7 ms·

Portland’s Disgraceful Anarchy

30 points by Dowwie 9y ago

1001101 9y ago
Despite the title, this has nothing to do with anarchy in Portland. Disorder, perhaps, anarchy, no.
- mdpye 9y ago
  At several points, the wording also appears to suggest that being homeless is in itself a criminal act. There may well be a big problem, but this active seems quite callously written.
  - TheAdamAndChe 9y ago
    It is important to consider the lives of the homeless, but if mass homelessness is causing societal disruption to the point that economic development stops and causes bright flight and capital flight, wouldn't that just amplify homelessness in the long run?
  - quasse 9y ago
    It's written by an Ayn Randian conservative think tank, so I wouldn't be that surprised by the tone.
    - michaelvkpdx 9y ago
      They sell all those Rand books in Portland, at Powell's. Every one of them. It's no wonder that Portland is a hotbed for libertarian thought and free market propaganda. It's awful. Don't move there.
      - dang 9y ago
        What you did in this thread is vandalism in its own right. Trying to defend one community by dropping crap in another doesn't seem very civil. Neither is the ingroup/outgroup subtext that seems to me to underly this sort of posting. Edit: since you've done this before on HN, I've banned this account for trolling. If you don't want to be banned on HN, you're welcome to email hn@ycombinator.com and give us reason to believe that you'll follow the site rules in the future.
alphabettsy 9y ago
Sensational title, and the article does not provide insights from other business owners to show any sense of pervasiveness.
- aplkorex 9y ago
  A friend of mine manages a large business on the outer edge of Portland. He pulls into work early one morning to find a couple of the homeless living in the community behind his office dragging a decent amount of power tools into the vegetation of the greenbelt. We're talking weed-eaters, chainsaws, etc..., that type of stuff. All rather expensive kit, organized and arranged in a very methodical manner, maybe 20 items or so. A call to the police results in a transfer to a third-party mediation team, as the police can't directly interact with "campers" in a situation of this type. There are several articles out there commenting on the "legal quagmire" that are Portland's policies dealing with the homeless community.
  - michaelvkpdx 9y ago
    Did you know it's legal for anyone to sleep on your sidewalk in Portland? And where are they going to the bathroom? It's terrible. Don't move there. Go to Beaverton if you need to move to Oregon. But you'll be sorry. Stay away from Portland. They'll take all your stuff and the police won't help you. They are in cahoots with the street criminals. It's awful. Don't move to Portland.
  - alphabettsy 9y ago
    That may be the case, but I was talking about the article.
eric_b 9y ago
Is it really this bad in Portland? (I've never been) Based on the number of people moving there and the hype, I can't believe open defecation and rampant crime are tolerated? Is it really so bad? (And is it getting worse?)
- ng12 9y ago
  I've only spent a little time in Portland but I wouldn't be surprised. I moved out of SF because I was fed up with the "Cloud Corridor" (aka Tenderloin) for the same problems -- public defecation, drug use, mentally unsound people wandering into the lobby, etc.
- 40acres 9y ago
  Yes, Portland is both growing very fast (high rise condos are popping up everywhere) and descending into a hell hole (Google springwater corridor) at the same time. Portland has established itself as a safe haven for homeless and down trodden folks due to it's mild weather, abundance of services, and general lack of enforcement. I've lived here under two mayor's and both have been horribly ineffective at tackling this issue. I'm not sure there is another downtown metro area as bad as Portland when it comes to homelessness.
- michaelvkpdx 9y ago
  Oh it's terrible. There are no toilets. Even though open carry is legal there's crime everywhere. It's horrible. The suburbs are so much better. Lake Oswego is a nice place. None of those dirty anarchists or loud musicians or street thugs. Portland is what happens when you let the inmates run the asylum. It's awful. They'll steal your laptop, key your Tesla, spit in your latte, and defecate on your front lawn, if you can even find a house. Otherwise you'll be in a condo where 8 people in a rock band live next door, smoke pot all the time, and play loud guitars. And the weather is terrible. It's awful. Don't move there.
- jaredcwhite 9y ago
  Anecdotally, I worked in SOMA in SF for 2 years, and now I've been working downtown in Portland for a few months...while it seems there are significant problems here, it's definitely not comparable to the problems in SF in my opinion. I think the issue here is Portland used to be a small-ish "big city" and now it's a medium-ish city and the growth has happened incredibly fast. For people on the ground, it feels like everything's spiraling out of control. Growing pains and the challenges the come with being a major American city that people want to move to (both middle-class and transient groups) are to some extent inevitable. But I'm optimistic that progress can and will be made. (But I could easily be wrong. As I said, I've only lived here for a few months.)
