22 ms·

California governor OKs mental health courts for homeless

40 points by _-david-_ 4y ago

lioeters 4y ago
> ..force some of them into treatment.. > The new law would let a court order a treatment plan for up to one year, which could be extended for a second year. > Those who refuse could be placed under a conservatorship and ordered to comply. > Newsom signed the law over the strong objections of the American Civil Liberties Union of California, Human Rights Watch, Disability Rights California and numerous other organizations that work with homeless people, minority communities and people with disabilities who say the new program will violate civil rights.
joshribakoff 4y ago
> opponents argue is cruel I have lived in SF for several years and done a complete 180. The status quo is not “compassionate”, there are people who turn down help. These same individuals quite literally destroy the city. For instance, we have people sleeping and overdosing (dying) in our buildings entryway. The other week, one person defecated and smeared it on our door, lit our awning on fire, and uprooted all the landscaping and burned it. At the same time, people are selling drugs nearby and individuals are literally lined up with backpacks. There is constantly broken glass, feces, and trash spewed everywhere. Something has to change, and again lots of these people are turning down help. Right now the police state they send out the HOT (homeless outreach team) which is basically older individuals who volunteer to distribute pamphlets. If there is a crime, usually no arrest is made if the police are even able to respond. The penalties are often a misdemeanor and a fine, and not showing up to court often only results in more (effectively unenforceable) fines It’s a fine line between “compassion” and “enabling”.
- NoraCodes 4y ago
  I think the key question here is: what kind of help is available? Is the "help" financial literacy classes, religious drug rehab, and overcrowded shelters with draconian policies? How many of these people would still be out on the street if housing was abundant and affordable? Some, maybe, but surely not most.
  - prottog 4y ago
    > How many of these people would still be out on the street if housing was abundant and affordable? What if the housing was abundant and affordable but came with strings attached, like not being able to do drugs or engage in other antisocial behavior in them? Would that be a draconian policy? Literature from people who have spoken with many of the homeless of SF suggest that "some, maybe, but surely not most" ratio is actually the other way around. People who are temporarily homeless due solely to financial factors are often able to find a home, and comprise a minority of the people you actually see on the street; and many of the latter actually turn down help if it means they cannot do as they please.
    - gamblor956 4y ago
      This exactly. There is more than enough housing in LA and SF to house the temporarily homeless. There is also enough housing to house the mentally ill homeless. But there is essentially no housing to house the drug-addicted homeless. Thousands of shelter beds go unused in LA every night because most homeless shelters are sober facilities, meaning no drugs or alcohol, and the drug addicts would rather keep their booze and their high then have a bed and a bath. And those are the majority of the homeless you encounter in LA and SF. (Note: mind altering substances can trigger mental illness; marijuana is known to trigger latent schizoid-series mental illnesses and this is one of the reasons it remained a controlled drug at the federal level for so long. Most illegal psychotropic drugs damage the brain, ultimately leading to the development of mental illness after sustained or heavy use; I don't classify such individuals as mentally ill because their drug addiction dominates.) Source: I was a public defender representing the criminally mentally ill at the start of my career and essentially acting in the same role as proposed by the mental health court plan (albeit without the criminal law element).
      - NoraCodes 4y ago
        > the drug addicts would rather keep their booze and their high then have a bed and a bath. Or, rather, their addiction - which is an illness - prevents them from making that decision. Right?
- dominotw 4y ago
  > I have lived in SF for several years and done a complete 180. Doesn't really matter because CA is uniparty system. Few people doing 180 isn't going stop us from providing compassionate care instead of vindictive suggestions like imprisonment.
  - hollywood_court 4y ago
    Where is the compassion for contributing members of society who have to deal with this on a daily basis? I consider myself a progressive individual, but I won’t allow someone to damage my home or other property simply because they are mentally unwell. I won’t allow my child or wife to be harassed or watch them tip toe around feces and broken class because people can’t get their act together.
    - dominotw 4y ago
      > Where is the compassion for contributing members of society Pretty sure compassion for top 1% of society isn't really top priority for the society. you can move easily if you want with all the resources you have at your disposal.
      - hollywood_court 4y ago
        People want to live their lives without being harassed and without having their property damaged or their loved ones harmed.
        kelseyfrog 4y ago
        If you had to choose between property or people, which would it be?
        hollywood_court 4y ago
        I would choose my family’s safety and well being over the life of a stranger every time.
- jseliger 4y ago
  Mental health courts may be a small step in the right direction, but California will try absolutely anything to solve homelessness apart from building more housing: https://www.mcsweeneys.net/articles/i-will-do-anything-to-end-homelessness-except-build-more-homes https://www.mcsweeneys.net/articles/i-will-do-anything-to-en... We see the results: https://seliger.com/2022/06/29/homelessness-is-a-housing-problem-when-cities-build-housing-homelessness-goes-down/ https://seliger.com/2022/06/29/homelessness-is-a-housing-pro...
