Tag: Homelessness

The ‘Bum Blockade’

After Little Donny made his speech about the homeless in DC and ordered the Nat Guard, FBI and who knows who else into DC to curb crime and round-up the homeless….all that silliness made me think back into American history, the Depression to be exact and the policy in and around LA.

The year is 1936….

Beginning on February 3, 1936, the LAPD sent 136 officers to patrol 16 points along California’s 700-mile border with Arizona, Nevada and Oregon. “Veritable Army Corps Formed,” read the February 4 front page of the Los Angeles Times. Working with railroad executives and county sheriffs, these officers stopped trains, vehicles and hitchhikers, turning away those they deemed suspicious. Though Davis claimed the blockade refused entry to around 11,000 people by March 31, historians have since cast doubt on this figure, suggesting the actual total was much lower.

The patrol’s criteria for determining whether someone “belonged in California” was vague and largely up to individual officers’ discretion, writes Lascher in The Golden Fortress. He explains:

Most detainees exhibited some subjective characteristics of poverty, such as piles of weather-beaten luggage teetering atop a rickety jalopy or bindles sagging behind weary men hiking into the state. … Officers tended to wave shiny new Packards through their checkpoints but halted sputtering early-model Fords pulling makeshift trailers and caked with half a continent’s dust.

During the initial stop, officers fingerprinted the potential detainees to check if they had criminal records. Some who didn’t have warrants out for their arrest received the option of turning around and leaving California. Others were sent to “jails that might be little more than makeshift cells in rooms rented at off-season hotels in communities near the checkpoints,” according to Lascher’s book. Before long, the stream of migrants flooding into California had slowed significantly.

“The ‘California, Here I Come’ marching song of penniless wanderers faded away to a faint whisper in Arizona today,” United Press observed on February 6. The previous night, the news agency reported, officers stopped three trains in Yuma, Arizona, detaining 14 “transients.” That same evening, just 20 or so people lingered at a hobo “jungle” in Phoenix that usually hosted nearly 100 overnight guests.

As the Bum Blockade policed California’s border, Davis simultaneously continued to enforce harsh vagrancy laws in Los Angeles itself, searching for “indigents who can be prosecuted as vagabonds,” according to the Los Angeles Times.On February 8, the LAPD arrested 122 people deemed to fit these parameters, many of whom Davis claimed had criminal records.

https://www.bunkhistory.org/resources/los-angeles-1936-bum-blockade-targeted-american-migrants-fleeing-hardship-during-the-depression

To learn more about this policy

View at Medium.com

Profiling has been with our law enforcement for a very long time.

Just a little something to think about.

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Criminalizing Homelessness

We have officially joined the bandwagon.

Mississippi has joined the list of states that are doing their level best to make homelessness illegal.

There is just such a bill making its way through the legislature…..

Two pieces of legislation aiming to limit where homeless people can sleep and where they can solicit donations from the public have advanced in the Mississippi House of Representatives.

On Tuesday, the House Judiciary A Committee passed two bills, House Bill 1197 and 1203, respectively. Combined, they would require any person soliciting for money or anything of value in a roadway to acquire a permit with a local police department and also prohibit them from “camping on public property.”

“It’s a safety issue,” said Rep. Shanda Yates, I-Jackson. “We limit (HB 1197) to just roadways. We’re not talking about sidewalks or any other areas with that. It’s literally just the roadways and the median. It is a public safety issue.”

…

HB 1197 states: “‘Solicitation or solicit’ means to request money or anything of value as a donation or contribution while standing, sitting or positioned in any manner on any road, street, highway median, traffic island or highway intersection; or to request any other thing of value in exchange for any goods, wares, merchandise or thing of value while standing, sitting or positioned in any manner on any road, street, highway median, traffic island or highway intersection.”

(clarionledger.com)

To help understand….what is homelessness?

In a nutshell:

  • A homeless person is one who is without a home, often one who is living on the streets. The term “homeless” and “homelessness” are most commonly used in lay terms and by government agencies.
  • An unhoused or houseless person is one who has no physical address, whether they live on the streets, in a tent or have temporary lodging at a shelter or other location.
  • An unsheltered person is one who is without shelter, for instance a tent or other place to get out of the elements.
  • Housing insecurity happens when a person does not have stable or adequate housing, including those who are being evicted or regularly come up short when paying their monthly bills.

