Why can’t we fix this? Every damn day I sit in hour long traffic on 280/85/101 to go 10 miles to work. As I sit in this massive parking lot, I see filth-ridden encampments feet away from me on 280 in areas that used to be pristine. How did we get here? We have the smartest minds in the world, the epicenter of new technology and this place is looking more and more like District 8 from the Hunger Games. I often wonder if many of us are just wishfully thinking that because we pay high rent and mortgages for million dollar shacks that this will just “get fixed”. Are there any Bay Area tech-based companies trying to find solutions?
You have the smartest minds who don’t give a fuck about anyone but themselves. It will only get worse, much worse... 🍆
That’s precisely why we are trying to decide if we really want to stay here.
@Orange My family moved. One of the best decisions we've made.
Helping the homeless is a prisoner’s dilemma. Individuals giving only reduces social competitiveness to that individual. We can only win through collective giving. In other words, tax and social programs.
Ding ding ding.
Socialist scum. The utopia of factional warlordism can never be realized with this type of logical response.
This problem is too big to solve properly for a city or a region. Let’s say we solve it by making it illegal to be homeless and we round everyone up, force them into public housing, give them medical and drug rehab, help place them into jobs and hope they can manage to wane off the public housing dole and manage themselves. That’s a monumental and worthy effort that will cost a good chunk of change. Then what? Every bum in the nation will come here for the same thing and overwhelm the system. It doesn’t scale if it’s not a national policy. And for that to happen you need socialism. And we’re too brainwashed against that label for it to happen.
Making panhandling illegal and actually enforcing it solves the problem right away
Solves what problem? Your inconvenience of seeing them on the street? Veneers are still fake even though they look better. I say making urban camping and panhandling illegal in the city is fine as long as your going to push them through other services to help them as I mentioned above. Otherwise you’re solving nothing. They’ll just panhandle in all the burbs and exoburbs.
Practically every city outlaws behaviors that cause problems related to homelessness (peeing/pooping in public, sleeping and erecting tents on the sidewalk, harassing random people, shooting up in public). The Bay Area cities have much of the same laws but the difference is that people aren’t willing to enforce them. They feel bad for the homeless and try to help them, which is very often totally futile.
You’ll need to solve addiction and mental illness. Not having a home is their symptom not the disease.
The car is a great social engineering tool perhaps better than the TV. For one or two hours 5 days a week millions of workers sit in meditation about how to get ahead of others without being caught by the police. Not only that, the seat is made for your back to assume a posture of submission. So the homeless you see along the highway are they not desensitzing us from the hardship of our fellow countrymen? I see them as the next step of action film gore, the 21st enactment of the Roman Games.
You had me until the posture of submission statement. Not getting the visual.
Rounded shoulders and neck lowered. I dable in martial arts and my posture while sitting in that sofa is the opposite of what I am stretching to acheive.
Isn’t what your describing partly a function of the vast differences of the haves vs have nots? This is a great example of helping others isn’t socialism, but rather a smart way to increase your own wellbeing by helping others. What does it cost to help someone get off the street? How much does that add to your RE value?
What does it cost to get someone off the street? About $4k a month.
465 - agree completely. The wealth gap is increasing and those finding themselves on the streets are more and more are middle-low income families. It’s really concerning and while my family and I try to do our part with local charities. It’s not enough.