  - powerslacker 4y ago
    Anyone who spends a few afternoons in the shady parts of San Francisco can tell you that the issue is not a lack of housing. There are some people who cannot live unsupervised in any kind of housing because they are a danger to themselves, others, and property. Newsom is one of my least favorite politicians, but credit where credit is due this is one of the best things that has been accomplished under his administration.
    - riddlemethat 4y ago
      California has been losing a ground war to hordes of homeless drug addicts for a long time. If Newsom can win a battle it'll be turning the tide even slightly...
  - bsder 4y ago
    About 1 in 5 homeless in San Francisco have a traumatic brain injury. To deal with that, you need medical facilities. Mere housing is insufficient.
    - watwut 4y ago
      Somehow, they just all happened to start having brain injuries as housing got expensive. rather then, expensive housing made it impossible to keep house for more and more people with issues.
  - rllearneratwork 4y ago
- atoav 4y ago
  Maybe these people don't feel the need uphold their part of the unwritten contract with society, because society hasn't uphold their side during their life. Generally such problems are much rarer in societies where the divide between rich and poor is smaller, where you have free access to healthcare and psychological treatment and where you have some form of social security that keeps you off the street. What you phrase here are the consequences of the form of society you are living in. The question now is, do you want to solve the root causes of these issues or do you want to paint over them following the motto "out of sight, out of mind". I mean maybe it is my European arrogance, but to me it is pretty damn obvious that a lot of the things that make parts of the US this dystopic place are a direct result of the lack of social cohesion. Helping total strangers out with my tax money is not something I just do because it is the right thing to do, I also do it because living in a nicer society feels better than living in one where one quarter is desperately fighting for survival while another quarter has basically already given up.
  - prottog 4y ago
    > maybe it is my European arrogance It could be. Social cohesion is a lot easier in monoethnic countries, for better or for worse; and in countries where the monoethnicity is changing like Sweden (where a full quarter of the population is not ethnically Swedish), voters are putting political parties in power that promise to restore it by some combination of reducing immigration or enforcing integration. In the meantime, the dystopia of the United States is such that the state of Mississippi, often panned both within the US and without as a "literal third-world country", has a higher per capita disposable income than Germany. The image that you have of half the population either struggling to stay alive or basically dead is not true to reality.
    - ZeroGravitas 4y ago
      I feel you're just repeating randomly cherry-picked stats. The data is fairly consistent that the USA as a whole has slowly lost it's advantages over Europe that it had after WWII and the New Deal: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_of_living_in_the_United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_of_living_in_the_Unit... > In the United Nations Human Development Index, which measures health, education, and per capita income levels, the United States is relatively high, currently ranking 8th. However, the Human Development Index is not considered a measure of living standards, but a measure of potential living standards were there no inequality: rather, the inequality-adjusted Human Development Index is considered the actual level of human development, taking inequality into account. On the inequality-adjusted HDI, the United States ranked 27th in 2014, tied with Poland Wikipedia has newer stats too, but the USA is still basically tied with Poland in the mid 20s: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_inequality-adjusted_Human_Development_Index https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_inequalit... So, if the USA as a whole is Poland then presumably Mississipi, despite all the money they get from other states, is likely not doing that great compared with Germany. Also intersesting, and new to me, they do one that takes into account how wasteful the country is with resources to achieve that standard of living, on that the USA slips way down, below Ukraine: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_planetary_pressures%E2%80%93adjusted_Human_Development_Index https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_planetary...
egberts1 4y ago
Enabling mental health issue by the court cannot be done the same as the court being compassionate. One thing is worse than the other.
hedora 4y ago
A friend attempted to give his his family, his doctor and me the ability to institutionalize him in case he had a psychotic break. He had medical insurance. Later, the psychotic break came, and he decided there was a complicated conspiracy involving doctors, and started fantisizing about shooting up the local synagogue (he did not and has never owned a gun). Despite this, the local mental hospital said they could not honor his wishes unless he voluntarily committed himself. Ultimately, before he got care, he lost his job, wife, apartment, most of his stuff, life savings, medical coverage, and car. If anything, this bill doesn't go far enough. For one thing, it only fines municipalities that ignore it $365K per year.
- yieldcrv 4y ago
  Maybe you could put him under conservatorship first, and then do whatever you wish. As long as conservatorship is a feature at all, might as well push it to its logical extremes
hollywood_court 4y ago