Here are the stats on the Mississippi homeless…..if anyone cares….

https://www.wjtv.com/news/state/mississippi-has-lowest-rate-of-homelessness-in-us/

Where did all this recent hatred of the homeless originate…..

In June 2024, the US Supreme Court made this promise much easier to keep by overturning a lower court’s decision on criminalizing homelessness. Grants Pass, Oregon, where the case originated, had been punishing the unhoused with fines ranging from $295 to $1,250 and 30 days in jail. Ed Johnson was the initial lawyer who successfully argued this practice was unconstitutional. But after the Supreme Court weighed in, Grants Pass now was able to resume this practice. Other cities are likely to do the same.

Trump has promised to get the homeless off the streets…..and so it begins….

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

US Homelessness Up 18%

Our employment is setting records….markets are doing good (for the most part) and all is well with the world.

Not exactly.

There is one sector of this nation that is growing….homelessness.

The US saw an 18.1% increase in homelessness this year, a dramatic rise driven mostly by a lack of affordable housing as well as devastating natural disasters and a surge of migrants in several parts of the country, federal officials said Friday. The Department of Housing and Urban Development said federally required counts taken across the country in January found that more than 770,000 people were counted as homeless. That tally misses some people and does not include those staying with friends or family because they do not have a place of their own, the AP reports.

The increase comes on top of a 12% increase in 2023, which HUD blamed on soaring rents and the end of pandemic assistance. The 2023 increase also was driven by people experiencing homelessness for the first time. The numbers overall represent 23 of every 10,000 people in the nation, with Black people being overrepresented among the homeless population. Adrianne Todman of HUD said in a statement that the focus should remain on “evidence-based efforts to prevent and end homelessness.” Among the most concerning trends was a nearly 40% rise in family homelessness—one of the areas most affected by the arrival of migrants in big cities.

Family homelessness more than doubled in 13 communities impacted by migrants including Denver, Chicago, and New York City, according to HUD, while it rose less than 8% in the remaining 373 communities. Nearly 150,000 children experienced homelessness on a single night in 2024, reflecting a 33% jump from last year. Disasters also played a part in the rise in the count, especially the Maui wildfire, per the AP. Several large cities had success bringing down their homeless numbers. Dallas, which worked to overhaul its homeless system, saw a 16% drop in its numbers between 2022 to 2024. Los Angeles, which increased housing for the homeless, saw a drop of 5% in unsheltered homelessness since 2023.

This is a situation that most Americans choose to ignore or make lame ass excuses for why this problem persists.

This needs attention and jail time for those homeless is not the answer…..only a quick fix to look like someone actually cares.

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Doing The Christian Thing.

I feel that anyone that tries to help their fellow man deserves all the credit…..but it appears that in Arizona it is against the law to feed the homeless.

n elderly Arizona woman is the first person to be arrested under a city ordinance after she shared food with people in need in a public park—and the first now to sue her hometown over that ordinance, per the AP. Norma Thornton, a 78-year-old retired restaurant owner, was arrested back in March in Bullhead City for passing out free food she’d prepared at home to individuals (some of them homeless) in the city’s Community Park, something she’d done regularly for at least four years, per her complaint filed Tuesday. Thornton had noticed after moving to Bullhead City that the park was “several miles away from the nearest shelter or food pantry,” and so she thought her expertise and home cooking could help those who needed sustenance, according to her suit.

Problems arose, however, because Thornton was technically breaching the city’s May 2021 ordinance against sharing food in public parks, which requires a $30 permit, proof of insurance, and a $250 refundable deposit within five days of food distribution. Even then, those who obtain such a permit can only hand out food once a month for two hours. The city says the rule is meant to “protect public health, safety, and welfare” and to “accommodate competing interests and uses for park space.” Mayor Tom Brady notes the ordinance applies only to public parks, and that churches, clubs, and private property are fair game without a permit.

