29 ms·

A Plan to Flood San Francisco with News on Homelessness

119 points by aaronbrethorst 11y ago

azinman2 11y ago
How about bussing back the homeless that cities across the US send to SF, or if Regan wasn't dead sending them to his place since his defunding of mental health flooded the streets with schizophrenics? Edit: see my links below... Not sure why I'm getting down voted but these things happened and contributed to the situation at hand. Homelessness is a very complicated issue, I'm not suggesting this is the entirety of it. http://thinkprogress.org/health/2013/09/11/2602391/san-francisco-sues-nevada-patient-dumping/ http://thinkprogress.org/health/2013/09/11/2602391/san-franc... http://www.povertyinsights.org/2013/10/14/did-reagans-crazy-mental-health-policies-cause-todays-homelessness/ http://www.povertyinsights.org/2013/10/14/did-reagans-crazy-...
- RA_Fisher 11y ago
  They're human, not trash, you know?
  - azinman2 11y ago
    So even worse that they get offloaded like trash by others. What did I say that was indicating otherwise?
- refurb 11y ago
  I suggest you do more research on how we ended up with this situation. Saying "Reagan defunded mental health" gives you about 1% of the picture.
  - azinman2 11y ago
    http://www.povertyinsights.org/2013/10/14/did-reagans-crazy-mental-health-policies-cause-todays-homelessness/ http://www.povertyinsights.org/2013/10/14/did-reagans-crazy-...
  - jonathankoren 11y ago
    Not really. Reagan did do that. He also made a lot of dick moves in the 1980s. That's why he was controversial. He also cut school lunches shortly after taking office which spawned the famous meme "Ketchup is a vegetable."[1] Now I know some hagiographer of Saint Ronald of Hollywood (Peace Be Upon His Name), will say that he never said that. And they would be technically correct. The actual guidelines said that schools "could credit a condiment such as pickle relish as a vegetable." [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ketchup_as_a_vegetable https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ketchup_as_a_vegetable
    - refurb 11y ago
      You're conveniently ignoring the fact that how mental health issues were treated were changing as well. Reagan was hardly at the forefront.
- bogomipz 11y ago
  Wow, that's just terrible thing to say. Really terrible.
  - Crito 11y ago
    He may be factually incorrect, but what is "horrible" about it? If he were right, wouldn't it be wrong for cities to offload their homeless problem on SF? If that were going on, what would be so "horrible" about sending them back, and asking all cities to take their fair share of the burden?
    - azinman2 11y ago
      What's incorrect? And why assume I'm a he?
      - deleted 11y ago
        [deleted]
      - Crito 11y ago
        > may be I see others claiming you are incorrect, but haven't been arsed to actually read their sources to see who is actually right. Regardless, I see nothing "horrible" with what you've said.
      - castis 11y ago
        > And why assume I'm a he? I'm curious. Why do you make this a talking point when you are, in fact, a he?
        azinman2 11y ago
        Do you know my gender identity? I don't believe we've ever met in real life. There's a big gender bias in tech already, and even within anonymous HN I see this in comments all the time where everyone is assumed male and few ever point it out directly. If we want balance in tech these kinds of assumptions need to get chipped away to make others feel welcome. It's the same thing with race, sexuality, etc.
- nosequel 11y ago
  If you actually did research, you'd know that cities sending their homeless to SF is a complete myth. Here are some numbers from SF itself discounting it. https://sfgov.org/lhcb/sites/sfgov.org.lhcb/files/2015%20San%20Francisco%20Homeless%20Count%20%20Report_0.pdf https://sfgov.org/lhcb/sites/sfgov.org.lhcb/files/2015%20San...
  - azinman2 11y ago
    86 page document. Where in there does it say that? I did see that out of state homeless is down at 10% (still significant), but 30% were not in SF when they became homeless. That's high. I don't see anything discounting the bus tickets, however. In fact, the city of SF sued Nevada for exactly this: http://thinkprogress.org/health/2013/09/11/2602391/san-francisco-sues-nevada-patient-dumping/ http://thinkprogress.org/health/2013/09/11/2602391/san-franc... Interesting report! Thanks for linking.
- beatpanda 11y ago
  Everyone else who's downvoting you and responding to this is also correct, but we do purchase bus tickets for people who came from other places and ended up homeless in SF. The program is called "Homeward Bound" and it's pretty good at getting people who have a means of support somewhere else back home. The issue is there are not that many homeless people in SF who came from very far away. Of the minority that did, most of them came from an adjacent county.
sna1l 11y ago
Whenever somebody comes and visits, the first thing they mention about San Francisco is all the homeless people. I hope, for the sake of homeless, that this leads to some substantial, positive change, because currently it feels like they are just being left out to dry.
- BurningFrog 11y ago
  Clearly, wherever your guests are visiting from handles homelessness better.
  - T2_t2 11y ago
    Not if the reason there are none is because they die off each winter. Or because the climate is too harsh in general. Or because of draconian laws that force people to move on.
Chronic51 11y ago
The homeless surely don't act human.
- vemy 11y ago
  I sincerely hope you are not being serious.
- namenotrequired 11y ago
  I don't think you'd think I'd be acting very human if I'd spent any time being treated the way homeless people are treated.
- dang 11y ago
  We've banned this account for trolling, and detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11703747 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11703747 and marked it off-topic.
pfarnsworth 11y ago
