Certainly I don’t advocate for the old fashioned One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest style asylum. On the other hand, contemporary short term stay psych hospitals do benefit the patients from what I’ve seen. Some patients, however, bounce back because the nature of their illness makes them unable to manage as an outpatient. I’m talking about people who come in to the acute psych hospital 15, 20, or even 25+ times a year with the same problems. Just like some people with severe non-psychiatric medical problems benefit from being in a nursing home on a long term basis, IMHO some people with severe psychiatric problems would benefit from being in a long term psychiatric care facility, assuming such places existed. Maybe it’s a lack of imagination on my part, but I don’t see any other good alternatives.
There are alternatives, taxpayers refuse to consistently pay for them. A client-directed continuum of care that included supported housing, supported employment, education, recreation and leisure, with intensive outpatient medical and psychiatric care that was dignified and respectful would go a long way. Otherwise it is incarceration called by another name.
In the actual proposition posted above I see this is for the U Texas area and downtown only. If it passes I expect the various tents cities, etc., will just move right outside those areas and so nothing will have really changed.
Because of the nature of the beast it’s hard to get accurate statistics regarding the homeless. But I don’t buy that 60% are regular people who just need a job or a better job. I’ve seen stats that claimed 2/3 were some form of mentally ill, addicts, or a combination of both. The remainder being disabled, veterans, and children along with a hodge podge of other strange creatures.
Just from my own real world experience no way are 60% of the homeless I deal with “regular” people. Not all of them may be severely mentally ill, but they aren’t just simply un or under employed. There are a lot of very weird people living on the streets.
Except there are programs like that. But if someone is deeply disturbed or severely addicted a voluntary program simply isn’t going to help them. They may get a little better but then they walk away, go back to abusing drugs or stop taking their psych meds and back on the street they go. It’s a vicious circle that just doesn’t work. For some of those people maybe the most loving thing we can do for them is lock them up.
It’s confusingly worded, but the “camping ban” would apply citywide.
Look, I think I’ve proved my left-of-center bona fides on this forum. But I’m all for reinstating the camping ban. First of all, a prohibition on camping in public spaces was in place for decades up until about a two years ago, when the city council repealed it. The very liberal city council spent months patting themselves on the back for this enlightened move, with no plan to actually help get the homeless population off the sidewalks. When it started blowing up in their faces, their solution was to buy a couple old hotels to stick them in.
The situation right now is untenable. Every highway underpass is an encampment. This is particularly dangerous because the Texas U-Turn means that cars are coming in blind to the underpass and often there are people loitering in the street. And as mentioned above, it isn’t just people sleeping. These encampments quickly become filled to the gills with tents, mattresses, shopping carts, and lots of other “stuff”. I’ve personally had to call 911 twice on encampments that were on fire.
There’s no easy answers here. If this had been done with a plan, it might have worked. But the primary lesson I think most other cities are going to take from the Austin experience is that repealing public camping and panhandling ordinances just pisses off voters without helping fix the situation.
While that might SOUND nice in the abstract, if people have mental and emotional issues which impair their ability to make (what the majority of society would consider) many basic health and lifestyle decisions, why are we to assume that they are competent to direct their own health care.
Moreover, my impression is that at least some people are willing to consume limitless amounts of healthcare, while exercising minimal effort on their own part to improve their overall condition. I am a VERY STRONG supporter of universal provision of SOME LEVEL of health care (as well as education, vocat training, and other social services.) But I think it very problematic to suggest a system “directed” by the recipients.
How much should society spend on each homeless person to attempt to solve the problem?
$100k?
That’s only about $60 billion nationally then. Compared to the recent spending bills regarding economic and Covid relief, that’s a drop in the bucket.
But before we start talking about money…can society even solve this problem…as mentioned upthread, many homeless don’t want to be helped.
You keep saying this does not make it true or moral. There is nothing moral, right or loving about ‘locking people up’. That makes it better for you, not them.
If being ‘locked up’ is so good, you do it so that you are sequestered away from those discomforting ‘others’ that you are so eager to lock up.
