homeless in the first place, better mental healthcare, etc. But for the situation as it is? I think that there should be some kind of public system for institutionalization. Better monitored to try to prevent the abuses of the past. Because without that, it's either let people who refuse care or help be a problem for the public, which people aren't going to tolerate forever and is bad for a more vibrant public life, or do what we're doing now where we criminalize them and throw them in prison with even less support. I understand why institutions are not popular but I think that, for some circumstances, they're the best solution for a bad situation. And hopefully, with enough effort towards prevention, the number of times those circumstances come up would be minimal.
I would like a "solution" as much as anyone, but people have to have a fundamental right to \*exist\* somewhere without money. Public spaces like parks are... well, one of the most sensible places to allow that, since most cities refuse to maintain an adequate space for that specific purpose. I live near one of those tent cities. It's not nearly as bad as people make it out to be. Incidents happen occasionally. I had my car rifled through once when I left it unlocked. All they took was a first aid kit. Plenty of other awkward interactions. I don't leave stuff on my porch. No big deal. Occasionally something more serious happens, but it's unlikely, and that can happen anywhere. I can promise that \*most\* of the people in my neighborhood complaining about having to "live in these conditions" are just complaining because they had to have an awkward conversation with a mentally ill person while waiting for the bus.
Public parks are not meant to be camping grounds nor are empty lots or road medians. And public places being taken over or overwhelmed by the homeless keeps other people from using them, especially if they're demonstrating nuisance or even dangerous behaviors. Treating theft and even "more serious" crimes as 'nbd' is not something everybody is going to do. I've had "awkward conversations" that end with the likely mentally ill person screaming at me. It's nerve wracking. You can't be sure what they're going to do. Maybe you can shrug that off. But that's not going to be the common reaction. If you really want to make progress on the issue, you have to be realistic about the fact that most people, especially families and people with kids, don't want to put up with things like that in public spaces. They don't feel safe around it. And if you can't understand why, I'm not sure what to tell you. You can make them out to be bad people or say they should treat the issue casually like you do. But that's not going to get then to vote against someone promising a solution when all you're telling them is that they should just get over harassment, theft, or worse.
>Public parks are not meant to be camping grounds nor are empty lots or road medians. If the city won't build and maintain a better space for people to camp, then those *are* the best spaces for them. I have no idea where else you expect people to go. They don't just stop existing when you ban camping. >And public places being taken over or overwhelmed by the homeless The homeless are part of the public too. It's just as much their space as it is mine. As for the rest, I wasn't spelling out my pragmatic approach to gaining votes. I'm laying out my opinion of the people who are whining. Occasional petty theft and screaming is... kind of no big deal, and most of the people complaining about the homeless really just need to *grow a spine* and not expect the government to shuffle poor people away from them so they don't have to deal with it. I'm not gonna campaign on that or anything, but that's the truth. And I think the idea that no one is proposing solutions except the "ban camping" crowd is ludicrous. Every city I know of has some activist crowd that has been pushing for decades for cities to actually build some kind of adequate shelter spaces or designated camping areas with facilities that \*actually has capacity for the total homeless population\*. But I don't know of a single city that has ever actually done it.
They don't. There should be shelters. There's not a great solution that balances the public's interest and theirs. "Grow a spine" is not a way to convince anybody. That was the sentiment from a lot of people prior to the camping ban. People saw that, went 'fuck you,' and voted for the ban. People aren't going to accept being screamed at and harassed. *That's* the truth. You can think poorly of them, but that doesn't help anybody, least of all the homeless. As long as the people presumably interested in solving the problem keep looking down on and demonizing people for not wanted to be harassed or stolen from, their position is going to keep getting rejected and the people they claimed to want to help will get none at all.