The Institute of Justice, which is representing Thornton, has posted video of her arrest on March 8, in which the arresting officer even seems reluctant to haul her down to the police station. “I think this is a PR nightmare, but OK,” he’s heard telling his superior, per NBC. Thornton was issued a citation and could have seen up to four months behind bars and a fine of up to $750. She wouldn’t accept a plea deal, though, and the charges were eventually dropped. That didn’t stop her from wanting to sue.

Bless her good heart for not accepting a plea deal.

Arizona that bastion on conservatism….this tells me that these so-called Christians care nothing for their fellow man….they are such hypocrites that have a firm grip on the penis in one hand and a Bible in the other….and that is their policies reflect.

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

The City Of ‘Brotherly Love’

I believe that Philadelphia claims that title…..maybe they should re-think that claim….

This country has a growing problem of homelessness and I am pleased to see at least some churches are acting in a very Christian way (more need to step up….leave politics to the sleazy people and help their fellow man)

A few churches are providing a few services for the homeless and now the city government weighs in…..

Two Philadelphia-area churches have come under fire from local zoning officials, who say their free meal services, mental health counseling, and monthly pantries aren’t allowed on their properties and will have to stop or else they risk fines.

In early June, Pottstown staff sent letters to Christ Episcopal Church and Mission First, saying that this charitable work went beyond the allowable activities for churches in the borough’s Downtown zoning district.

“I am writing this letter with compassion for those affected by the COVID pandemic and with gratitude to residents who’ve provided aid to those in need throughout that period,” wrote Pottstown Zoning Officer Winter Stokes in a letter to one of the churches obtained by WHYY, which first reported the story. “However, as the Zoning Officer, I must enforce the zoning code.”

Stokes’ letters specifically lists regular provision of mental health counseling to families, weekly buffet meals, and the distribution of soap, razors, toothbrushes, and other essential items as disallowed uses.

The two churches can either apply for a zoning variance—which requires going before the borough’s Zoning Hearing Board—or stop the disallowed charitable work. Failure to do either of those things could result in the churches being hit with $500 fines for every day they’re out of compliance.

“It was an absolute surprise when we got this letter,” says Dennis Coleman, the deacon of Christ Episcopal Church. He says that his church has been providing meals and an “essentials” pantry for years without incident.

“We’ve been doing the one meal a week for as long as anyone can remember,” which typically feeds about 60 people, Coleman says. The church also runs a “Last Week of the Month” program that provides people with food, essential items, or even assistance in paying gas and electric bills.

Pennsylvania Town Threatens Churches With $500 Fines for Providing Free Meals, Counseling Services

This is a ridiculous ordinance!

I am pleased to see that at least some churches are responding to this growing problem….they should be supported not punished.

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Closing Thought–23Feb21

As the pandemic rages we hear horror stories from every angle…..the cases, the deaths, the job losses, etc……but there is one aspect of life now here in the US that gets very little airtime or ink…..the situation of homelessness.

AS more and more people are losing a job….they are resulting into extreme living conditions….

For months, Nicholas Atencio and his girlfriend, Heather Surovik, spent nearly every minute of their lives together in a 2000 Cadillac Escalade.

After Atencio, 33, lost his job as a plumber in May, he and Surovik, 36, delivered for Grubhub by day and at night curled up with their puppy on an air bed in the back of their car parked in a lot in Longmont, Colorado, dreaming of being reunited under one roof with Surovik’s teenage son who was living with his grandmother.

“I’m a mom, so I want to fix everything and make it better,” Surovik said. “It’s hard when you don’t have the means to do that when you can’t do anything because you don’t have anything.”

Americans are being driven into their vehicles by COVID-19 pandemic-fueled woes. And their ranks are likely to grow as the government safety net frays and evictions and foreclosures rise.

https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/2021/02/12/covid-unemployment-layoffs-foreclosure-eviction-homeless-car-rv/6713901002/

It is time that the government address homelessness in all phases…..ignoring the problem has not solved it.

Americans do not want to know about this situation…..for it flies in the face of all the propaganda that they are bombarded with every day.

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Cessation Of Home Evictions

The raging pandemic and the loss of employment had caused a surge in the number of home evictions because of the inability to pay ones mortgage….

Something had to be done…..

The government, the CDC to be exact, had issued an order for the cessation of home evictions during the pandemic.