I can't believe that SF spends $240M dollars per year on homelessness, and the current environment is the outcome of all that money. Even worse, there is zero accountability so there must be mass corruption and waste taking place because based on what I see every single day, none of that money is being spent properly. http://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/article/S-F-spends-record-241-million-on-homeless-6808319.php http://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/article/S-F-spends-record...
- Camillo 11y ago
  Of course there is massive corruption and waste at all levels of SF government. It is the inevitable outcome when a single party is permanently in power.
  - scurvy 11y ago
    This. It's almost all this. Even worse, these politicians and bureaucrats are later nominated by the machine for higher office. Where they try to screw things up on a grander scale (and only face opposition on the federal level). This is what San Franciscans want and what they get. If you self select to such a narrow mindset, this is the outcome.
- x5n1 11y ago
  If you were building cheap homes, say at 120k a pop, you could build 2,000 such homes every year. The total homeless pop in SF is 6,000. In three years you could build 6,000 such homes in say Mississippi or some other middle of nowhere place where land is very cheap.
  - thrownaway2424 11y ago
    That's not where the money goes. The money goes to responding to every drug addict with a stubbed toe with a giant firetruck and its crew, and then taking the aforementioned drug addict to SF General for the world's most expensive emergency room bath. A little bit of prevention here would be far cheaper.
jMyles 11y ago
Although many people who live without a house are struggling, desperate, addicted, and / or mentally ill, I also think that SF in particular has many such people who are well-adjusted, happy, and simply don't care to live a middle-class lifestyle. For the former, let's get help. But for the latter, let's not judge.
Chronic51 11y ago
We need Donald Trump to get rid of this waste, fraud, and abuse. Literally no other candidate has said this.
- Crito 11y ago
  He's said it alright, but realistically, what can he do about SF corruption? Sic the FBI on the city I guess? Is local political corruption under their jurisdiction?
  - lsiebert 11y ago
    If The Wire had any truth it it, political corruption and terrorism are all the FBI cared about, at one point. That said, people say waste fraud and abuse about the private sector, but forget the millions investors put in private companies that end up being worthless. The difference is, governments have to be accountable about everything they do and if there is one failure, it's taken as representative of the government, whereas an industry can have immense waste, 9 out of ten startups can fail, but people focus on the successes.
- kyledrake 11y ago
  Brilliant strategy. Maybe he will build a border around homeless people.
  - megablast 11y ago
    Well, put a roof on there and it might just work!
- raldi 11y ago
  Your comment is so sarcastic that I have no idea what point you're actually trying to convey.
- dang 11y ago
  We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11703772 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11703772 and marked it off-topic.
vumgl 11y ago
Anyone knows of a city that has successfully "solved" the homelessness problem?
- apenwarr 11y ago
  Utah did, or so they claim: http://www.npr.org/2015/12/10/459100751/utah-reduced-chronic-homelessness-by-91-percent-heres-how http://www.npr.org/2015/12/10/459100751/utah-reduced-chronic...
  - fiatmoney 11y ago
    Easy enough to implement "housing first" where housing is cheap.
    - TulliusCicero 11y ago
      Housing would be a lot cheaper in SF if SF wanted cheaper housing. Yes, they have geographical limitations on how much housing they can build horizontally, but on top of those they also have strict self-imposed limitations on how much they can build vertically.
- BurningFrog 11y ago
  100% solved hardly exists, but is there any city where the problem isn't smaller than in SF?
  - geebee 11y ago
    Maybe Los Angeles? Doubt it, though.
fiatmoney 11y ago
"We need to be a hell of a lot more creative about how we solve this problem" I think that's incredibly unlikely. "Homelessness" is not a technical problem, it's a choice about desired tradeoffs. SF is squeamish about anything that might actually work.
raldi 11y ago
This isn't the usual yada yada; it's a dramatic media experiment. Some quick quotes from the article: Advocacy is a longstanding taboo in American journalism, making reporters and editors wary of discussing solutions to the problems they highlight in their coverage. [T]he question of whether San Francisco’s journalists are crossing into activism has not come up, at least not in the initial meeting of news organizations last month. [...] “It was sort of shocking that there was no dissension [...] On the contrary, the conversation was, ‘Let’s do way more.’” "Your job is to investigate solutions," she said. "People want to read about how to fix broken systems." It's disappointing that most of the comments here are missing all of this, and just focusing on the same old arguments about homelessness that could be made on any of the articles that get written 25 times a week.
- Shivetya 11y ago
  I like how they try to portray the idea that that American journalism isn't on the constant advocacy path because I cannot recall a time they are not. locally (Atlanta here) the homeless situation never comes up unless some over the top sporting event or convention is in town. then its stories about how they are being pushed out or hidden from view. If anything the news plays the lets ignore them line because it doesn't want to jeopardize its access to some politicians by making it an issue. I would assume that in SF either someone in the news finally said "screw it" or they have some unseen politicians in the background giving them the the go. Sorry to sound so cynical but damn if homelessness and similar issues only arise during political season.
