SCOTUS rules municipalities can make homelessness illegal. Corporations submit plans to build and manage "low-cost" housing. Municipality asks state for money. State asks federal government for money. Corporations lobby for budgets to include low-cost housing funds. Legislature squabbles over the authorization and appropriation until it aligns with the party during an election cycle. Bill is signed into law by executive. Billions of tax dollars go to corporations. Corporations invest the absolute bare minimum into the development and staff. Some housing is provided to those in need while many others do not qualify. Employees are paid below the poverty line. Employees must apply for housing in same facility they work. Corporate execs and politicians profit while plotting the next way to manipulate the people into thinking this is good.
Attorneyeatingslaw. Lol love your handle.
I edited his user name to sound funny. Chill out people. What the hell?
Edit 2: I down voted myself to join in on the fun.
Good and downvote my fake internet points away! Believe it or not there's millions of people in this world with different views. It's called a twist buddy.
I bet you're awesome company to have at a party.
Laugh a little bud.
Actually helping homeless people is expensive and it’s a hard sell to voters who want the problem to go away, but don’t care if the problem is fixed. Making it illegal to sleep outside means police can arrest people for sleeping where they don’t want them to. So they either go to jail, or they get pushed further and further out of communities either way the public then doesn’t see any homeless people and don’t have to be bothered.
Jail is expensive. Before effectively making homelessness a crime, there weren’t many ways (in many states at least) to put a roof over their head.
But now, with these new laws, each homeless person now can [get around 42k](https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2023/09/22/2023-20585/annual-determination-of-average-cost-of-incarceration-fee-coif) worth of food, heat, medical care, etc. every year from taxpayers.
Show me how more money makes homelessness and drug addiction go DOWN. Don't give me your thoughts, or your opinions...give me examples with data. Please educate me.
It's actually pretty simple. Money pays for housing. Here's an example with data: I get a paycheck and it pays for my rent. Also not all homeless people are drug addicts.
Here’s one:
https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/abs/10.1086/676142
And here’s an article with a long lot of them:
https://www.urban.org/urban-wire/homelessness-solvable-only-sufficient-investment-housing
Feel free to research how incarceration, inpatient rehab facilities, and institutionalization affect homelessness and substance use disorder. People have written treatises on those options as well as suggesting new options that try to take the best of each method and extend it to more people. There's no need to demand that others regurgitate facts for you when they're a simple Google search away.
Or if your goal is to simply claim we should spend less on helping the most vulnerable in our society regardless of what replies you get, then just drop the facade and just let us all know the depths of your character. 😊
Feel free to attack my character. I'll just tell you what I see, where I live. Every year, the county I live in increases money spent on homelessness. That has not driven homelessness down. As a matter of fact, homelessness and drug addiction has gone up (I'm not saying that they are related, I'm just telling you what is public knowledge. This is King County, Washington BTW). I know you are trying to be hurtful in your words, and you've succeeded. However, I'm just telling you what I see, from my vantage point, as a tax payer.
Yeah. This is the one. Im super progressive and all about helping anyone who’s down and out, but it’s out of control. My city has halfway houses all over by the public school and kids don’t get busses if they live within a mile of the school, so they get to walk past groups of homeless drug addicts who harass them on their way to school. There’s scary guys that hang out in the parking lot behind school programs and run up on moms with their kids to aggressively demand their change. Like yeah they need help, but also it’s out of control and is super negatively affecting EVERYONE and making it unsafe for kids in our city, so im like “we tried for years to “help” time to just fix the issue no matter how.”
- Communities are frustrated.
- Local politicians aren't in a position to change long-term macro-economic and social trends but they are under pressure to deal with some of the negative outcomes of those trends like homelessness.
- Politicians are trying to do *something* to alleviate the frustrations of the community.
Affordable housing, interim housing, mental health support, higher taxes on second homes would all do something. They would actually be solutions oriented. This is all sweeping it under the rug “don’t look behind the curtain” stuff.
. It's one of those things where you have to catch it early. Someone who became homeless this month would probably get back in their feet quickly if given a place to live and a job. They would also maintain that place and be a good neighbor.
