All across our country our most vulnerable citizens are being pushed out of our sight and into the shadows. Our homeless population is at its highest since the deep depression. Back then President Roosevelt formed the WPA program and put millions of Americans back to work on Federal, State and Municipal projects.
Now we hear of stories like Portland Oregon Mayor ordering there police to dismantle and remove the over 4000 homeless people from there camps and throw away what meager belongings they have. .
We also hear of Columbia SC ruling that non profits must pull permits at the cost of 125.00 to set up soap kitchens in a local park to feed the homeless.
Even right here in Lowell we pushed our homeless out of sight. I don't have the answers on how to stop the growing homeless population in our country. Some of the reasons are lack of jobs and the closing of mental health facility's. Substance abuse and returning war veterans with PTSD.
A friend of mine has a saying " You don't punch down" .
Sea ya
The Capt.
The good news is that Utah has broken the code and begun moving homeless into homes. From a strictly practical point of view, it is cheaper than (1) motels and hotels and (2) the costs of visits to Emergency Rooms. Homelessness seems to me to have a broad spectrum of causes, from someone having just lost a job to jobless and lacking skills to jobless and lacking the fundamentals of being an employee to addiction, to mental illness to limited mental capacity to just wanting to be on the road and many things in between. It is one problem, but aside from "Housing First" as a first action, a lot of study is needed before we can properly act.
ReplyDeleteThe homeless are not just a collection of individuals with the same problem, but rather a number of groups of people given the same designation. They are, and we are, individuals.
Regards — Cliff