  - pdabbadabba 11y ago
    > I like how they try to portray the idea that that American journalism isn't on the constant advocacy path because I cannot recall a time they are not. This is important--and you can see it on the issue of homelessness itself. Journalists' failure to cover homelessness may (charitably) have been borne of a desire for neutrality, but failure to cover an issue is not necessarily neutral in effect. If homeless is, objectively, a serious problem, the failure to cover it is a form of tacit (though inadvertent) support. It's just that ones motives are harder to discern and, thus, one's actions are more readily justified when one does nothing. When one does something, the universe of justifications narrows dramatically, and there's no escaping the fact that the world will be able to see and evaluate your motives.
mynameishere 11y ago
San Francisco has a wealth of homeless people because: 1. The climate is good. 2. The population is rich. and 3. The government is liberal. It's a trifecta of bum-bait. No policy changes aside from going right-wing and shipping them off to Austin or Charlotte (or whatever liberal sucker is next down the list) is going to fix the problem.
- beatpanda 11y ago
  No. Every bit of research on this issue discounts this theory. I'm sure it makes you feel good to say it, but you're wrong.
  - Sacho 11y ago
    That's interesting - how do they discount these theories? Do you have an example of such research?
    - beatpanda 11y ago
      Try reading the rest of this thread
beatpanda 11y ago
"The 30 years of systematic disenfranchisement of poor people never really bothered me," Ms. Cooper said, "But as soon as those disgusting people made me personally uncomfortable, I knew we had to do something." Wow. Golf clap for bravery there. Great work.
- chris_wot 11y ago
  The problem with a systematic dismantling of welfare protection and the denial of things like basic health care is that people who hit rock bottom have got to go somewhere. And if you create a culture where things like a minimum wage are seen as bad for business, you'll get people who don't make enough to live a normal, basic life. They'll be one disaster removed from losing the lot and the landlord turfing them into the streets. When that happens, you can move them on, but they'll eventually grow to such numbers there's nowhere to move them to. One day, you might hit a personal crisis. Or your kids might hit that personal crisis. Or your whole family might find themselves living in a car. Then you will be the one being moved on. And you will curse those who dismantled the welfare systems. You may well be cursing yourself.
  - burfog 11y ago
    Yes, they do have to go somewhere. There is a solution for this in the movie Soylent Green.
    - chris_wot 11y ago
      You really do not want to give the Immigration Department any ideas like this... :-) In all seriousness, refugees are dying on Manus Island and Nauru already, either from suicide, lack of medical care or from violence. In my view, it's only marginally more safe in off-shore detention than it is on the very boats the facilities are meant to be stopping.
- geebee 11y ago
  I was unable to find that quote… are you referring to a different article? If so, would you source it?
chris_wot 11y ago
All I know right now is that if I didn't have my family, I'd be homeless myself right now. Right now I'm utterly, utterly depressed and finding it hard to do anything. It's like trying to run through a vat of molasses, nothing works very fast. I'll probably be better after some more sleep, but I know the black dog and anxiety is always just around the corner. It makes it very hard to do anything let alone look for work. I really don't know how an already homeless person with a worse mental illness does it. I fear they could be the most capable person in the world, but if you hit a certain stage it's very hard to pick up from. It not self-pity either. I constantly tell myself that the feeling isn't reality but just my brain being out of kilter temporarily. And I'm of course correct. But if your head isn't ordered, no amount of positive thinking is ever going to fix it. Sometimes all you can do is ride it out, but you can only do this if you have a safe place to sleep, eat and keep yourself clean. And that sure as hell isn't on the streets. I hope that is never me, but sometimes I realise that I'm only a few steps removed from the situation of those without anything. That's why I get frustrated with so many attitudes towards homelessness and mental illness. Saying that it's there own fault isn't terribly helpful. Maybe it is, maybe it isn't. Maybe some homeless people choose to be homeless. Maybe some are lazy and got into the situation through their own behaviour. But I'll hazard a guess that isn't most people. God help you if you ever hit rock bottom. God help you from the morally outraged, fit and wealthy self-made man. In his eyes, you're worse than a failure, you deserve your situation.
- dosgonlogs 11y ago
  I really appreciate you sharing your personal situation. That last line was amazing. Some people lack compassion, spoiled by their own blessings that they are oblivious to, because their pride hides those blessings from them. Their ego tells them "I worked too hard and am too damn good at what I do, and too damn smart and able to have my success be attributed to anything but my self". Of course I may be citing an extreme example, but I have seen people espouse this line of thinking, because you do see it promoted in subtle and less subtle ways.
- marincounty 11y ago
  I'm in a similar boat. I am one life crisis from being homeless. I've had that feeling of being off kilter since '89. I busted a gasket in that year. The experts said it was nothing besides anxiety, and dysthymia. I said busted a gasket, because in all those years that's the clinical definition that made most sense. I just couldn't blame it all on my chilhood. My heart goes out to you. I know words are cheap, but I truly understand how you feel.