The opponents of this decision argue that it is cruel. Yet something must be done. I’m not one to disparage California, but this behavior would not be allowed where I live. I’ve experienced exactly one instance of a mentally ill individual harassing my son while he played in our yard. The police were here less than 90 seconds after I called them. I’m not a fan of the police in general, but they performed their duty that day and possibly saved that individual’s life.
- prottog 4y ago
  > they performed their duty that day and possibly saved that individual’s life Let's not neglect you and your son's right not to be harassed in your own yard! A person's life is important, yes, but if their deranged behavior is causing small amounts of harm to a great number of people, at some point it adds up enough to justify forcing them to change their behavior. Let's call it "social pollution", if you will.
  - hollywood_court 4y ago
    I was prepared to change his behavior by shooting him. It may sound harsh, but if you trespass onto my property uninvited, regardless of your intentions, you have effectively forfeited your life. Especially when you are behaving in an intimidating manner and standing between me and my 3.5 year old son.
    - prottog 4y ago
      I fully agree with you when it comes to him standing between you and your young son, but we should realize that sometimes people might get lost or be looking for a different house or something and accidentally trespass. If that happens without the intimidating manner involved, hopefully you have the wits to not open fire.
      - hollywood_court 4y ago
        Absolutely. I haven't left home without a firearm in almost 21 years, but I'm actually not a fan of guns. I just experienced some things during my childhood and during my most formative years that made me understand that violence is the ultimate authority in the world, and I want to make sure I'm capable of defending against it if the need arises. I would feel like an absolute coward if I were to shoot someone that wasn't harming or threatening harm to my people or myself. I live in a college town and have had run ins with random drunk kids on my property, but I was always capable of handling those issues with my words and my hands. However, I'm not taking that chance with a mentally ill individual with my child standing right there.
cestith 4y ago
Nothing solves homelessness like homes. No mental health program, court ordered treatment, financial assistance program, skills training program, or jobs program will entirely fix homelessness for people struggling with maintaining an average everyday life. The only thing that will fix homelessness for people with the inability to make income and manage their bills is to provide them homes.
- _-david-_ 4y ago
  When people talk about the problems of homelessness they generally don't mean just people without houses. That is just a symptom of a greater problem. The majority of the homeless people have some sort of issue (mental or substance). Just giving them a house won't solve the problems they face, it will just hide it from the rest of us. If you want to provide housing and bill management as part of the solution that is fine, but it can't be the complete solution. Ultimately you need to fix the underlying problem so they can fully or partially support themselves. I would also say that just giving people houses will also not completely fix homelessness unless you ban people living on the street and enforce the law. Some people with mental illnesses will live on the street even if they have housing unless you stop them from doing it.
  - cestith 4y ago
    Many of the reasons mental illness makes homelessness more likely have to do with difficulty keeping steady employment or lacking the executive function and presence of mind to manage finances. Yes, some people are so detached that they would wander parks and such anyway. But many, many people would be kept out of homelessness if they only had a little help with a place to live, some life management issues, or both.
    - _-david-_ 4y ago
      Some people are advocating just giving homeless people housing and then saying homelessness is solved. I'm not suggesting you are advocating for that, I just was attempting to be clear that something more than just providing housing needs to be done.
anonAndOn 4y ago
This is a step in the right direction. There is no miracle policy that cures all of the reasons CA has thousands of people sleeping unsheltered. Getting the mentally unstable into shelter is a big first step, though. Hopefully, this helps people like the lady I watched lift her skirt and defecate on the road median at a stop light.
deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
_-david-_ 4y ago
Some people are suggesting we need to be compassionate toward those in society that have to deal with the problems associated with homelessness. While that is true I think it is better to focus on being compassionate towards the homeless. There is an interesting question I have heard: who is more free, a person who lives in a society with minimal laws but has substance abuse issues and is not really in control of themselves or a person who lives in a society with more restrictive laws but is in control and not dealing with addiction. I generally agree with the second one, but opponents of laws like this one are in the first camp. I think the skewed understanding of freedom is the root of the dissent on this law. It is not compassionate to allow people who have impaired facilities due to mental illness and/or substance abuse live life as a homeless person. Many people with those issues are unable to solve their problems on their own. Letting them continue on this destructive path will not allow them to have freedom. Freedom is not just being able to do X, but being able to choose to do X. We can help treat people with these type problems and let them have true freedom. Both the individual and society will be better even if we remove their "freedom" to be homeless.
kurupt213 4y ago
Ha. California’s tax receipts are 11% below budget
jabthedang 4y ago