This action, although needed, leaves gaping holes in the Trump administration’s response to the pre-existing and current pandemic-impacted housing crisis.

The coronavirus pandemic was expected to trigger the severest housing crisis in U.S. history. By one estimate, as many as 40 million Americans were at risk of eviction.

Then in September, the CDC made an unprecedented announcement: Most evictions had to be halted through the end of the year. Dr. Robert R. Redfield, director of the CDC, signed a declaration that said evictions could get in the way of the nation’s attempts at curbing the coronavirus.

But the moratorium is failing to keep many families in their homes during the crisis, according to eviction records, housing advocates and legal aid attorneys. Tens of thousands of people have been evicted since September because the CDC’s policy has been applied inconsistently across states and some landlords have ignored or challenged their tenants’ attempts at using the protection, experts say.

https://www.cnbc.com/2020/12/05/why-home-evictions-are-still-happening-despite-cdc-ban.html

AS one might expect….the inconsistency of the Trump admin made this attempt to help the American people little more than just another idle promise.

The Eviction Lab at Princeton University has identified around 80,000 evictions in just the 27 cities that it tracks, including Cleveland, Houston, Tampa and New York, during September, October and November.

Jim Baker, executive director of the Private Equity Stakeholder Project, has counted more than 20,000 new eviction cases filed since September by corporate landlords in Arizona, Florida, Georgia, Nevada, Tennessee and Texas alone.

Once again the people of this country are secondary…..the Congress made sure to protect corporations in this time of hardship and yet did very little for the people that pay the bills for this failing experiment that is our government.

And yet we vote the same type of gutless spineless politicians time after time……the fault is ours not the system.

At least the Congressional Progressives tried to do the right thing…..

A group of progressive lawmakers including Sens. Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders sent letters to the Department of Housing and Urban Development and private landlord associations on Wednesday demanding an immediate nationwide moratorium on evictions as individuals and families struggle with the massive financial impact of the coronavirus pandemic.

“Evicting families from their homes in the middle of a pandemic is cruel and dangerous,” reads the letter (pdf) to Housing Secretary Ben Carson. “HUD must avoid the risk of exacerbating a public health emergency and protect the safety of renters.”

Joining Warren and Sanders in signing the letter were Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.), Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass.), and Rep. Katie Porter (D-Calif.).

https://www.commondreams.org/news/2020/03/18/progressive-lawmakers-demand-nationwide-moratorium-cruel-and-dangerous-evictions

Sadly this went nowhere…..because the cowardly centrists were not on-board….their owners and donors made sure this went nowhere.

Finally….Please STOP calling Pelosi a Progressive!  It shows your ignorance when you do.

Be Smart!

Learn Stuff!

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Closing Thought–09Jul19

Homelessness

Our Dear Beloved Supreme Leader in an interview with Tucker Carlson made known a revelation that homelessness was a two year old phenom….

WTF? Right?

I have been writing about the situation for at least 7 years but not to be tooting my own horn here are some of the post from IST…….

https://lobotero.com/2012/11/25/the-homeless-planet/

https://lobotero.com/2013/04/03/can-washington-get-vets-off-the-streets-tens-of-thousands-homeless-despite-billions-in-spending-in-plain-sight/

https://lobotero.com/2014/10/24/21-us-cities-restrict-sharing-food-with-homeless-people-popularresistance-org/

https://lobotero.com/2018/10/24/homeless-and-hungry-just-another-country-song/

There is more but this is just a sampling……but now to why I fond the president’s statement as absurd…..

During his interview with President Trump that aired on Monday night on Fox News, Tucker Carlson got the president to weigh in on a topic that he and other Fox News hosts have devoted copious amounts of airtime to lately—homelessness in largely Democratic-run cities and states.

And, according to Trump, the homeless problem is a rather recent phenomenon.

Noting that they were in Japan during the president’s visit to the G-20 summit, Carlson contrasted the cleanliness of their metro areas to large American cities, adding that “there is no graffiti” or people “going to the bathroom on the streets” in Japan.

https://www.thedailybeast.com/trump-to-tucker-on-fox-news-homelessness-is-a-phenomenon-that-started-two-years-ago

But if you hate to read then watch his comments…..