xchaotic 11y ago
This is what struck me when I first visited SF - such a great country, all this tech and you have homeless people on your office doorsteps? " "The measure of a society is found in how they treat their weakest and most helpless citizens." - Jimmy Carter
- raldi 11y ago
  To be fair, in a lot of cities where you don't see homeless people on office doorsteps, it's not because they take better care of their most helpless citizens, but rather because they crack down on them: http://www.nytimes.com/1999/11/20/nyregion/in-wake-of-attack-giuliani-cracks-down-on-homeless.html http://www.nytimes.com/1999/11/20/nyregion/in-wake-of-attack...
- azinman2 11y ago
  SF spends hundreds of millions of dollars on homeless and probably has more services than almost any other city on earth. Whether they're effective or not is a different question...
marincounty 11y ago
1. Don't want them sleeping in tents on sidewalks? Provide a place to pitch a tent that doesn't cost money--maybe rent a piece of land in another county, and use tax payer money for security, etc. Other counties don't want them. Problem. 2. Want to avoid stepping on feces/urine? Build some restrooms? Oh no? They will just have sex in them, or shoot up. Problem. (By the way, I can find a restroom in that lovely city.) 3. That study concluded most homeless are from San Francisco. "Oh, no they arn't! It's a bad study!" Problem. 4. "There here for the benefits?" What benefits? I only know of one benefit, and that benefit was for homeless animals. It was shut down years ago. 5. Every county in the Bay Area has been essentially harassing the Homeless. In Marin County, where your bosses live; there's not one square inch of land that's legal to pitch a tent, or sleep--that's free. If you have no money--you are breaking some municipal/county law by sleeping. 6. Our economy has desimated most jobs. The jobs left don't provide a livable wage. This has been going on for 25-30 years. Problem. 7. I haven't even got to drug use, or mental patients. Problem. 8. Oh yea, why is the Bay Area going to do this day of homeless awareness now? I think the writing us on the walls. I know Willie Brown is publically wondering what SF is going to do with thousands of newly unemployed tech. workers.
- cname 11y ago
  > I can find a restroom ... Did you mean "can't" or maybe "can never"? In most cities I've been to, including SF, it's been really hard to find public restrooms.
Cozumel 11y ago
"Ms. Kernan said her station plans “blanket” coverage on June 29, but will not propose solutions." Just trying to palm it off on everyone else, people know the system is broken, they don't need more whiny ass bitching. They want solutions! Edit: Actually reading further down one of the proposed 'solutions' is building a mental hospital for them all!! That's just horrific, not all of them are mentally ill and that's a dangerous judgement to make. They just need help to get back on their feet. It could just as easily be any one of us in their position!
nametakenobv 11y ago
Carcetti for governor?
alva 11y ago
> her station plans “blanket” coverage on June 29, but will not propose solutions. Surely not blanket coverage to raise awareness? The problem is obvious to any one who has spent a day in the city. I don't think this will elicit the call to action they want. From the relatively little time I have spent in SF and having lived in a number of major cities, the challenges do seem unique. All of the biggest cities have many homeless, however they are not routinely exposing themselves, screaming, lashing out, openly injecting drugs and defecating to the extent they do in SF. I feel incredibly sorry for the homeless described above, it is really hard to work out why the behaviours seem so common in SF and not other cities.
Overtonwindow 11y ago
Forgive my pessimism here, but is this the fourth estate really attempting to expose the problems of homelessness for a solution, or is this an attempt by elites in the media to make the problem go away so they don't have to deal with it. The opening lines where the reporter sees the couple having sex in a tent. That just sets a negative tone for the whole thing. From there it just sounds less like "we need to solve this problem" to "we need to do something to get these people out of here.."
googletazer 11y ago
You should have followed your instincts.
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
- dang 11y ago
  Comments like this are not allowed here. We detached it from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11705156 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11705156 and marked it off-topic.
knightofmars 11y ago
This article, from 1984, describes the policy changes that lead to the decline of mental health institutions and the rise of homeless populations made up of the individuals that were a part of those institutions. http://www.nytimes.com/1984/10/30/science/how-release-of-mental-patients-began.html?pagewanted=all http://www.nytimes.com/1984/10/30/science/how-release-of-men...
- bobwaycott 11y ago
  FYI, the past-tense of the verb "lead" is "led", not its homophone noun "lead".
  - knightofmars 11y ago
    Fast fingers lead to fast mistakes. Thanks. :)
- DrScump 11y ago
  It's not a bit surprising that they omit the role of court decisions, especially O’Connor v. Donaldson (422 U.S. 563, 1975).
erjjones 11y ago
I couldn't even imagine trying to "fix" a homelessness crisis in SF. From here in Indianapolis, IN when the whether turns cold for the winter many homeless get out of town, turn to the shelters or other means of general weather protection. While some will just layer up and deal with the cold. I know a "homeless" man that chooses to be "homeless". He loves the freedom of being able to go and do as he pleases. I would imagine SF has many who enjoy the life style. How do you "fix" that? Besides flat out ordinances with police backing... Very dynamic issue to "fix".

