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>Besides showing great concern about homelessness, the poll indicated that while Silicon Valley residents are anxious to help alleviate the problem, they are le

by daenz 6y ago

>Besides showing great concern about homelessness, the poll indicated that while Silicon Valley residents are anxious to help alleviate the problem, they are less enthusiastic when the solutions include providing homeless shelters and housing in their own neighborhoods. I think that says most of it right there. We've cultivated an environment where paying lip service towards a cause is more important than actually doing anything about it. Real solutions are too easy to attack, so the only safe position is speaking platitudes.

qaq 6y ago
I am not in SV but is there a reason housing for homeless needs to be located on pretty much the most expansive land in the world?
- aerostable_slug 6y ago
  No, but there's a persistent sense of entitlement where people honestly believe they have the Right to live in San Francisco. It's mind-boggling, like commuting is some special Hell only they experience. Nobody bats an eye when Manhattan schoolteachers are in the bridge & tunnel crowd, but if you listen to some folks they will assure you that San Francisco's children deserve teachers who live near their schools, and anything else would be a travesty. Think of the children!
  - neilparikh 6y ago
    There’s also a sense of entitlement from homeowners who believe they should be able to stop any and all changes to their neighborhoods, while paying property tax rates from 1980s (and thus having all their services paid for by the income tax of those “commuters”, who won’t even be able to use the services they pay for).
- mayneack 6y ago
  I don't know about SV specifically, but a majority of the homeless in LA County have been here for more than 10 years and weren't homeless when they arrived. Seems like the rising cost of housing is one of the causes of homelessness in the first place.
  - foogazi 6y ago
    > Seems like the rising cost of housing is one of the causes of homelessness in the first place. There seems to be another side to that equation There are a lot of very cheap places all over the US (You can buy a house in Jackson, MS for 50k right now) So it’s not like the rent went up and people decided to stay on the streets for 10 years
- Gibbon1 6y ago
  I was born and raised in San Jose, Moved to SF, and then to the Easy Bay. One point is most homeless have long standing attachment to the bay area. Both social and economic. There are a lot of very negative effects to moving vulnerable people. The flipside is is there a reason that the big tech companies need to import tech bros to work in one of the most expensive land in the world. And in particular a place where creating new housing units is frightfully expensive? Seriously why not some place like Waco Texas? In Waco Texas a Tech Bro could live like a king and send his kids to private school on half the salary.
  - qaq 6y ago
    The budgets are underwater with all the taxes generated by tech Bros are you sure things will be better if that tax revenue dries up ?
    - Gibbon1 6y ago
      City budgets in California suffer from the effects of Prop 13. The other thing to consider is a lot of the cities budget is labor, labor costs track cost of living, especially rents. It's not necessarily that tech companies overpaid workers are a win for the city. Even more so when a lot of them commute from elsewhere.
twblalock 6y ago
> Real solutions are too easy to attack, so the only safe position is speaking platitudes. No, a "real" solution is one that actually works for everyone. You wouldn't want a homeless shelter on your street either once you've seen the consequences. It is not just a minor inconvenience. It is not morally wrong for people to want to preserve quality of life and physical safety for themselves and their families. Find a way to house homeless people without causing everyone else to suffer. That would be a real solution and more people would support it.
- daenz 6y ago
  >No, a "real" solution is one that actually works for everyone. Good luck ever finding a "real" solution, if "working for everyone" is your requirement. Also, I don't support more homeless shelters, though I can see how my first post could be interpreted as that.
  - twblalock 6y ago
    We live in a democracy and a large subset of "everyone" has to be happy with any policy or they won't vote for it, and they will also vote against policies they don't like. "Real" solutions proposed by serious people will take that into account.

by daenz 6y ago

qaq 6y ago

I am not in SV but is there a reason housing for homeless needs to be located on pretty much the most expansive land in the world?

aerostable_slug 6y ago
No, but there's a persistent sense of entitlement where people honestly believe they have the Right to live in San Francisco. It's mind-boggling, like commuting is some special Hell only they experience. Nobody bats an eye when Manhattan schoolteachers are in the bridge & tunnel crowd, but if you listen to some folks they will assure you that San Francisco's children deserve teachers who live near their schools, and anything else would be a travesty. Think of the children!
- neilparikh 6y ago
  There’s also a sense of entitlement from homeowners who believe they should be able to stop any and all changes to their neighborhoods, while paying property tax rates from 1980s (and thus having all their services paid for by the income tax of those “commuters”, who won’t even be able to use the services they pay for).
mayneack 6y ago
I don't know about SV specifically, but a majority of the homeless in LA County have been here for more than 10 years and weren't homeless when they arrived. Seems like the rising cost of housing is one of the causes of homelessness in the first place.
- foogazi 6y ago
  > Seems like the rising cost of housing is one of the causes of homelessness in the first place. There seems to be another side to that equation There are a lot of very cheap places all over the US (You can buy a house in Jackson, MS for 50k right now) So it’s not like the rent went up and people decided to stay on the streets for 10 years
Gibbon1 6y ago
I was born and raised in San Jose, Moved to SF, and then to the Easy Bay. One point is most homeless have long standing attachment to the bay area. Both social and economic. There are a lot of very negative effects to moving vulnerable people. The flipside is is there a reason that the big tech companies need to import tech bros to work in one of the most expensive land in the world. And in particular a place where creating new housing units is frightfully expensive? Seriously why not some place like Waco Texas? In Waco Texas a Tech Bro could live like a king and send his kids to private school on half the salary.
- qaq 6y ago
  The budgets are underwater with all the taxes generated by tech Bros are you sure things will be better if that tax revenue dries up ?
  - Gibbon1 6y ago
    City budgets in California suffer from the effects of Prop 13. The other thing to consider is a lot of the cities budget is labor, labor costs track cost of living, especially rents. It's not necessarily that tech companies overpaid workers are a win for the city. Even more so when a lot of them commute from elsewhere.

twblalock 6y ago

> Real solutions are too easy to attack, so the only safe position is speaking platitudes. No, a "real" solution is one that actually works for everyone. You wouldn't want a homeless shelter on your street either once you've seen the consequences. It is not just a minor inconvenience. It is not morally wrong for people to want to preserve quality of life and physical safety for themselves and their families. Find a way to house homeless people without causing everyone else to suffer. That would be a real solution and more people would support it.

daenz 6y ago
>No, a "real" solution is one that actually works for everyone. Good luck ever finding a "real" solution, if "working for everyone" is your requirement. Also, I don't support more homeless shelters, though I can see how my first post could be interpreted as that.
- twblalock 6y ago
  We live in a democracy and a large subset of "everyone" has to be happy with any policy or they won't vote for it, and they will also vote against policies they don't like. "Real" solutions proposed by serious people will take that into account.