There are some percentage of homeless, although perhaps not @mikecurtis’s 60%, who can really be helped by assistance with housing and jobs and training. Which may be lifelong help in some cases (e.g. handicapped folks) but in many cases will be intermittent. At least in locations where the cost of housing and the minimum wage have some rational overlap. That we are not tackling this aspect of the problem with both feet is a national disgrace.
I suspect the ROI on doing that job adequately would be positive for society once we consider the costs of policing, petty crime, and the severe impact childhood homelessness will have on those kids as adults. Stopping the cycle will have large out-year payoffs. It may be a hard sell for the first few years until the payoffs come back in, and it’ll always be easier to see and attack the “homeless management” budget than it will be to properly credit the costs and harms forgone by not having a homeless problem as a result of that well-spent budget.
Said another way, homelessness is a symptom, not a disease. Multiple different social maladies result in this symptom. Just above I’ve addressed one disease, earning power inadequacy and/or bad luck, and proposed an outline of a direction towards a treatment if not a cure.
As to a different disease with the same symptom …
As to the chronically addicted & the true mental problems that are beyond our current medical tech to help much, or even at all, IMO we’re left with the comments just above by @pkbites & @Dinsdale.
If folks like that have a say in their care, they’ll choose to be living under our overpasses, shitting on our sidewalks, and harassing our pedestrians. Perhaps full-time or perhaps alternating with 6 month stays in the voluntary rehab & feeding facility while the weather outside is too cold for their tastes.
At some point, just as with actual unequivocal criminals like robbers & murderers, society does have the right to protect itself, and the rest of us, from the negative externalities of these folks’ chosen lifestyles & means of support. In fact the true historical and moral underpinnings of all criminal law is exactly that: protecting society from excessively sharp negative externalities of others’ behavior. Be that voluntary or involuntary behavior, while given that our knowledge of the true dividing line between the two is ever-evolving.
Maybe that protection does take the form of a traditional asylum, but done as best we can today, not the cynical worst we can do today.
Maybe it takes the form of a “Jurassic Park” for wackos. A designated wilderness park in a benign enough climate where the fence keeps them in and everyone else out, but they’re otherwise free to do as they will. As with managing cattle on the range, if the local flora and fauna can’t support them (and it won’t) we need to provide sufficient food in convenient forms. And otherwise let them have the (dubious) freedom they insist upon, while still providing the rest of society the freedom we reasonably insist upon from their noxious side effects.
You direct your health care and social services don’t you? Why should it be different for people who are homeless? If you want to make my decisions for me and impose them, then I expect to make your decisions for you and impose them to an equal degree.
FTR, I don’t disagree with any of this. Especially the provision of the ‘done as best we can today’. Do that with integrity and most of the problem will be eased and what doesn’t becomes much more tolerable for the rest of us. Don’t provide a net of supports and services for a few years and then decide that it no longer needs as much funding and then be surprised when the solution falls apart. That is what got us here in the first place. Mental hospitals were “deinstitutionalized” in the ‘70s, many thousands were turned out into the streets and cities without palatable access to the same necessities and supports of life that all of us require. That is where much of the homeless problem started for most locales. It has always been with us throughout civilization on a scale that society has struggled with but managed to tolerate til that was done (albeit with good intentions) in the ‘70s. We didn’t put the services and supports in place first and then built a supportive system wrapping around the person before turning them out. Re-locking people up who we don’t understand and who repel us is not the ethical or moral answer.
So basically, the Sanctuary Districts from an episode of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine. Life imitating art!
I could not disagree with you more strongly. I enjoy some discretion because I bear some costs related to the health care and social services I receive, and because I have made certain choices that qualify me for the services I desire.
I support a far more robust safety net than our society currently provides, but in no way do I believe that net should be without limits.
If someone is poor and disadvantaged, they should be offered some health/safety/housing assistance. That does NOT mean IMO they should have endless options - including living on the streets. IF (and that is a big if) a community provides adequate safe and clean shelter, then IMO that community is entirely justified in enforcing rules against living on the streets.
I compared mental illness to physical illness in my post, and I stand by my opinion. Some people really are better off in nursing homes because of the severity of their physical illnesses. Some people would be better off in a long term psychiatric care facility due to the severity of their psychiatric illness. I have, in fact, encountered some of those people, some of whom were being discharged from the short term psych hospital, who wanted to stay long term. Only of course there is no such facility, so they were out of luck, back to their previous shitty circumstances the go.