119 points by aaronbrethorst 11y ago

How about bussing back the homeless that cities across the US send to SF, or if Regan wasn't dead sending them to his place since his defunding of mental health flooded the streets with schizophrenics? Edit: see my links below... Not sure why I'm getting down voted but these things happened and contributed to the situation at hand. Homelessness is a very complicated issue, I'm not suggesting this is the entirety of it. http://thinkprogress.org/health/2013/09/11/2602391/san-francisco-sues-nevada-patient-dumping/ http://thinkprogress.org/health/2013/09/11/2602391/san-franc... http://www.povertyinsights.org/2013/10/14/did-reagans-crazy-mental-health-policies-cause-todays-homelessness/ http://www.povertyinsights.org/2013/10/14/did-reagans-crazy-...

RA_Fisher 11y ago
They're human, not trash, you know?
- azinman2 11y ago
  So even worse that they get offloaded like trash by others. What did I say that was indicating otherwise?
refurb 11y ago
I suggest you do more research on how we ended up with this situation. Saying "Reagan defunded mental health" gives you about 1% of the picture.
- azinman2 11y ago
  http://www.povertyinsights.org/2013/10/14/did-reagans-crazy-mental-health-policies-cause-todays-homelessness/ http://www.povertyinsights.org/2013/10/14/did-reagans-crazy-...
- jonathankoren 11y ago
  Not really. Reagan did do that. He also made a lot of dick moves in the 1980s. That's why he was controversial. He also cut school lunches shortly after taking office which spawned the famous meme "Ketchup is a vegetable."[1] Now I know some hagiographer of Saint Ronald of Hollywood (Peace Be Upon His Name), will say that he never said that. And they would be technically correct. The actual guidelines said that schools "could credit a condiment such as pickle relish as a vegetable." [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ketchup_as_a_vegetable https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ketchup_as_a_vegetable
  - refurb 11y ago
    You're conveniently ignoring the fact that how mental health issues were treated were changing as well. Reagan was hardly at the forefront.
bogomipz 11y ago
Wow, that's just terrible thing to say. Really terrible.
- Crito 11y ago
  He may be factually incorrect, but what is "horrible" about it? If he were right, wouldn't it be wrong for cities to offload their homeless problem on SF? If that were going on, what would be so "horrible" about sending them back, and asking all cities to take their fair share of the burden?
  - azinman2 11y ago
    What's incorrect? And why assume I'm a he?
    - deleted 11y ago
      [deleted]
    - Crito 11y ago
      > may be I see others claiming you are incorrect, but haven't been arsed to actually read their sources to see who is actually right. Regardless, I see nothing "horrible" with what you've said.
    - castis 11y ago
      > And why assume I'm a he? I'm curious. Why do you make this a talking point when you are, in fact, a he?
      - azinman2 11y ago
        Do you know my gender identity? I don't believe we've ever met in real life. There's a big gender bias in tech already, and even within anonymous HN I see this in comments all the time where everyone is assumed male and few ever point it out directly. If we want balance in tech these kinds of assumptions need to get chipped away to make others feel welcome. It's the same thing with race, sexuality, etc.
nosequel 11y ago
If you actually did research, you'd know that cities sending their homeless to SF is a complete myth. Here are some numbers from SF itself discounting it. https://sfgov.org/lhcb/sites/sfgov.org.lhcb/files/2015%20San%20Francisco%20Homeless%20Count%20%20Report_0.pdf https://sfgov.org/lhcb/sites/sfgov.org.lhcb/files/2015%20San...
- azinman2 11y ago
  86 page document. Where in there does it say that? I did see that out of state homeless is down at 10% (still significant), but 30% were not in SF when they became homeless. That's high. I don't see anything discounting the bus tickets, however. In fact, the city of SF sued Nevada for exactly this: http://thinkprogress.org/health/2013/09/11/2602391/san-francisco-sues-nevada-patient-dumping/ http://thinkprogress.org/health/2013/09/11/2602391/san-franc... Interesting report! Thanks for linking.
beatpanda 11y ago
Everyone else who's downvoting you and responding to this is also correct, but we do purchase bus tickets for people who came from other places and ended up homeless in SF. The program is called "Homeward Bound" and it's pretty good at getting people who have a means of support somewhere else back home. The issue is there are not that many homeless people in SF who came from very far away. Of the minority that did, most of them came from an adjacent county.

sna1l 11y ago

Whenever somebody comes and visits, the first thing they mention about San Francisco is all the homeless people. I hope, for the sake of homeless, that this leads to some substantial, positive change, because currently it feels like they are just being left out to dry.

BurningFrog 11y ago
Clearly, wherever your guests are visiting from handles homelessness better.
- T2_t2 11y ago
  Not if the reason there are none is because they die off each winter. Or because the climate is too harsh in general. Or because of draconian laws that force people to move on.