40 points by _-david-_ 4y ago

> ..force some of them into treatment.. > The new law would let a court order a treatment plan for up to one year, which could be extended for a second year. > Those who refuse could be placed under a conservatorship and ordered to comply. > Newsom signed the law over the strong objections of the American Civil Liberties Union of California, Human Rights Watch, Disability Rights California and numerous other organizations that work with homeless people, minority communities and people with disabilities who say the new program will violate civil rights.

joshribakoff 4y ago

> opponents argue is cruel I have lived in SF for several years and done a complete 180. The status quo is not “compassionate”, there are people who turn down help. These same individuals quite literally destroy the city. For instance, we have people sleeping and overdosing (dying) in our buildings entryway. The other week, one person defecated and smeared it on our door, lit our awning on fire, and uprooted all the landscaping and burned it. At the same time, people are selling drugs nearby and individuals are literally lined up with backpacks. There is constantly broken glass, feces, and trash spewed everywhere. Something has to change, and again lots of these people are turning down help. Right now the police state they send out the HOT (homeless outreach team) which is basically older individuals who volunteer to distribute pamphlets. If there is a crime, usually no arrest is made if the police are even able to respond. The penalties are often a misdemeanor and a fine, and not showing up to court often only results in more (effectively unenforceable) fines It’s a fine line between “compassion” and “enabling”.