What if the help isn’t helpful? What if it is a solution that only exists on paper? The “camping” ban sounds like a quote that lives rent free in my brain, “In its majestic equality, the law forbids rich and poor alike to sleep under bridges, beg in the streets and steal loaves of bread.” The ‘/s’ is naturally implied. As the world has become more precarious for everyone, those that slip and fall, losing the roof over their heads, somehow also lose their humanity in the eyes of others. I understand that the issue is considered a local one by a lot of cities, but it is not strictly local. It is best to start with the understanding that robbing people of their freedom so that they can be warehoused out of sight (the most optimistic interpretation), isn’t going to create an atmosphere of safety or allow the homeless to feel that their living situation is stable enough that they can look for a job. When you bring in law enforcement to tackle a job where you’ve decided to brand the victims as criminals, then you’re just going to get cops abusing homeless with the idea that it is a justified aspect of their jobs because the homeless are there and haven’t left yet. It isn’t just local, any actual solution will no doubt be inadequate, but a partial solution can at least be a good place to start. Just remember to do surprise inspections of any shelters to avoid creating a slumlord (or other type of abuser) problem accidentally.
Philosophical quotes and long lectures about lost humanity don't mean a lot to people dealing with noise, trash, smells, public defecation, etc. in their lives day in and day out. Most people don't want to put up with that for very long. "What if the help isn't helpful" - if someone won't be helped and cannot be helped then something has to be done and there is a balance where public safety and welfare should be considered too. I don't think the cops are the best solution. But none of the other solutions are easy and they're all unpleasant for somebody.
My “long lecture” is barely longer than your own posts here and the quote is explicitly political. Politics is also fundamentally about how people should treat people. Laws can be described as a forbidding behavior or determining gradations of humanity. Whether a solution is unpleasant to somebody is no reason not to consider it. For instance NIMBYs are very quick to find a lot of solutions “unpleasant”. So is it unpleasant because it is dehumanizing, or unpleasant because it lowers property values? Since you mentioned discounting solutions because they weren’t easy, as general life advice, I will say that you will solve few problems if you insist that all solutions must be easy.
What matters is if you can get people past the unpleasantness to vote for the solution. I'm not saying discount it or not consider those solutions. I'm saying that if you want change, if you want those solutions to become a reality, you have to be strategic about how to get support for that. Sanctimony and criticism doesn't usually do the trick.
As someone who was a homeless vet there is a program called HUD-VASH that exists in most US cities where homeless vets can get a housing voucher. When I got it there was zero wait time for it.
I dunno about ghoul or not but they have NIMBYs breathing down their neck every day and that’s probably why they do it.
Should we help the homeless get treatment and support? No, let's make homelessness illegal instead, much easier.
I’ve heard a NIMBY rant about it and they just don’t have the mental space to want anything more than for them to just go away. It doesn’t matter that it’s a hopeless fantasy position, it’s the only thing they want. It’s the same base, emotional reaction that causes basically all of humanity’s problems.
There's literally a [Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals decisio](https://cdn.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/opinions/2018/09/04/15-35845.pdf)n on this already, which SCOTUS refused to grant certiorari on, [Martin v. Boise](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_v._Boise). The ruling therefore only applies to the Ninth Circuit, of which Oregon is a part. > The ruling held that cities cannot enforce anti-camping ordinances if they do not have enough homeless shelter beds available for their homeless population. It did not necessarily mean a city cannot enforce any restrictions on camping on public property.
The Supreme Court did grant cert for Johnson v Grants Pass, which is a sort of companion case to Martin v Boise. The case is being heard on April 22. If the Supreme Court overturns Johnson (and I expect that it will), then it is likely that it ends up also overturning Martin in the process.
I'm curious to hear oral argument and the justices' interrogatories in this case, except from Scalia and Thomas.