Chronic51 11y ago

The homeless surely don't act human.

vemy 11y ago
I sincerely hope you are not being serious.
namenotrequired 11y ago
I don't think you'd think I'd be acting very human if I'd spent any time being treated the way homeless people are treated.
dang 11y ago
We've banned this account for trolling, and detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11703747 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11703747 and marked it off-topic.

pfarnsworth 11y ago

I can't believe that SF spends $240M dollars per year on homelessness, and the current environment is the outcome of all that money. Even worse, there is zero accountability so there must be mass corruption and waste taking place because based on what I see every single day, none of that money is being spent properly. http://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/article/S-F-spends-record-241-million-on-homeless-6808319.php http://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/article/S-F-spends-record...

Camillo 11y ago
Of course there is massive corruption and waste at all levels of SF government. It is the inevitable outcome when a single party is permanently in power.
- scurvy 11y ago
  This. It's almost all this. Even worse, these politicians and bureaucrats are later nominated by the machine for higher office. Where they try to screw things up on a grander scale (and only face opposition on the federal level). This is what San Franciscans want and what they get. If you self select to such a narrow mindset, this is the outcome.
x5n1 11y ago
If you were building cheap homes, say at 120k a pop, you could build 2,000 such homes every year. The total homeless pop in SF is 6,000. In three years you could build 6,000 such homes in say Mississippi or some other middle of nowhere place where land is very cheap.
- thrownaway2424 11y ago
  That's not where the money goes. The money goes to responding to every drug addict with a stubbed toe with a giant firetruck and its crew, and then taking the aforementioned drug addict to SF General for the world's most expensive emergency room bath. A little bit of prevention here would be far cheaper.

jMyles 11y ago

Although many people who live without a house are struggling, desperate, addicted, and / or mentally ill, I also think that SF in particular has many such people who are well-adjusted, happy, and simply don't care to live a middle-class lifestyle. For the former, let's get help. But for the latter, let's not judge.

Chronic51 11y ago

We need Donald Trump to get rid of this waste, fraud, and abuse. Literally no other candidate has said this.

Crito 11y ago
He's said it alright, but realistically, what can he do about SF corruption? Sic the FBI on the city I guess? Is local political corruption under their jurisdiction?
- lsiebert 11y ago
  If The Wire had any truth it it, political corruption and terrorism are all the FBI cared about, at one point. That said, people say waste fraud and abuse about the private sector, but forget the millions investors put in private companies that end up being worthless. The difference is, governments have to be accountable about everything they do and if there is one failure, it's taken as representative of the government, whereas an industry can have immense waste, 9 out of ten startups can fail, but people focus on the successes.
kyledrake 11y ago
Brilliant strategy. Maybe he will build a border around homeless people.
- megablast 11y ago
  Well, put a roof on there and it might just work!
raldi 11y ago
Your comment is so sarcastic that I have no idea what point you're actually trying to convey.
dang 11y ago
We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11703772 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11703772 and marked it off-topic.

vumgl 11y ago

Anyone knows of a city that has successfully "solved" the homelessness problem?

apenwarr 11y ago
Utah did, or so they claim: http://www.npr.org/2015/12/10/459100751/utah-reduced-chronic-homelessness-by-91-percent-heres-how http://www.npr.org/2015/12/10/459100751/utah-reduced-chronic...
- fiatmoney 11y ago
  Easy enough to implement "housing first" where housing is cheap.
  - TulliusCicero 11y ago
    Housing would be a lot cheaper in SF if SF wanted cheaper housing. Yes, they have geographical limitations on how much housing they can build horizontally, but on top of those they also have strict self-imposed limitations on how much they can build vertically.
BurningFrog 11y ago
100% solved hardly exists, but is there any city where the problem isn't smaller than in SF?
- geebee 11y ago
  Maybe Los Angeles? Doubt it, though.

fiatmoney 11y ago

"We need to be a hell of a lot more creative about how we solve this problem" I think that's incredibly unlikely. "Homelessness" is not a technical problem, it's a choice about desired tradeoffs. SF is squeamish about anything that might actually work.

raldi 11y ago

This isn't the usual yada yada; it's a dramatic media experiment. Some quick quotes from the article: Advocacy is a longstanding taboo in American journalism, making reporters and editors wary of discussing solutions to the problems they highlight in their coverage. [T]he question of whether San Francisco’s journalists are crossing into activism has not come up, at least not in the initial meeting of news organizations last month. [...] “It was sort of shocking that there was no dissension [...] On the contrary, the conversation was, ‘Let’s do way more.’” "Your job is to investigate solutions," she said. "People want to read about how to fix broken systems." It's disappointing that most of the comments here are missing all of this, and just focusing on the same old arguments about homelessness that could be made on any of the articles that get written 25 times a week.