NoraCodes 4y ago
I think the key question here is: what kind of help is available? Is the "help" financial literacy classes, religious drug rehab, and overcrowded shelters with draconian policies? How many of these people would still be out on the street if housing was abundant and affordable? Some, maybe, but surely not most.
- prottog 4y ago
  > How many of these people would still be out on the street if housing was abundant and affordable? What if the housing was abundant and affordable but came with strings attached, like not being able to do drugs or engage in other antisocial behavior in them? Would that be a draconian policy? Literature from people who have spoken with many of the homeless of SF suggest that "some, maybe, but surely not most" ratio is actually the other way around. People who are temporarily homeless due solely to financial factors are often able to find a home, and comprise a minority of the people you actually see on the street; and many of the latter actually turn down help if it means they cannot do as they please.
  - gamblor956 4y ago
    This exactly. There is more than enough housing in LA and SF to house the temporarily homeless. There is also enough housing to house the mentally ill homeless. But there is essentially no housing to house the drug-addicted homeless. Thousands of shelter beds go unused in LA every night because most homeless shelters are sober facilities, meaning no drugs or alcohol, and the drug addicts would rather keep their booze and their high then have a bed and a bath. And those are the majority of the homeless you encounter in LA and SF. (Note: mind altering substances can trigger mental illness; marijuana is known to trigger latent schizoid-series mental illnesses and this is one of the reasons it remained a controlled drug at the federal level for so long. Most illegal psychotropic drugs damage the brain, ultimately leading to the development of mental illness after sustained or heavy use; I don't classify such individuals as mentally ill because their drug addiction dominates.) Source: I was a public defender representing the criminally mentally ill at the start of my career and essentially acting in the same role as proposed by the mental health court plan (albeit without the criminal law element).
    - NoraCodes 4y ago
      > the drug addicts would rather keep their booze and their high then have a bed and a bath. Or, rather, their addiction - which is an illness - prevents them from making that decision. Right?
dominotw 4y ago
> I have lived in SF for several years and done a complete 180. Doesn't really matter because CA is uniparty system. Few people doing 180 isn't going stop us from providing compassionate care instead of vindictive suggestions like imprisonment.
- hollywood_court 4y ago
  Where is the compassion for contributing members of society who have to deal with this on a daily basis? I consider myself a progressive individual, but I won’t allow someone to damage my home or other property simply because they are mentally unwell. I won’t allow my child or wife to be harassed or watch them tip toe around feces and broken class because people can’t get their act together.
  - dominotw 4y ago
    > Where is the compassion for contributing members of society Pretty sure compassion for top 1% of society isn't really top priority for the society. you can move easily if you want with all the resources you have at your disposal.
    - hollywood_court 4y ago
      People want to live their lives without being harassed and without having their property damaged or their loved ones harmed.
      - kelseyfrog 4y ago
        If you had to choose between property or people, which would it be?
        hollywood_court 4y ago
        I would choose my family’s safety and well being over the life of a stranger every time.
jseliger 4y ago
Mental health courts may be a small step in the right direction, but California will try absolutely anything to solve homelessness apart from building more housing: https://www.mcsweeneys.net/articles/i-will-do-anything-to-end-homelessness-except-build-more-homes https://www.mcsweeneys.net/articles/i-will-do-anything-to-en... We see the results: https://seliger.com/2022/06/29/homelessness-is-a-housing-problem-when-cities-build-housing-homelessness-goes-down/ https://seliger.com/2022/06/29/homelessness-is-a-housing-pro...
- powerslacker 4y ago