akamaka 9y ago
City Journal is published by the Manhattan Institute. > The Institute's research seeks to develop and promote free-market ideas. > [The institute] argued that the welfare state had fostered a culture and cycle of dependency that was to the detriment of both welfare recipients and the United States as a whole. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manhattan_Institute_for_Policy_Research https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manhattan_Institute_for_Poli...
- TheAdamAndChe 9y ago
  How is this relevant? How does this fact invalidate any of what the article stated?
  - bitwize 9y ago
    Conservative think tanks are well known to lie to promote their agenda.
    - devmunchies 9y ago
      That's sound like anything political and not just conservatives. Speaking of conservatives (and to bring things back to the article), I remember reading on HN that salt lake city, Utah is one of the best at handling homelessness.
  - _jal 9y ago
    Funny how attribution brings out defensiveness. Do you also think all bylines should be removed from articles? It doesn't appear to me that the OP was saying anything about invalidation.
    - TheAdamAndChe 9y ago
      People naturally form us-vs-them tribal mentalities, and the fact that this is the top comment of this post indicates that its a tribal mentality that's leading it to be upvoted. It's like saying on a Roy Moore post that the investigation was carried out by CNBC: it leads to Republicans invalidating any finding of the investigation. This default of ignoring any information from the Other Side is what almost got Roy Moore elected. This us-vs-them mentality needs to be noted. The fact that this comes from a think tank does not immediately mean they don't raise a good point.
spamizbad 9y ago
Is the author aware that by cracking down on homelessness, all you're doing is spending taxpayer resources to move them somewhere else? It's not like you enact some anti-homeless policy and the homeless throw their hands up in disgust, defeated by the swift arm of the law, then pull a resumes out of their back pocket, and then land some middle-class job.
- TheAdamAndChe 9y ago
  Your comment assumes that relocation 1) is bad, and 2) is the only step being taken to fight homelessness. In response to the second one, the city may be taking a number of steps to fight homelessness. Shelters, mental health facilities, drug rehab programs, and counseling can all help the issue without relocation. Also, I'm just not sure relocation is completely a bad thing. Portland is one of the most expensive cities in the world to live in, with rent being prohibitively expensive to the lower class unless several people congeal in a single apartment. Not everyone can do that. How is it bad if they are relocated to a cheaper part of the country?
  - spamizbad 9y ago
    > Your comment assumes that relocation 1) is bad, and 2) is the only step being taken to fight homelessness. Relocation does not solve the problem, it simply moves it. Yes, technically, mass-relocation of homeless could solve Portland's homeless problem, but it simply shifts the burden somewhere else. Second, the article specifically mentions the mayor's inaction to utilize the police and to enforce a ban on tent cities. It doesn't talk about shelters, mental health facilities, drug rehab, or counseling.
    - TheAdamAndChe 9y ago
      > Relocation does not solve the problem, it simply moves it. Why didn't you argue against my point that the cost of living varies massively between regions? Why shouldn't we send homeless to a lower cost of living area?
      - 9y ago
TheMagicHorsey 9y ago
I've been to Portland, and I live in SOMA. SOMA and the Mission in SF are way worse than Portland. The article author has no idea how much more anarchy American progressives are capable of countenancing. SF is faaaaaar worse than Portland, and there really isn't any political backlash against city officials. The teenagers in the Bay Area call SOMA "pooptown". When I first came to learn of this nickname, I was about to protest as a resident, because I thought it was offensive and didn't reflect the neighborhood, with all its restaurants and fancy employers. But then I thought about it some more. And I remembered how on my first day at work in 2014, I stepped in human feces and tracked it over the office. And I thought these kids are visiting the neighborhood from other, cleaner suburbs. It makes sense that their primary impression of the neighborhood would be the large amount of human feces everywhere ... which would really stand out to them. As residents, we just walk around the poo, and don't think much about it. Anyway, I have to agree, we do live in a crime-ridden, feces smeared neighborhood. But there's a couple of positives too. First, the crime is almost all non-violent. And, second, the city cleans up the poo very quickly, if you call them.
- _jal 9y ago