Shivetya 11y ago
I like how they try to portray the idea that that American journalism isn't on the constant advocacy path because I cannot recall a time they are not. locally (Atlanta here) the homeless situation never comes up unless some over the top sporting event or convention is in town. then its stories about how they are being pushed out or hidden from view. If anything the news plays the lets ignore them line because it doesn't want to jeopardize its access to some politicians by making it an issue. I would assume that in SF either someone in the news finally said "screw it" or they have some unseen politicians in the background giving them the the go. Sorry to sound so cynical but damn if homelessness and similar issues only arise during political season.
- pdabbadabba 11y ago
  > I like how they try to portray the idea that that American journalism isn't on the constant advocacy path because I cannot recall a time they are not. This is important--and you can see it on the issue of homelessness itself. Journalists' failure to cover homelessness may (charitably) have been borne of a desire for neutrality, but failure to cover an issue is not necessarily neutral in effect. If homeless is, objectively, a serious problem, the failure to cover it is a form of tacit (though inadvertent) support. It's just that ones motives are harder to discern and, thus, one's actions are more readily justified when one does nothing. When one does something, the universe of justifications narrows dramatically, and there's no escaping the fact that the world will be able to see and evaluate your motives.

mynameishere 11y ago

San Francisco has a wealth of homeless people because: 1. The climate is good. 2. The population is rich. and 3. The government is liberal. It's a trifecta of bum-bait. No policy changes aside from going right-wing and shipping them off to Austin or Charlotte (or whatever liberal sucker is next down the list) is going to fix the problem.

beatpanda 11y ago
No. Every bit of research on this issue discounts this theory. I'm sure it makes you feel good to say it, but you're wrong.
- Sacho 11y ago
  That's interesting - how do they discount these theories? Do you have an example of such research?
  - beatpanda 11y ago
    Try reading the rest of this thread

beatpanda 11y ago

"The 30 years of systematic disenfranchisement of poor people never really bothered me," Ms. Cooper said, "But as soon as those disgusting people made me personally uncomfortable, I knew we had to do something." Wow. Golf clap for bravery there. Great work.

chris_wot 11y ago
The problem with a systematic dismantling of welfare protection and the denial of things like basic health care is that people who hit rock bottom have got to go somewhere. And if you create a culture where things like a minimum wage are seen as bad for business, you'll get people who don't make enough to live a normal, basic life. They'll be one disaster removed from losing the lot and the landlord turfing them into the streets. When that happens, you can move them on, but they'll eventually grow to such numbers there's nowhere to move them to. One day, you might hit a personal crisis. Or your kids might hit that personal crisis. Or your whole family might find themselves living in a car. Then you will be the one being moved on. And you will curse those who dismantled the welfare systems. You may well be cursing yourself.
- burfog 11y ago
  Yes, they do have to go somewhere. There is a solution for this in the movie Soylent Green.
  - chris_wot 11y ago
    You really do not want to give the Immigration Department any ideas like this... :-) In all seriousness, refugees are dying on Manus Island and Nauru already, either from suicide, lack of medical care or from violence. In my view, it's only marginally more safe in off-shore detention than it is on the very boats the facilities are meant to be stopping.
geebee 11y ago
I was unable to find that quote… are you referring to a different article? If so, would you source it?

chris_wot 11y ago

All I know right now is that if I didn't have my family, I'd be homeless myself right now. Right now I'm utterly, utterly depressed and finding it hard to do anything. It's like trying to run through a vat of molasses, nothing works very fast. I'll probably be better after some more sleep, but I know the black dog and anxiety is always just around the corner. It makes it very hard to do anything let alone look for work. I really don't know how an already homeless person with a worse mental illness does it. I fear they could be the most capable person in the world, but if you hit a certain stage it's very hard to pick up from. It not self-pity either. I constantly tell myself that the feeling isn't reality but just my brain being out of kilter temporarily. And I'm of course correct. But if your head isn't ordered, no amount of positive thinking is ever going to fix it. Sometimes all you can do is ride it out, but you can only do this if you have a safe place to sleep, eat and keep yourself clean. And that sure as hell isn't on the streets. I hope that is never me, but sometimes I realise that I'm only a few steps removed from the situation of those without anything. That's why I get frustrated with so many attitudes towards homelessness and mental illness. Saying that it's there own fault isn't terribly helpful. Maybe it is, maybe it isn't. Maybe some homeless people choose to be homeless. Maybe some are lazy and got into the situation through their own behaviour. But I'll hazard a guess that isn't most people. God help you if you ever hit rock bottom. God help you from the morally outraged, fit and wealthy self-made man. In his eyes, you're worse than a failure, you deserve your situation.

dosgonlogs 11y ago
I really appreciate you sharing your personal situation. That last line was amazing. Some people lack compassion, spoiled by their own blessings that they are oblivious to, because their pride hides those blessings from them. Their ego tells them "I worked too hard and am too damn good at what I do, and too damn smart and able to have my success be attributed to anything but my self". Of course I may be citing an extreme example, but I have seen people espouse this line of thinking, because you do see it promoted in subtle and less subtle ways.
marincounty 11y ago
I'm in a similar boat. I am one life crisis from being homeless. I've had that feeling of being off kilter since '89. I busted a gasket in that year. The experts said it was nothing besides anxiety, and dysthymia. I said busted a gasket, because in all those years that's the clinical definition that made most sense. I just couldn't blame it all on my chilhood. My heart goes out to you. I know words are cheap, but I truly understand how you feel.