  Anyone who spends a few afternoons in the shady parts of San Francisco can tell you that the issue is not a lack of housing. There are some people who cannot live unsupervised in any kind of housing because they are a danger to themselves, others, and property. Newsom is one of my least favorite politicians, but credit where credit is due this is one of the best things that has been accomplished under his administration.
  - riddlemethat 4y ago
    California has been losing a ground war to hordes of homeless drug addicts for a long time. If Newsom can win a battle it'll be turning the tide even slightly...
- bsder 4y ago
  About 1 in 5 homeless in San Francisco have a traumatic brain injury. To deal with that, you need medical facilities. Mere housing is insufficient.
  - watwut 4y ago
    Somehow, they just all happened to start having brain injuries as housing got expensive. rather then, expensive housing made it impossible to keep house for more and more people with issues.
- rllearneratwork 4y ago
atoav 4y ago
Maybe these people don't feel the need uphold their part of the unwritten contract with society, because society hasn't uphold their side during their life. Generally such problems are much rarer in societies where the divide between rich and poor is smaller, where you have free access to healthcare and psychological treatment and where you have some form of social security that keeps you off the street. What you phrase here are the consequences of the form of society you are living in. The question now is, do you want to solve the root causes of these issues or do you want to paint over them following the motto "out of sight, out of mind". I mean maybe it is my European arrogance, but to me it is pretty damn obvious that a lot of the things that make parts of the US this dystopic place are a direct result of the lack of social cohesion. Helping total strangers out with my tax money is not something I just do because it is the right thing to do, I also do it because living in a nicer society feels better than living in one where one quarter is desperately fighting for survival while another quarter has basically already given up.
- prottog 4y ago
  > maybe it is my European arrogance It could be. Social cohesion is a lot easier in monoethnic countries, for better or for worse; and in countries where the monoethnicity is changing like Sweden (where a full quarter of the population is not ethnically Swedish), voters are putting political parties in power that promise to restore it by some combination of reducing immigration or enforcing integration. In the meantime, the dystopia of the United States is such that the state of Mississippi, often panned both within the US and without as a "literal third-world country", has a higher per capita disposable income than Germany. The image that you have of half the population either struggling to stay alive or basically dead is not true to reality.
  - ZeroGravitas 4y ago
    I feel you're just repeating randomly cherry-picked stats. The data is fairly consistent that the USA as a whole has slowly lost it's advantages over Europe that it had after WWII and the New Deal: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_of_living_in_the_United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_of_living_in_the_Unit... > In the United Nations Human Development Index, which measures health, education, and per capita income levels, the United States is relatively high, currently ranking 8th. However, the Human Development Index is not considered a measure of living standards, but a measure of potential living standards were there no inequality: rather, the inequality-adjusted Human Development Index is considered the actual level of human development, taking inequality into account. On the inequality-adjusted HDI, the United States ranked 27th in 2014, tied with Poland Wikipedia has newer stats too, but the USA is still basically tied with Poland in the mid 20s: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_inequality-adjusted_Human_Development_Index https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_inequalit... So, if the USA as a whole is Poland then presumably Mississipi, despite all the money they get from other states, is likely not doing that great compared with Germany. Also intersesting, and new to me, they do one that takes into account how wasteful the country is with resources to achieve that standard of living, on that the USA slips way down, below Ukraine: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_planetary_pressures%E2%80%93adjusted_Human_Development_Index https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_planetary...