  Fellow SOMA resident chiming in. Calling this the result of "anarchy" is silly and deflects responsibility. The cops manage where the homeless folks end up. They chase the homeless here, away from businesses north of Market and richer neighborhoods. Talk to enough cops and one will be honest about it. Any time I hear how powerless the city is to do anything, I point out that they can't do anything about the total population, but they can and do ensure the bulk of the homeless population lives in SOMA. San Francisco does have a serious homeless problem, but it isn't due to a lack of government. Quality of life on my block varies over time. Some months it is downright pleasant here; others, my street is an open sewer. I have a phone tree with some other nearby residents; through trial and error we've found a combination of calls to make that seems to reliably get action when things get awful. OP: Consider coming to a "Better SOMA" meeting. That group actually has moved the needle. (There's just still a lot of gauge left for the needle to move across.)
- yammajr 9y ago
  As a non-local, I had to look it up, but presumably you're talking about the Mission District ("The Mission") and South of Market (SOMA) neighborhoods in San Francisco, correct?
hyperion2010 9y ago
The Bay Area's finest export. Rising property values and the accompanying homelessness. Why not build some toilets? Has anyone tried? There are designs for public restrooms that are essentially self cleaning (hole in the ground with high pressure water nozzles in the ceiling). If you can't even have enough decency to build a place for someone who has been thrown out by every other part of society to poop, it seems entirely fair that they choose to do so on your stoop.
- idiot900 9y ago
  > Why not build some toilets? Has anyone tried? Yes: http://theloo.biz/ http://theloo.biz/
- michaelvkpdx 9y ago
  No toilets anywhere. They are into that composting thing and they think it's all fertilizer. It smells like a mix of rotting feces, pot, and body odor. Horrible place. Don't move there.
cybervegan 9y ago
Surely homelessness is, in and of itself, a symptom of a much deeper rot? I'm not trying to excuse the behaviour of these people, but if you feel that society has shat on you, and robbed you of your dignity, might you not want to return the favour? Homelessness is rarely a chosen situation; every homeless person has a story, often a dire set of circumstances that landed them on the streets. It may be personal problems, substance abuse, or mental issues - all things people need help and treatment for. Many of these things are, at the root, down to lacking education or social support structures; symptoms of a society that doesn't care. Don't get me wrong, the affected businesses are justifiably angry, but their anger is misdirected; sometimes the perpetrators of crime are not the root cause. In small part, maybe they are part of the root cause.
- aeorgnoieang 9y ago
  So, would you be okay with someone shitting in front of the front door of your house or apartment? What would you do, personally, to help resolve the root issues that led to that shit.
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
michaelvkpdx 9y ago
Portland is terrible. Don't move here. There's nowhere to park. There's homeless everywhere. There's no real tech companies. There's no VC. And the air smells like pot. Don't move here. Trust me. Stay in California. You think it's bad but you have no idea what happens here. Your children may be kidnapped by Sasquatch. Did you know that meat might even be illegal in Portland by 2019? And they still listen to rock music, cassettes, and guitars. Don't move to Portland. Disgraceful anarchists. Car hating thugs. Dirty homeless people. It's terrible. The author has no idea how bad it is. They don't fluoridate water. You can't pump your own gas. They shut down roads for cars and only allow bikes. It's going to be illegal to drive your own car. You can't do anything to your property if there's trees in it. And there's hippies. Real smelly granola types. They all smoke pot all the time. Don't move to Portland. It'll ruin your life. The homeless are everywhere.
- cowmix 9y ago
  That's it.. NOW I'm moving.
- deleted 9y ago
thinkcontext 9y ago
Better solutions for homelessness are badly needed. The best evidence based solution is called "housing first", pay to get people into housing then address their needs. It works out to be cheaper and also is more likely to fix the problem w/o the quality of life issues talked about here https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Housing_First https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Housing_First San Diego is dealing with a huge Hepatitis outbreak caused by open defecation around homeless encampments, 20 deaths last I looked. http://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/news/health/sd-me-hepatitis-update-20171031-story.html http://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/news/health/sd-me-hepati...
michaelvkpdx 9y ago
SOMA is So Mach Better than Portland. You can meet other people who work in your field. No one looks at you weird when you get on the bus for work. You can get a real burrito. You can find a bathroom. Don't move to Portland. It's awful.
- deleted 9y ago
  [deleted]
TYPE_FASTER 9y ago
> Meanwhile, the city has been reluctant to deploy the crime-prevention resources that it already has at its disposal to address the homelessness wave. ... > She added that, “the police came and then he came back four minutes later after they left.”

