Oregon homeless camp bill

DIY-HP-LED

Well-Known Member
Why not?

It is an issue in Canada too and most of them are mentally ill, whatever their issue is they are human beings who need help. It puts us one step away from the elderly dying in ditches. It's not just money that solves this issue, it is new law and policy. Letting them live in public places is not the answer and perhaps we should look elsewhere for solutions? The cost of rent in most Canadian cities puts any housing out of reach for many working poor people.


How Finland Found A Solution To Homelessness
 

Metasynth

Well-Known Member

HGCC

Well-Known Member
Think it's a bad idea, have you been around many homeless camps? They tend to destroy the public place they are in. It also is kind of just leaving people who are often mentally ill out on the streets to just fend for themselves.

I think we should go back to mental institutions, like large long term care places. Tiny house villages built around services for the down on their luck people. We have a shitload of willfully homeless junkies here, idk what to do about that shit. It's a major issue where I am and people are fed up and sick of dealing with it, it ruins sympathy for the mentally ill and the people just not able to afford housing.
 

Roger A. Shrubber

Well-Known Member
Think it's a bad idea, have you been around many homeless camps? They tend to destroy the public place they are in. It also is kind of just leaving people who are often mentally ill out on the streets to just fend for themselves.

I think we should go back to mental institutions, like large long term care places. Tiny house villages built around services for the down on their luck people. We have a shitload of willfully homeless junkies here, idk what to do about that shit. It's a major issue where I am and people are fed up and sick of dealing with it, it ruins sympathy for the mentally ill and the people just not able to afford housing.
Homelessness and Mental Health

The idea that mental illness alone causes homelessness is naive and inaccurate, for two major reasons. First, the overwhelming majority of those living with mental illness are not homeless (and studies have failed to demonstrate a causal relationship between the two).

These types of distortions can have dangerous implications, wrongly focusing the attention on the individual rather than on the institutions that perpetuate housing insecurity. As a result, the illusory division between the “mentally ill homeless” and the “non-mentally ill homeless” casts the former as more deserving of intervention and services and the latter as seemingly “unworthy” or “undeserving” of support.

Though there is no causal relationship between mental illness and homelessness, those who suffer from housing insecurity are struggling significantly, both psychologically and emotionally. The constellation of economics, subsistence living, family breakdown, psychological deprivation, and impoverished self-esteem all contribute to the downward cycle of poverty.

FROM
https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/mind-matters-menninger/202105/the-complex-link-between-homelessness-and-mental-health

willfully homeless junkies may be a problem where you live, but they're about 2% of the total...
 

sunni

Administrator
Staff member
Think it's a bad idea, have you been around many homeless camps? They tend to destroy the public place they are in. It also is kind of just leaving people who are often mentally ill out on the streets to just fend for themselves.

I think we should go back to mental institutions, like large long term care places. Tiny house villages built around services for the down on their luck people. We have a shitload of willfully homeless junkies here, idk what to do about that shit. It's a major issue where I am and people are fed up and sick of dealing with it, it ruins sympathy for the mentally ill and the people just not able to afford housing.
I think you may want to consider looking up what they did in those institutions….or maybe you know and that’s why you want it ?
 

Fogdog

Well-Known Member
Think it's a bad idea, have you been around many homeless camps? They tend to destroy the public place they are in. It also is kind of just leaving people who are often mentally ill out on the streets to just fend for themselves.

I think we should go back to mental institutions, like large long term care places. Tiny house villages built around services for the down on their luck people. We have a shitload of willfully homeless junkies here, idk what to do about that shit. It's a major issue where I am and people are fed up and sick of dealing with it, it ruins sympathy for the mentally ill and the people just not able to afford housing.
Gov. Kotek ran on addressing Oregon's out of control housing problem. She is willing to work with Oregon's cities and smaller communities to find answers to not only the growing number of unhoused but also making housing affordable for those who find making the rent harder and harder year by year.

Fun facts about people who are unhoused.