egberts1 4y ago

Enabling mental health issue by the court cannot be done the same as the court being compassionate. One thing is worse than the other.

hedora 4y ago

A friend attempted to give his his family, his doctor and me the ability to institutionalize him in case he had a psychotic break. He had medical insurance. Later, the psychotic break came, and he decided there was a complicated conspiracy involving doctors, and started fantisizing about shooting up the local synagogue (he did not and has never owned a gun). Despite this, the local mental hospital said they could not honor his wishes unless he voluntarily committed himself. Ultimately, before he got care, he lost his job, wife, apartment, most of his stuff, life savings, medical coverage, and car. If anything, this bill doesn't go far enough. For one thing, it only fines municipalities that ignore it $365K per year.

yieldcrv 4y ago
Maybe you could put him under conservatorship first, and then do whatever you wish. As long as conservatorship is a feature at all, might as well push it to its logical extremes

hollywood_court 4y ago

The opponents of this decision argue that it is cruel. Yet something must be done. I’m not one to disparage California, but this behavior would not be allowed where I live. I’ve experienced exactly one instance of a mentally ill individual harassing my son while he played in our yard. The police were here less than 90 seconds after I called them. I’m not a fan of the police in general, but they performed their duty that day and possibly saved that individual’s life.

prottog 4y ago
> they performed their duty that day and possibly saved that individual’s life Let's not neglect you and your son's right not to be harassed in your own yard! A person's life is important, yes, but if their deranged behavior is causing small amounts of harm to a great number of people, at some point it adds up enough to justify forcing them to change their behavior. Let's call it "social pollution", if you will.
- hollywood_court 4y ago
  I was prepared to change his behavior by shooting him. It may sound harsh, but if you trespass onto my property uninvited, regardless of your intentions, you have effectively forfeited your life. Especially when you are behaving in an intimidating manner and standing between me and my 3.5 year old son.
  - prottog 4y ago
    I fully agree with you when it comes to him standing between you and your young son, but we should realize that sometimes people might get lost or be looking for a different house or something and accidentally trespass. If that happens without the intimidating manner involved, hopefully you have the wits to not open fire.
    - hollywood_court 4y ago
      Absolutely. I haven't left home without a firearm in almost 21 years, but I'm actually not a fan of guns. I just experienced some things during my childhood and during my most formative years that made me understand that violence is the ultimate authority in the world, and I want to make sure I'm capable of defending against it if the need arises. I would feel like an absolute coward if I were to shoot someone that wasn't harming or threatening harm to my people or myself. I live in a college town and have had run ins with random drunk kids on my property, but I was always capable of handling those issues with my words and my hands. However, I'm not taking that chance with a mentally ill individual with my child standing right there.

cestith 4y ago

Nothing solves homelessness like homes. No mental health program, court ordered treatment, financial assistance program, skills training program, or jobs program will entirely fix homelessness for people struggling with maintaining an average everyday life. The only thing that will fix homelessness for people with the inability to make income and manage their bills is to provide them homes.

_-david-_ 4y ago
When people talk about the problems of homelessness they generally don't mean just people without houses. That is just a symptom of a greater problem. The majority of the homeless people have some sort of issue (mental or substance). Just giving them a house won't solve the problems they face, it will just hide it from the rest of us. If you want to provide housing and bill management as part of the solution that is fine, but it can't be the complete solution. Ultimately you need to fix the underlying problem so they can fully or partially support themselves. I would also say that just giving people houses will also not completely fix homelessness unless you ban people living on the street and enforce the law. Some people with mental illnesses will live on the street even if they have housing unless you stop them from doing it.
- cestith 4y ago
  Many of the reasons mental illness makes homelessness more likely have to do with difficulty keeping steady employment or lacking the executive function and presence of mind to manage finances. Yes, some people are so detached that they would wander parks and such anyway. But many, many people would be kept out of homelessness if they only had a little help with a place to live, some life management issues, or both.
  - _-david-_ 4y ago
    Some people are advocating just giving homeless people housing and then saying homelessness is solved. I'm not suggesting you are advocating for that, I just was attempting to be clear that something more than just providing housing needs to be done.

anonAndOn 4y ago

This is a step in the right direction. There is no miracle policy that cures all of the reasons CA has thousands of people sleeping unsheltered. Getting the mentally unstable into shelter is a big first step, though. Hopefully, this helps people like the lady I watched lift her skirt and defecate on the road median at a stop light.

deleted 4y ago

[deleted]

_-david-_ 4y ago

Some people are suggesting we need to be compassionate toward those in society that have to deal with the problems associated with homelessness. While that is true I think it is better to focus on being compassionate towards the homeless. There is an interesting question I have heard: who is more free, a person who lives in a society with minimal laws but has substance abuse issues and is not really in control of themselves or a person who lives in a society with more restrictive laws but is in control and not dealing with addiction. I generally agree with the second one, but opponents of laws like this one are in the first camp. I think the skewed understanding of freedom is the root of the dissent on this law. It is not compassionate to allow people who have impaired facilities due to mental illness and/or substance abuse live life as a homeless person. Many people with those issues are unable to solve their problems on their own. Letting them continue on this destructive path will not allow them to have freedom. Freedom is not just being able to do X, but being able to choose to do X. We can help treat people with these type problems and let them have true freedom. Both the individual and society will be better even if we remove their "freedom" to be homeless.

kurupt213 4y ago

Ha. California’s tax receipts are 11% below budget

jabthedang 4y ago