30 points by Dowwie 9y ago

1001101 9y ago

Despite the title, this has nothing to do with anarchy in Portland. Disorder, perhaps, anarchy, no.

mdpye 9y ago
At several points, the wording also appears to suggest that being homeless is in itself a criminal act. There may well be a big problem, but this active seems quite callously written.
- TheAdamAndChe 9y ago
  It is important to consider the lives of the homeless, but if mass homelessness is causing societal disruption to the point that economic development stops and causes bright flight and capital flight, wouldn't that just amplify homelessness in the long run?
- quasse 9y ago
  It's written by an Ayn Randian conservative think tank, so I wouldn't be that surprised by the tone.
  - michaelvkpdx 9y ago
    They sell all those Rand books in Portland, at Powell's. Every one of them. It's no wonder that Portland is a hotbed for libertarian thought and free market propaganda. It's awful. Don't move there.
    - dang 9y ago
      What you did in this thread is vandalism in its own right. Trying to defend one community by dropping crap in another doesn't seem very civil. Neither is the ingroup/outgroup subtext that seems to me to underly this sort of posting. Edit: since you've done this before on HN, I've banned this account for trolling. If you don't want to be banned on HN, you're welcome to email hn@ycombinator.com and give us reason to believe that you'll follow the site rules in the future.

alphabettsy 9y ago

Sensational title, and the article does not provide insights from other business owners to show any sense of pervasiveness.

aplkorex 9y ago
A friend of mine manages a large business on the outer edge of Portland. He pulls into work early one morning to find a couple of the homeless living in the community behind his office dragging a decent amount of power tools into the vegetation of the greenbelt. We're talking weed-eaters, chainsaws, etc..., that type of stuff. All rather expensive kit, organized and arranged in a very methodical manner, maybe 20 items or so. A call to the police results in a transfer to a third-party mediation team, as the police can't directly interact with "campers" in a situation of this type. There are several articles out there commenting on the "legal quagmire" that are Portland's policies dealing with the homeless community.
- michaelvkpdx 9y ago
  Did you know it's legal for anyone to sleep on your sidewalk in Portland? And where are they going to the bathroom? It's terrible. Don't move there. Go to Beaverton if you need to move to Oregon. But you'll be sorry. Stay away from Portland. They'll take all your stuff and the police won't help you. They are in cahoots with the street criminals. It's awful. Don't move to Portland.
- alphabettsy 9y ago
  That may be the case, but I was talking about the article.

eric_b 9y ago

Is it really this bad in Portland? (I've never been) Based on the number of people moving there and the hype, I can't believe open defecation and rampant crime are tolerated? Is it really so bad? (And is it getting worse?)

ng12 9y ago
I've only spent a little time in Portland but I wouldn't be surprised. I moved out of SF because I was fed up with the "Cloud Corridor" (aka Tenderloin) for the same problems -- public defecation, drug use, mentally unsound people wandering into the lobby, etc.
40acres 9y ago
Yes, Portland is both growing very fast (high rise condos are popping up everywhere) and descending into a hell hole (Google springwater corridor) at the same time. Portland has established itself as a safe haven for homeless and down trodden folks due to it's mild weather, abundance of services, and general lack of enforcement. I've lived here under two mayor's and both have been horribly ineffective at tackling this issue. I'm not sure there is another downtown metro area as bad as Portland when it comes to homelessness.
michaelvkpdx 9y ago
Oh it's terrible. There are no toilets. Even though open carry is legal there's crime everywhere. It's horrible. The suburbs are so much better. Lake Oswego is a nice place. None of those dirty anarchists or loud musicians or street thugs. Portland is what happens when you let the inmates run the asylum. It's awful. They'll steal your laptop, key your Tesla, spit in your latte, and defecate on your front lawn, if you can even find a house. Otherwise you'll be in a condo where 8 people in a rock band live next door, smoke pot all the time, and play loud guitars. And the weather is terrible. It's awful. Don't move there.
jaredcwhite 9y ago
Anecdotally, I worked in SOMA in SF for 2 years, and now I've been working downtown in Portland for a few months...while it seems there are significant problems here, it's definitely not comparable to the problems in SF in my opinion. I think the issue here is Portland used to be a small-ish "big city" and now it's a medium-ish city and the growth has happened incredibly fast. For people on the ground, it feels like everything's spiraling out of control. Growing pains and the challenges the come with being a major American city that people want to move to (both middle-class and transient groups) are to some extent inevitable. But I'm optimistic that progress can and will be made. (But I could easily be wrong. As I said, I've only lived here for a few months.)

akamaka 9y ago

City Journal is published by the Manhattan Institute. > The Institute's research seeks to develop and promote free-market ideas. > [The institute] argued that the welfare state had fostered a culture and cycle of dependency that was to the detriment of both welfare recipients and the United States as a whole. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manhattan_Institute_for_Policy_Research https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manhattan_Institute_for_Poli...