Each person has their own story.​
Most are locals​
Some have jobs that don't pay enough,​
a majority of chronic unhoused have mental problems,​
some have drug problems,​
some have both,​
most are unhoused for less than two years,​
some are troubled vets,​
some have pets​
some have partners​
some are kids who ran away from abusive parents.​

They all are US citizens and have the right to sleep. Oregon's communities aren't taking responsibility to provide shelter and housing to enable the unhoused to exercise that right. They, as you say, think it's a bad idea to have homeless camps. I don't want homeless camps in my parks either but I recognize the right of the unhoused to find shelter where they can rest, sleep and recover.

Regarding the bill that @Dr.Amber Trichome referenced; I see it as helpful. It takes away the option of cities and other Oregon communities to harass and prosecute unhoused people in the attempt to make them "go away". Removing that option, provides motivation for reluctant communities to work with the Oregon State government to find solutions that work for them and the unhoused. Because every unhoused person has a different story to tell, there isn't one answer, but everybody has a legal right to sleep. That is the minimum humane solution that Oregon must find.

I think you need to reconsider placing the unhoused in compounds. I call them compounds because about a third of Oregon's unhoused aren't mentally ill. That suggestion is more like a prison than some kind of humane answer.
 
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Fogdog

Well-Known Member
New York found a way to provide shelter for almost all of its unhoused.


While the overwhelming majority — about 95 percent — of the more than 78,000 people who qualify as homeless in New York actually have temporary shelter, others live on the streets, for a host of reasons. They represent a persistent challenge. Since an annual count began more than a decade ago, that population has never fallen below about 2,300, and it hit near-record levels under Mayor Bill de Blasio.

As first goal, I'd settle with 95% of the unhoused in Oregon having shelter. We aren't anywhere near that number now. As New York demonstrates, Oregon's cities' problems with homeless camps is a political problem, not a real one.
 

Budley Doright

Well-Known Member
Being a relatively small city we have one big homeless community and it’s amazing when driving by with others that there are basically two reactions. One being the city needs to kick them out and tear it down. The second is the thought that those poor people need to get proper housing and it’s sad to see. I’m amazed at the resourcefulness these people show re living space. As a person that was homeless for a short period (my home was a 71 Ventura) I can tell you it’s a very scary degrading feeling.
 

Roger A. Shrubber

Well-Known Member
I think you may want to consider looking up what they did in those institutions….or maybe you know and that’s why you want it ?
They weren't all bad, i don't think the majority were bad...People see, or worse, read "one flew over the cuckoos nest" and they think every nurse is Rached, and all the male staff take turns raping random inmates.
There was some pretty horrific shit that occurred at some of them, but for the most part, it was people who wanted to help other people.
There were no "homeless" or "unhoused" people in the 60s and before, there were bums, that were run out of town, if they were lucky.
If you showed up to work, you were tolerated, until the work ended, then it was time for you to move on.
If those people hadn't had those hospitals, they probably would have ended up dead in some small town where they ran into the wrong rednecks.
 

DIY-HP-LED

Well-Known Member
I think a major contributing factor is the high cost of rent, at least in Canada, most working poor can't afford the rent. The government used to build low-cost housing for poor people, but they don't seem to be doing it much anymore. As for mental hospitals, they tore the one we had down here and, in its place, there is kind of a hospital/village and the people there are treated with kindness. It is not a homeless or unhoused shelter or place to live through and I think we need some low-cost public housing. The numbers of unhoused are relatively low in my area, but in Halifax there is a problem because rents are very high there and they are getting high here too for some reason.

The higher numbers appear to be related to a tight housing market and a shortage of affordable options, IMHO it is just another symptom of wealth inequality and insufficient social services. Everybody including governments are getting poorer, except the billionaire class who appear to be doing better than ever while we suffer from inflation caused mostly by greed.
 

DIY-HP-LED

Well-Known Member
Foxnews demonizes the homeless too, they are just someone else to other and foment fear and hatred against for profit.


The surprise turn in Fox's favorite new fearmongering story

Chris Hayes on the truth behind the San Francisco attack that obsessed Fox News: “According to the video and the public defender, this is where the story actually began. This is the key context of what happened before everything they played on Fox News.”
 