These deranged delusional rants are becoming more and more common…..almost like he may be losing his grip on reality…..but that is only my opinion.

Closing Thought–14May19

I remember a couple of years ago WalMart caught some grief because they threw away coats in dumpsters in some big cities….cities that have a large homeless population that could have used some warmth from the coats in the harsh winters.

I said then that it should be unacceptable to Americans to see a corporation care so little when they could have done the right thing and donated the coats marked for the trash bin…..

And now AmazonGo has been caught being a douche with food…….

Seattle resident Nathan Gregg was at a waste facility, about 15 minutes south of the city’s downtown area, dumping construction materials at around 3:30 p.m. Thursday when he discovered a nearly 6-foot-high pile of prepared meals still in their Amazon Go packaging. Amazon Go is the e-commerce giant’s cashierless convenience store concept.

Photos provided by Gregg showed various wraps, salads, and sandwiches encased in their original sealed plastic containers alongside packaged hot dogs, mushrooms, loose bell peppers, and other grocery items. The discarded food was found at South Transfer Station. There are four Amazon Go stores located in Seattle, and eight other locations across San Francisco, Chicago, and New York.

After Gregg reported the incident, Seattle Public Utilities told him that the Amazon Go waste is being investigated, and the items would be removed from the landfill.

https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/nicolenguyen/amazon-go-waste-food-packaging

This is disgusting but something I expect from corporation…..

I am sure that Seattle food pantries/churches/charities could have put that food to good use….feed the hungry something apparently Amazon could care little about…..

Homeless And Hungry (Just Another Country Song)

There are two situations that have been with us since the beginning and will be with us when this world ends its life cycle……homelessness and hunger.

The promise of politicians says that if you live right then these two situations will never know your name……well my dear friends….that is a LIE! (capitalized for effect)

Take homelessness…….

These men and women, and increasingly children, are the collateral damage of the corporate state, their dignity and lives destroyed by the massive transference of wealth upward, deindustrialization and the slashing of federal investment in affordable housing begun during the Reagan administration.

It is 8 a.m. I am in the small offices of Street Roots, a weekly newspaper that prints 10,000 copies per edition. Those who sell the newspaper on the streets—all of them victims of extreme poverty and half of them homeless—have gathered before heading out with their bundles to spend hours in the cold and rain.

https://www.commondreams.org/views/2018/10/08/homeless-america

The necessities are shelter (home) and food…..in some regions food is almost a luxury item…..famine is always with us somewhere in the world….(BTW an Iphone is not a necessity)

Scientists are getting concerned about the global food supply…..

Researchers from Washington State University have published a new report of the Great Drought, the most destructive known drought of the past 800 years – and how it sparked the Global Famine that claimed the lives of 50 million people. The scientists warn that the Earth’s current warming climate could spark a similar drought, but even worse.

One of the lead researchers, Deepti Singh, a professor in WSU’s School of the Environment, used rainfall records and climate reconstruction models to characterize the environmental conditions leading up to the Great Drought, a period in the mid-1870s known for widespread crop failures across Asia, Brazil, and Africa. The drought was connected to the most extreme manifestation of the El Nino supercycle ever recorded.

“Climate conditions that caused the Great Drought and Global Famine arose from natural variability. And their recurrence — with hydrological impacts intensified by global warming — could again potentially undermine global food safety,” lead author Singh and her colleagues wrote in the Journal of Climate, published online Oct. 04.

The release of the study came days before the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) warned that global warming could cause intense droughts, floods, extreme heat and poverty for hundreds of millions of people.

https://www.zerohedge.com/news/2018-10-15/scientist-warn-world-brink-major-famine-lead-severe-shocks-global-food-system

I realize that the term “climate change” is a dirty word in some circles…..but that should not matter…..making damn sure that the food supply holds should be a priority…..not a partisan issue….sadly it is not.

Why not?

On a side note….Americans lead the world in wasted food……Americans waste about a pound of food per person each day, with people who have healthier diets rich in fruit and vegetables the most wasteful, research has found.

About 150,000 tons of food is tossed out in US households each day, equivalent to about a third of the daily calories that each American consumes. Fruit and vegetables were the most likely to be thrown out, followed by dairy and then meat.

How pathetic is that?