TheAdamAndChe 9y ago
How is this relevant? How does this fact invalidate any of what the article stated?
- bitwize 9y ago
  Conservative think tanks are well known to lie to promote their agenda.
  - devmunchies 9y ago
    That's sound like anything political and not just conservatives. Speaking of conservatives (and to bring things back to the article), I remember reading on HN that salt lake city, Utah is one of the best at handling homelessness.
- _jal 9y ago
  Funny how attribution brings out defensiveness. Do you also think all bylines should be removed from articles? It doesn't appear to me that the OP was saying anything about invalidation.
  - TheAdamAndChe 9y ago
    People naturally form us-vs-them tribal mentalities, and the fact that this is the top comment of this post indicates that its a tribal mentality that's leading it to be upvoted. It's like saying on a Roy Moore post that the investigation was carried out by CNBC: it leads to Republicans invalidating any finding of the investigation. This default of ignoring any information from the Other Side is what almost got Roy Moore elected. This us-vs-them mentality needs to be noted. The fact that this comes from a think tank does not immediately mean they don't raise a good point.

spamizbad 9y ago

Is the author aware that by cracking down on homelessness, all you're doing is spending taxpayer resources to move them somewhere else? It's not like you enact some anti-homeless policy and the homeless throw their hands up in disgust, defeated by the swift arm of the law, then pull a resumes out of their back pocket, and then land some middle-class job.

TheAdamAndChe 9y ago
Your comment assumes that relocation 1) is bad, and 2) is the only step being taken to fight homelessness. In response to the second one, the city may be taking a number of steps to fight homelessness. Shelters, mental health facilities, drug rehab programs, and counseling can all help the issue without relocation. Also, I'm just not sure relocation is completely a bad thing. Portland is one of the most expensive cities in the world to live in, with rent being prohibitively expensive to the lower class unless several people congeal in a single apartment. Not everyone can do that. How is it bad if they are relocated to a cheaper part of the country?
- spamizbad 9y ago
  > Your comment assumes that relocation 1) is bad, and 2) is the only step being taken to fight homelessness. Relocation does not solve the problem, it simply moves it. Yes, technically, mass-relocation of homeless could solve Portland's homeless problem, but it simply shifts the burden somewhere else. Second, the article specifically mentions the mayor's inaction to utilize the police and to enforce a ban on tent cities. It doesn't talk about shelters, mental health facilities, drug rehab, or counseling.
  - TheAdamAndChe 9y ago
    > Relocation does not solve the problem, it simply moves it. Why didn't you argue against my point that the cost of living varies massively between regions? Why shouldn't we send homeless to a lower cost of living area?
    - 9y ago

TheMagicHorsey 9y ago

I've been to Portland, and I live in SOMA. SOMA and the Mission in SF are way worse than Portland. The article author has no idea how much more anarchy American progressives are capable of countenancing. SF is faaaaaar worse than Portland, and there really isn't any political backlash against city officials. The teenagers in the Bay Area call SOMA "pooptown". When I first came to learn of this nickname, I was about to protest as a resident, because I thought it was offensive and didn't reflect the neighborhood, with all its restaurants and fancy employers. But then I thought about it some more. And I remembered how on my first day at work in 2014, I stepped in human feces and tracked it over the office. And I thought these kids are visiting the neighborhood from other, cleaner suburbs. It makes sense that their primary impression of the neighborhood would be the large amount of human feces everywhere ... which would really stand out to them. As residents, we just walk around the poo, and don't think much about it. Anyway, I have to agree, we do live in a crime-ridden, feces smeared neighborhood. But there's a couple of positives too. First, the crime is almost all non-violent. And, second, the city cleans up the poo very quickly, if you call them.