It’s the ‘locked up’ I object to, not the ‘facility’ part. Open door facilities that people choose to stay in, more power to them. Have at it, build it and they will come. Just no locked in against their will.
Thank you for this. I too hope the proposition passes. Untenable is an understatement. The level of encampments and litter and trash has probably tripled in most of Austin and surrounding communities in the past couple of years. I don’t even want to think about the effect of the pandemic on the homeless population, nor the effect of the homeless population on the pandemic. Clearly answers are needed and clearly city government does not have any answers at all, and I don’t just mean in Austin. Ten years ago we moved from Los Angeles to Austin and Austin was not like LA. Now it is.
How ironic that Austin is considering this when there’s such a wonderful solution just 10 miles away. Granted, there’s not enough space there for all of Austin’s homeless population; nor would every homeless person want to live at Community First, but the concept is pretty much win-win. I’ll try to keep this concise:
• Homeless people benefit from belonging to a community.
• Many homeless people either have mental health issues or are too quirky to fit in in work environments. Temporary residences are therefore not a solution. Residents can live at CF as long as they like.
• At CF, people live in either tiny houses or RV’s. The homes do not have kitchens or bathrooms, as those are communal (encouraging community).
• There is a monthly charge to live there (I think about $400.); however, residents can work at CF(e.g., in the kitchen) and will make more than enough money to pay the charges. This gives dignity and a sense of belonging to residents.
• Residents are connected to mental health resources and/or addiction programs if needed. (Drugs are not allowed there.)
• CF is not a religious community. It was started by a church, but there’s no proselytizing, no religious symbols, etc. There’s no church on the premises, though there is a sort of non-religious meditation center available.
• Residents can learn a variety of skills, including computer skills, art (which they can sell at the gift shop), automotive repair, and others. Classes are open to non-residents.
• Corporations donate some equipment and some supplies. (Example: the open air theater, which is open to anyone, resident or not). Some send employees to volunteer. There’s no government support. The community is largely self-supporting.
• There’s a B&B and other amenities there. You can book a stay, if you’d like.
• Police rarely have to be called to resolve disputes.
Community First was originally planned to be in Austin, but the NIMBY public outcry forced it to be located 10 miles out. Some CF residents do work in Austin.
There are over 200 residences there now. Obviously, that’s not enough. It seems to me, though, that if Austin is willing to either do something similar or work in conjunction with Community First, it could go a long way toward helping alleviate the homeless issue.
So the productive members of society have to put up with the homeless causing a blight of their community, public vomiting, defecating, masturbating, fornicating, and urination, being accosted for money everywhere they go, having to step over passed out derelicts on public sidewalks, finding trespassing homeless on their property, in stairwells, elevators, etc? What about the rights of regular people?
Bull! In my jurisdiction we have voluntary mental services. The homeless rarely enter on their own. We even encourage it when we have contact with them. We have a packet of information we give the homeless that includes where they can get shelter, food, clothing, drug/alcohol treatment and mental health services. We explain to them that the mental health facility can aid them to get off the street. They just won’t use it! Why should we expect someone who is severely addicted or mentally ill to be able to make a rational decision on what should be done about their problem?
I have been dealing with the homeless every day for just shy of 40 years. The problem has become worse and those on the streets have become more and more insolent. The number one constant is YOUR WAY DOESN’T WORK! it has never worked and it is not going to work. EVER! The homeless will not go away by allowing them to do what they want and dictate what their treatment is. And who ends up suffering? All of us because the homeless remain so and the rest of us have to put up with them.
Yes. If normies are unwilling to make the least fucking effort to improve the lot of the less fortunate, they deserve to have to wade through the shitstream that they are fostering.
Everyday working people are not the ones making the decisions on how to deal with the homeless, and those making the decisions have been doing the wrong things for decades.
This nonsense of allowing addicts and the mentally ill to make the important decisions on how to end their homelessness has to end. If they had the capacity to make those important decisions they wouldn’t be on the street in the first place.