Budley Doright

Well-Known Member
Rents are crazy high here as well, $1800 gets you a small 2 bedroom in a mid class location. I just had a very hard conversation with my tenants re giving notice soon due to uncontrollable circumstances and the rent I charge them is less than half of market. I have not officially given notice yet but did inform them that if they found something before that happens and is affordable they need to take it and there will be no penalties re breaking lease, etc. I worry that they will be financially strapped if paying market prices. Hopefully they can get a subsidized unit :(.
 

sunni

Administrator
Staff member
They weren't all bad, i don't think the majority were bad...People see, or worse, read "one flew over the cuckoos nest" and they think every nurse is Rached, and all the male staff take turns raping random inmates.
There was some pretty horrific shit that occurred at some of them, but for the most part, it was people who wanted to help other people.
There were no "homeless" or "unhoused" people in the 60s and before, there were bums, that were run out of town, if they were lucky.
If you showed up to work, you were tolerated, until the work ended, then it was time for you to move on.
If those people hadn't had those hospitals, they probably would have ended up dead in some small town where they ran into the wrong rednecks.
you got two seperate things here. ill address cause i dont think they are one in the same or a solution to eachother

if there were no unhoused in the 60s which why? sure getting a job was alot easier in the 60s they have made it impossible for unhoused people to get a job, once you are on the streets you cannot obtain employment without a home, bank, etc when you are worried about your next meal. services are severely underfunded. shelters currently dont really help unless you fit into their confinement of dehumanizing rules worse than prison


second issue
i think a lot more psychiatrics "hospitals" were worse than you think, a woman doesnt need a lobotomy just because she is "hysterical" so many o those "hospitals" were under staff,had severe care giver burn out , allowed people to go without proper dignified care. misdiagnosis. there's a lot here.

to say every unhoused person needs to be thrown into a psychiatrics hospital is silly, most dont even need one.

psychiatric hospitals still have severe problems today
 

sunni

Administrator
Staff member
Rents are crazy high here as well, $1800 gets you a small 2 bedroom in a mid class location. I just had a very hard conversation with my tenants re giving notice soon due to uncontrollable circumstances and the rent I charge them is less than half of market. I have not officially given notice yet but did inform them that if they found something before that happens and is affordable they need to take it and there will be no penalties re breaking lease, etc. I worry that they will be financially strapped if paying market prices. Hopefully they can get a subsidized unit :(.
we are currently moving for a PCS and people are literally renting out ROOMS for 1,500 where we are going.

I pay 800 currently for an entire house
 

Roger A. Shrubber

Well-Known Member
you got two seperate things here. ill address cause i dont think they are one in the same or a solution to eachother

if there were no unhoused in the 60s which why? sure getting a job was alot easier in the 60s they have made it impossible for unhoused people to get a job, once you are on the streets you cannot obtain employment without a home, bank, etc when you are worried about your next meal. services are severely underfunded. shelters currently dont really help unless you fit into their confinement of dehumanizing rules worse than prison


second issue
i think a lot more psychiatrics "hospitals" were worse than you think, a woman doesnt need a lobotomy just because she is "hysterical" so many o those "hospitals" were under staff,had severe care giver burn out , allowed people to go without proper dignified care. misdiagnosis. there's a lot here.

to say every unhoused person needs to be thrown into a psychiatrics hospital is silly, most dont even need one.

psychiatric hospitals still have severe problems today
i didn't say every homeless person needs to be thrown in a mental institution. There are some who need supervision and are not getting it, and they are a danger to themselves and others.
When i was 15 i got put in the drug rehab unit of the Fergus Falls State Mental Hospital...it was a large place, with a huge psychiatric unit.
Of course, we were segregated, but we ate in the same lunch room with the mental patients, played softball with them, sat in some of the same group therapy...I never saw any of the orderlies abusing anyone, i didn't see any of the abuses people claim are rampant...for the most part, i saw health care professionals acting professionally. I don't for one second claim that there were no abuses, even at that particular hospital, but we're talking about decades ago...I can't see how it is better for those people to be walking around with no supervision, causing harm to themselves and other people...Of course there needs to be strict supervision of the staff, and oversight by professional, ethical people.
 
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