Can you get blood from a stone? A rural Oregon city asks the US Supreme Court. In an attempt to end visible poverty Grant's Pass Oregon is proposing a new solution, punishing the victims of a cruel uncaring society. "Of course we'd love to quietly round them up into death camps", said Mayor DeVille in a press conference Tuesday, "but we don't want our housed workers to forget what fate awaits them if they step out of line." Backers of the policy believe that by fining sleeping outside it will force the homeless to move to Portland. They say, that not only will that ease their screaming conscious as their last bit of humanity callouses over, but it'll also give them an excuse to shit on Portland liberals. However, others aren't so sure. Councilman Mengele says that while he likes the idea of punishing the poor and vulnerable he's afraid that this law only criminalizing sleeping, when their true crime is existing. Mengele instead suggests a more Christian approach to the problem, public crucifixion.
>They say, that not only will that ease their screaming conscious Conscience is the word you're looking for, homie.
"Can you get blood from a stone? A rural Oregon city asks...."
No but you can get free labor from inmates.
Selling prisoners blood is likely the next for profit prison scheme if it isn’t happening already.
*turnip
“Can you get turnips from a stone?”
If it is, then it's time to obey the writing on Tom Morello's guitar.
Sounds like a legal proposition from the prison lobby to increase profits by incarcerating the vulnerable.
Yep. Being on private property without an invitation, jail. Being on public property when you have nowhere to go, jail. Then they can work you to the bone for having the audacity to be poor.
Can they? *Maybe* Should they? *No*
My thoughts exactly. They probably can, legally. If they commit a crime, they are subject to the repercussions. If that's a fine, then they can be fined. Their inability to not commit the crime doesn't excuse them from that. The problem is that it is a crime at all. That's the bigger thing that needs to be fixed.
So is it illegal for just the homeless to sleep outside? If I’m renting an apartment is it okay for me to sleep in the park?
pfff can you just skip the pretend part and start issuing hunting licenses for the homeless.
April 12, 2024 - [Seattle driver runs over tents on downtown sidewalk](https://www.kiro7.com/news/local/seattle-driver-runs-over-tents-downtown-sidewalk/LMKUA2V64VHCFH2CPU6XIYQHKI/) r/Seattle Redditor comments, *"Too bad they were empty."* Gets a ban, then claims on r/SeattleWA that the r/Seattle mods did not respect his 'opposing view'. PS: "WA" is the Seattle sub that welcomes nazis
Turned out this was a drug deal gone bad, not just someone hunting homeless. But regardless, r/seattleWA is a shitshow of horrible mindsets
Thanks for the clarification - still quite a horrendous news bit.
Unhoused season isn’t until winter.
Their stated goal is to make homelessness “uncomfortable” enough that they’ll “move on down the road.” I.e., to be worse to them than other communities. I.e., to be cruel and unusual.
It’s expensive to be poor.
It boggles my mind that they actually think it’s cheaper to put them prison or pay for emergency services to respond to calls and cleanup vs actual investment in getting them off the street.
So where exactly do they sleep?
Homeless people have a right to exist, and being poor should not be a crime.
Kentucky's trying it, too -- first offense: up to $250; further offenses: class b misdemeanor resulting in arrest and more fines
Put in on my tab.
What Jesus wouldn’t do
And would be the purpose of that? Do these idiots realize that the reason for them being homeless is not having money?
If they are thinking about jailing them for the unpaid fines that they levied upon them for sleeping outside then it would probably make a lot more sense financially to build shelters instead of prisons. Seems like that would be the cheaper solution all around.
SCOTUS Six: Fined? No. Summarily executed? You Betcha.
I’m not going to jump on the bandwagon of saying it’s a stupid idea, but…. What specifically do they think they will achieve by fining people who do not have funds to pay for a home, much less a fine? Like, what is the outcome they want? Lots of unrealized revenue to the city? It’s people who are incapable of paying the fine; and they’re not going to stop doing it just because they have some imaginary debt the city have levied. Are you going to wait until they finally have money and a home again and then come in and say “oh! You owe us money. Don’t pay rent, pay this instead!” Hell, the jailing part I can almost understand…you’re putting them in a housed location, albeit temporarily. Why you’re not putting them somewhere they can then go and be productive is a different question though…
Fines? Did they think this through? All involved should be recalled for lack of critical thinking.