_jal 9y ago
Fellow SOMA resident chiming in. Calling this the result of "anarchy" is silly and deflects responsibility. The cops manage where the homeless folks end up. They chase the homeless here, away from businesses north of Market and richer neighborhoods. Talk to enough cops and one will be honest about it. Any time I hear how powerless the city is to do anything, I point out that they can't do anything about the total population, but they can and do ensure the bulk of the homeless population lives in SOMA. San Francisco does have a serious homeless problem, but it isn't due to a lack of government. Quality of life on my block varies over time. Some months it is downright pleasant here; others, my street is an open sewer. I have a phone tree with some other nearby residents; through trial and error we've found a combination of calls to make that seems to reliably get action when things get awful. OP: Consider coming to a "Better SOMA" meeting. That group actually has moved the needle. (There's just still a lot of gauge left for the needle to move across.)
yammajr 9y ago
As a non-local, I had to look it up, but presumably you're talking about the Mission District ("The Mission") and South of Market (SOMA) neighborhoods in San Francisco, correct?

hyperion2010 9y ago

The Bay Area's finest export. Rising property values and the accompanying homelessness. Why not build some toilets? Has anyone tried? There are designs for public restrooms that are essentially self cleaning (hole in the ground with high pressure water nozzles in the ceiling). If you can't even have enough decency to build a place for someone who has been thrown out by every other part of society to poop, it seems entirely fair that they choose to do so on your stoop.

idiot900 9y ago
> Why not build some toilets? Has anyone tried? Yes: http://theloo.biz/ http://theloo.biz/
michaelvkpdx 9y ago
No toilets anywhere. They are into that composting thing and they think it's all fertilizer. It smells like a mix of rotting feces, pot, and body odor. Horrible place. Don't move there.

cybervegan 9y ago

Surely homelessness is, in and of itself, a symptom of a much deeper rot? I'm not trying to excuse the behaviour of these people, but if you feel that society has shat on you, and robbed you of your dignity, might you not want to return the favour? Homelessness is rarely a chosen situation; every homeless person has a story, often a dire set of circumstances that landed them on the streets. It may be personal problems, substance abuse, or mental issues - all things people need help and treatment for. Many of these things are, at the root, down to lacking education or social support structures; symptoms of a society that doesn't care. Don't get me wrong, the affected businesses are justifiably angry, but their anger is misdirected; sometimes the perpetrators of crime are not the root cause. In small part, maybe they are part of the root cause.

aeorgnoieang 9y ago
So, would you be okay with someone shitting in front of the front door of your house or apartment? What would you do, personally, to help resolve the root issues that led to that shit.
deleted 9y ago
[deleted]

michaelvkpdx 9y ago

Portland is terrible. Don't move here. There's nowhere to park. There's homeless everywhere. There's no real tech companies. There's no VC. And the air smells like pot. Don't move here. Trust me. Stay in California. You think it's bad but you have no idea what happens here. Your children may be kidnapped by Sasquatch. Did you know that meat might even be illegal in Portland by 2019? And they still listen to rock music, cassettes, and guitars. Don't move to Portland. Disgraceful anarchists. Car hating thugs. Dirty homeless people. It's terrible. The author has no idea how bad it is. They don't fluoridate water. You can't pump your own gas. They shut down roads for cars and only allow bikes. It's going to be illegal to drive your own car. You can't do anything to your property if there's trees in it. And there's hippies. Real smelly granola types. They all smoke pot all the time. Don't move to Portland. It'll ruin your life. The homeless are everywhere.

cowmix 9y ago
That's it.. NOW I'm moving.
deleted 9y ago

thinkcontext 9y ago

Better solutions for homelessness are badly needed. The best evidence based solution is called "housing first", pay to get people into housing then address their needs. It works out to be cheaper and also is more likely to fix the problem w/o the quality of life issues talked about here https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Housing_First https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Housing_First San Diego is dealing with a huge Hepatitis outbreak caused by open defecation around homeless encampments, 20 deaths last I looked. http://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/news/health/sd-me-hepatitis-update-20171031-story.html http://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/news/health/sd-me-hepati...

michaelvkpdx 9y ago

SOMA is So Mach Better than Portland. You can meet other people who work in your field. No one looks at you weird when you get on the bus for work. You can get a real burrito. You can find a bathroom. Don't move to Portland. It's awful.

deleted 9y ago
[deleted]

TYPE_FASTER 9y ago

> Meanwhile, the city has been reluctant to deploy the crime-prevention resources that it already has at its disposal to address the homelessness wave. ... > She added that, “the police came and then he came back four minutes later after they left.”