xchaotic 11y ago

This is what struck me when I first visited SF - such a great country, all this tech and you have homeless people on your office doorsteps? " "The measure of a society is found in how they treat their weakest and most helpless citizens." - Jimmy Carter

raldi 11y ago
To be fair, in a lot of cities where you don't see homeless people on office doorsteps, it's not because they take better care of their most helpless citizens, but rather because they crack down on them: http://www.nytimes.com/1999/11/20/nyregion/in-wake-of-attack-giuliani-cracks-down-on-homeless.html http://www.nytimes.com/1999/11/20/nyregion/in-wake-of-attack...
azinman2 11y ago
SF spends hundreds of millions of dollars on homeless and probably has more services than almost any other city on earth. Whether they're effective or not is a different question...

marincounty 11y ago

1. Don't want them sleeping in tents on sidewalks? Provide a place to pitch a tent that doesn't cost money--maybe rent a piece of land in another county, and use tax payer money for security, etc. Other counties don't want them. Problem. 2. Want to avoid stepping on feces/urine? Build some restrooms? Oh no? They will just have sex in them, or shoot up. Problem. (By the way, I can find a restroom in that lovely city.) 3. That study concluded most homeless are from San Francisco. "Oh, no they arn't! It's a bad study!" Problem. 4. "There here for the benefits?" What benefits? I only know of one benefit, and that benefit was for homeless animals. It was shut down years ago. 5. Every county in the Bay Area has been essentially harassing the Homeless. In Marin County, where your bosses live; there's not one square inch of land that's legal to pitch a tent, or sleep--that's free. If you have no money--you are breaking some municipal/county law by sleeping. 6. Our economy has desimated most jobs. The jobs left don't provide a livable wage. This has been going on for 25-30 years. Problem. 7. I haven't even got to drug use, or mental patients. Problem. 8. Oh yea, why is the Bay Area going to do this day of homeless awareness now? I think the writing us on the walls. I know Willie Brown is publically wondering what SF is going to do with thousands of newly unemployed tech. workers.

cname 11y ago
> I can find a restroom ... Did you mean "can't" or maybe "can never"? In most cities I've been to, including SF, it's been really hard to find public restrooms.

Cozumel 11y ago

"Ms. Kernan said her station plans “blanket” coverage on June 29, but will not propose solutions." Just trying to palm it off on everyone else, people know the system is broken, they don't need more whiny ass bitching. They want solutions! Edit: Actually reading further down one of the proposed 'solutions' is building a mental hospital for them all!! That's just horrific, not all of them are mentally ill and that's a dangerous judgement to make. They just need help to get back on their feet. It could just as easily be any one of us in their position!

nametakenobv 11y ago

Carcetti for governor?

alva 11y ago

> her station plans “blanket” coverage on June 29, but will not propose solutions. Surely not blanket coverage to raise awareness? The problem is obvious to any one who has spent a day in the city. I don't think this will elicit the call to action they want. From the relatively little time I have spent in SF and having lived in a number of major cities, the challenges do seem unique. All of the biggest cities have many homeless, however they are not routinely exposing themselves, screaming, lashing out, openly injecting drugs and defecating to the extent they do in SF. I feel incredibly sorry for the homeless described above, it is really hard to work out why the behaviours seem so common in SF and not other cities.

Overtonwindow 11y ago

Forgive my pessimism here, but is this the fourth estate really attempting to expose the problems of homelessness for a solution, or is this an attempt by elites in the media to make the problem go away so they don't have to deal with it. The opening lines where the reporter sees the couple having sex in a tent. That just sets a negative tone for the whole thing. From there it just sounds less like "we need to solve this problem" to "we need to do something to get these people out of here.."

googletazer 11y ago

You should have followed your instincts.

deleted 11y ago
[deleted]
dang 11y ago
Comments like this are not allowed here. We detached it from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11705156 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=11705156 and marked it off-topic.

knightofmars 11y ago

This article, from 1984, describes the policy changes that lead to the decline of mental health institutions and the rise of homeless populations made up of the individuals that were a part of those institutions. http://www.nytimes.com/1984/10/30/science/how-release-of-mental-patients-began.html?pagewanted=all http://www.nytimes.com/1984/10/30/science/how-release-of-men...

bobwaycott 11y ago
FYI, the past-tense of the verb "lead" is "led", not its homophone noun "lead".
- knightofmars 11y ago
  Fast fingers lead to fast mistakes. Thanks. :)
DrScump 11y ago
It's not a bit surprising that they omit the role of court decisions, especially O’Connor v. Donaldson (422 U.S. 563, 1975).

erjjones 11y ago

I couldn't even imagine trying to "fix" a homelessness crisis in SF. From here in Indianapolis, IN when the whether turns cold for the winter many homeless get out of town, turn to the shelters or other means of general weather protection. While some will just layer up and deal with the cold. I know a "homeless" man that chooses to be "homeless". He loves the freedom of being able to go and do as he pleases. I would imagine SF has many who enjoy the life style. How do you "fix" that? Besides flat out ordinances with police backing... Very dynamic issue to "fix".