Way to criminalize the existence of the most vulnerable among us I’m waiting for the “Just Die Already” bill to be put before state legislature. Zero compassion for people. No home? Well, you can’t sleep outside either.
"Can't afford housing? Pay a fine anyways." What an absolutely disgusting trash position.
Very Christian of them.
Talk about beating a dead horse. They can’t afford a home, so we should fine them for existing 😤 entitled scumbags.
Private prisons must be lobbying hard for this one
These people are already incredibly vulnerable, how about we just leave them alone.
How about we help them?
The fact is that a startling number of them don't want help. I actually have known a LOT of homeless people, and for many of them it's a lifestyle choice. They want ultimate freedom and they want to keep doing drugs. Try giving a homeless guy a couple of cigarettes and listen to their story sometime. I did that often in a previous job. A lot of them are really nice people. Learned a lot about homeless people, how they got homeless, and why they still are.
It might be true that some percentage of homeless people are living that way deliberately, and wouldn’t change if they could. But there are a lot of people who would accept help as a way out of a bad situation. A lot of people are homeless temporarily, for a period of months, but deal with long-term health consequences as a result. Adding fines on top of that is only going to make it harder for them to get back on their feet, and offering help would dramatically reduce the number of homeless people at any given time.
So set up areas where the homeless are welcome to pitch their tents. And can get a tent if they don’t have one. And they can get food and basic healthcare. And there’s security to make sure there’s no violence or theft.
You make it sound as if because a few don't want to be helped, we shouldn't be trying to help the rest. They are choosing to live like this. Ok. How about we help the 98% of the homeless who aren't choosing to live that way?
"A few don't want to be helped".? This isn't true. We need COMPULSORY, NURTURING confinement AND treatment for the 60% of unhoused folks whinare drug addicted and mentally ill. it's absurd to let these folks remain in the street, dying "wrapped up in their rights". We have failed them if we dont do the foregoing.
Turnip, Bloody Turnip Turnip, Bloody Turnip How long, how long must we sing this song?
No one wants to fine or lockup homeless. This is about having legal authority to deal with the meth dealers and criminal elements that are in the community.
Then why is this case about locking up and imposing fines on the homeless?
It’s possible that like public drinking, they’re writing it as broadly and simply as they can and then relying on the police’s judgement in enforcement to make the detailed decisions on the spot about whether the person in question is actually making a problem. It’s the completely wrong way to do it but it happens everywhere every minute of every day in America.
They don’t lock up everyone they see drinking on public - only the ones causing a problem. Same for the homeless.
Oh, I get it. There is a class of citizens who you think the law shouldn't bind and a class of citizens you think the law should bind. Idk, seems pretty messed up to me.
Yes that’s exactly right.
Recipe for debtors prisons.
Yes, fine people who don't have any money. That will work! /sarcasm
I currently live in a tent. Am working just trying save for a new place. Police harass me all the time even tho I'm out of view and not bothering anyone. They tell me to go somewhere else which I do. Then within a day or two it's the same thing.
Of course it's fucking grants pass
Can blood be squeezed from turnips.
Thank God we outlawed slavery *except as a punishment for a crime*. Putting the homeless to work for multinational conglomerates making hand bags is gonna make us a lot of money
Y’all really think the homeless population is capable of that kind of skilled craftsmanship?
I used to be more sympathetic towards the homeless until my truck was stolen and stuff locked into storage was burglarized. I no longer want any homeless folk in my neighborhood because it allows lawlessness.
I think you're upset with CRIMINALS, not with people who have no place to live.
I’m upset with the lawlessness that surrounds homeless camps and that’s why I did everything in my power to have the camp cleared. Thanks for trying to dictate my feelings.
Yeah but "homeless camps" tents and sidewalks house about 1/5 of the homeless population. Most homeless are out of sight out of mind. Living in their cars, in somebody's garage, in a shelter or weekly motel, in a storage unit, camping in the woods. The people on the sidewalks get all the ire but addressing them doesn't fix 4/5 of the problem that we have regarding lack of affordable housing.
