4 ms·

> And what if it turns out that homelessness, on a local scale, is like traffic - and providing more services just creates more homeless in the area? Do you ho

> And what if it turns out that homelessness, on a local scale, is like traffic - and providing more services just creates more homeless in the area? Do you honestly believe most people are so lazy that they are desperate to lose everything they have? If so, why do high school students give up their after-school time to flip hamburgers and bag groceries - because otherwise they will starve? I'll encourage you to read about Maslow's hierarchy.

DuskStar 8y ago
That's part of why I included on a local scale. If your town provides more amenities and generally treats the homeless population better than the surrounding areas, of course homeless people are going to move to it. Which might be good for the homeless, but it's kind of counterproductive in terms of the original problem statement - "as a homeowner I really don't like that an army of homeless people can setup encampment by my home on public property (in part maintained by my tax dollars) and then bring crime, aggressive panhandling, trash (lots of it) and lowered property values to my neighborhood."
- stephengillie 8y ago
  So you're saying a regional, or even statewide approach is needed?
  - DuskStar 8y ago
    I'm saying that an approach that covers an area large enough that you cannot easily traverse it has a chance of working, and smaller programs will always have to contend with the "importing more homeless" problem. IMO, that would have to be the entire country - getting a greyhound from Las Vegas to Los Angeles isn't out of reach, for example. But a statewide approach would still be less affected by this than a citywide one, which itself would be better than something on the scale of a neighborhood. And even then, that's to have a chance. I don't think that "give a ton of benefits to the homeless" is a surefire solution to reducing homelessness. The Utah approach (fix the "homeless" part by giving them a home, then fix everything else) might work, but it requires a bit more societal trust than a lot of the country has.
berbec 8y ago
I'd like to think the point was that such policies may attraco out of town homeless, or get them shipped there. Many municipalities have been caught giving the homeless bus tickets.
- stephengillie 8y ago
  It's difficult to talk a bus driver into giving you a free ride into Seattle. It's basically impossible to talk a bus driver into giving you a free ride out of Seattle.
- Broken_Hippo 8y ago
  Going from town to town is really difficult when you are homeless: Not impossible though. It will happen some, and already does to some extent since there are homeless folks that travel to better climates to avoid freezing to death. Not all, though, hence seeing homeless folks in places like Chicago. Wouldn't the solution for this sort of thing is to make sure everywhere has a robust system to help homeless folks? The solution doesn't need to be the same thing in every city so long as the outcome is the same. Towns of 3000 have different problems than towns of 40k, 200k, and 1 million, after all. As far as municipalities pushing folks off on other towns, that (in my eyes) is horrible and the folks responsible should be fired. If a city thinks this is a feasible option, it means they haven't fixed the problems they have and do not have a robust enough system in place.

DuskStar 8y ago

That's part of why I included on a local scale. If your town provides more amenities and generally treats the homeless population better than the surrounding areas, of course homeless people are going to move to it. Which might be good for the homeless, but it's kind of counterproductive in terms of the original problem statement - "as a homeowner I really don't like that an army of homeless people can setup encampment by my home on public property (in part maintained by my tax dollars) and then bring crime, aggressive panhandling, trash (lots of it) and lowered property values to my neighborhood."

stephengillie 8y ago
So you're saying a regional, or even statewide approach is needed?
- DuskStar 8y ago
  I'm saying that an approach that covers an area large enough that you cannot easily traverse it has a chance of working, and smaller programs will always have to contend with the "importing more homeless" problem. IMO, that would have to be the entire country - getting a greyhound from Las Vegas to Los Angeles isn't out of reach, for example. But a statewide approach would still be less affected by this than a citywide one, which itself would be better than something on the scale of a neighborhood. And even then, that's to have a chance. I don't think that "give a ton of benefits to the homeless" is a surefire solution to reducing homelessness. The Utah approach (fix the "homeless" part by giving them a home, then fix everything else) might work, but it requires a bit more societal trust than a lot of the country has.

berbec 8y ago

I'd like to think the point was that such policies may attraco out of town homeless, or get them shipped there. Many municipalities have been caught giving the homeless bus tickets.

stephengillie 8y ago
It's difficult to talk a bus driver into giving you a free ride into Seattle. It's basically impossible to talk a bus driver into giving you a free ride out of Seattle.
Broken_Hippo 8y ago
Going from town to town is really difficult when you are homeless: Not impossible though. It will happen some, and already does to some extent since there are homeless folks that travel to better climates to avoid freezing to death. Not all, though, hence seeing homeless folks in places like Chicago. Wouldn't the solution for this sort of thing is to make sure everywhere has a robust system to help homeless folks? The solution doesn't need to be the same thing in every city so long as the outcome is the same. Towns of 3000 have different problems than towns of 40k, 200k, and 1 million, after all. As far as municipalities pushing folks off on other towns, that (in my eyes) is horrible and the folks responsible should be fired. If a city thinks this is a feasible option, it means they haven't fixed the problems they have and do not have a robust enough system in place.