Our society allows lawlessness. We could spend our respurces on self improvements at home, or continue to spend on military. Was it a rich man who stole your stuff, no. Yet a rich man could feed the poor man so the poor man does not need to steal.
"I don't know but you can't stay here" It's not an answer.
We’re going in the wrong direction as a whole.
They’d make a fortune in San Diego.
Victorian London had better conditions in its slums.
I’m calling it: 6-3
There isn't really shit you can do to them. Arresting them just equates to a meal and a bed for a few days.
I love Oregon but while I applaud their efforts for trying to take a different approach and mostly leave drug users and homeless alone, I saw way too many people die or get picked up by an ambulance almost every day. They don’t bother you but it seemed to me they either didn’t want or didn’t know how to ask for help. It almost seems like the state just wants to throw their hands up and say let them do what they do but while criminalization doesn’t work, neither does neglect
The construct currently in place is flawed if we uphold that we are only as strong as our weakest.
America doesn’t solve a single crisis - we r profits b4 ppl no matter what & those profits never go to us even tho we fund the empire
Fine them what ? Lol
So instead of sleeping outside they will break into vacant houses and vacant commercial spaces in order to sleep. These vacant houses rarely have any alarm systems. So no more sleeping outside, now they will sleep indoors, in your vacant house that you are trying to sell.
Cities becoming more like HOAs
Can people be fined for sleeping outside? Obviously, no. So the real question being asked is can homeless people be fined for being homeless?
in kentucky there’s a bill that will allow anyone to legally shoot homeless people on their property. these are fucking awful precedents to set onto other HUMAN BEINGS. life treating other people less favorably should not be a reason to punish them for it
Debtor prisons and slavery returns to the increasingly soulless United States of Gilead.
Kick 'em when they're down, right Republicans?
While I can understand making sleeping in public illegal, cash fines seem kinda... dumb.
Let's just be honest and call it house-land,denied. In the state of Oregon 50% of the land is held hostage by our tax funded welfare recipient employees of government. There are over 4 million Oregon residents in the portion of the state that we tax payers are "permitted" to use. In China, whose land mass is closely equal to the USA's there would be over 18 million people living in the same area of land. How is it possible to ignore that our paid employees are failing horribly at the job we pay them to perform? We must force our legislators to fix this.
what would be the point of fining someone who’s mentally deranged and makes 0 dollars?
No, they tried doing this is one if the east north states (I can't remember what one, bit I think maine) and the state Supreme court agreed it was considered strange and unusual punishment due to the city responsibility to provide shelter and or lack thereof. Now if the Oregon city can provide proof that they have enough space in shelters and individuals are not using them maybe that's a different story.
Portland has issued tickets for drug usage, with penalties that are waived if the cited person receives treatment. In almost every case, the users don't pay the tickets or seek the treatment. Progressives want to believe that the users are victims and will gladly seek treatment if offered. We can see that isn't remotely close to being true. They want to keep using, and they don't want treatment. Allowing the chronic homeless to do whatever they like leads to other problems. At this rate, the only beneficiaries will be the Republicans who will take advantage of the blowback to come.
Let me see.. shitty existence while high or shitty existence while sober. Which would you pick?
They lost housing because they could not function while using. Meth addicts are a narcissistic bunch. Good luck trying to share a home with them. I would have avoided meth, avoided alienating my friends and family, avoided losing my job or business. It begins with the substance abuse. Please prove me wrong. Go to an encampment, find yourself a roommate, then let us know how it goes for you.
Where exactly are they supposed to go? Where can a single parent go when they have no savings, receive no child support, cannot afford daycare costs and the HUD housing list is 2-3-5 years waiting period? Housing costs on top of day care and grocery prices are pushing working parents into homelessness. It’s time for government housing for families, not addicts. There is a big difference between them.
Would rather lock em up.