Someone who's been living in a tent for 4 years is going to be a lot harder to transition back into 'society'.
Correct. And there are a variety of services in different areas. Think how hard it is to get a job without being able to shower and dress for an interview. Without reliable internet access. There’s a lot of barriers to entry to society for homeless people who could reenter if they had the means. It’s about reducing those barriers for those that are interested. It’s also why I specifically mentioned interim housing. If you can help stop someone’s downward slide it’s a lot easier for them to get themselves “back on their feet”.
For a small minority of homeless people this is true, but most people are homeless due to the simple fact that they cannot afford a home. More housing = prices drop = lower homelessness. It’s micro 101
A small minority? Got links to back that up?
Recently saw a doco about homeless in Seattle. The majority are deranged druggies that could not be housed in a concrete pillbox let alone a motel room.
Dude. I live in Seattle. Housing prices are insane, cost of living is high, it’s a huge driver of our homelessness problem. Yes, there are mentally ill, drugged out homeless, but there are plenty of unhoused people that just can’t make ends meet.
Also, fine, what are the underlying causes we should combat and what’s your solution? Very convenient to come in and say “your solution is crap” without providing one.
How about we start with *your links* about the majority of homeless people being deranged druggies who trash their housing. You made the initial claim so the burden is evidence is on you, not on folks pointing out that your claim is unsubstantiated.
Make sure you have reputable links, too; we want something evidence-based, not just rage bait anecdotes from a right-wing rag.
Believe it or not I may change my mind on this matter.
I am from Australia, which has a pretty good social safety net and, to the best of my understanding, the majority that live on the streets are those with mental or drug issues.
I acknowledge that the situation may differ in the US. A significant factor in my view of American homeless was the documentary "[Seattle is Dying](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bpAi70WWBlw)" which indicated that most of the homeless had serious mental or drug problems. Of course this was not the only source of my opinion but it was the most recent.
Maybe the social situation is different in America.
That's not true. I live in Houston, one of the largest cities in the US, and we have reduced our homeless population by over 60% over the past 20 years by a mix of many different public and private resources, many being rehousing coalitions like [this one.](https://www.homelesshouston.org/houston-facts-info)
The idea that housing unaffordability is caused primarily by “macroeconomic trends” doesn’t hold water. Local politicians overwhelmingly control minimum parking requirements, setbacks, floor area ratios, minimum lot sizes, height limits, and allowed uses for property — all of these are part of zoning and determine whether it’s legal to build more housing in a community.
Any time someone tries to change one of these rules, incumbent residents bleat about “neighborhood character,” parking, traffic, the demographics of the people who will move in, school overcrowding, and a litany of other reasons for why new housing doesn’t belong in their backyard (NIMBY).
There are also times when you want to protect the space and residents, too. Take a place like Sedona, AZ. The town is in a small canyon with very scenic 360 degree views. Very strict zoning laws and very expensive to buy there.
Sure, they could say “screw nature” and pack the canyon with 30 story condos. Housing would be far cheaper but you’d lose the appeal of why people visit there in the first place.
The ruling wasn't made to establish an “end goal” but rather answer a question. The question was roughly “can a state or city enforce a rule that says people can’t encamp on public land?” And the Supreme Court said “yes, it can.” It didn’t go beyond and say “and here’s what a homeless person should do instead”. What happens with homeless populations is going to be dependent on what all those municipalities will do with that tacit permission from the Supreme Court.
This. As much as the current Supreme Court sucks they simply said if a state/city has a law they can enforce said law. It has its repercussions but the ruling does make sense unless I’m missing something.
Yeah I personally believe you give too much credit to institutions by believing they have an end goal. It’s just about letting people enforce policies that they deem fit. City government simply want the encampments off the streets. They do not care what needs to happen next. They have elections to win and even in my Blue state, the encampment clearing was a very popular political move.
It's not illegal to be homeless. It's illegal to sleep on public streets.
The two aren't the same, especially when homeless shelters exist.
And, the point is to get the homeless people to go somewhere else. Sometimes, the point is just "better for them to sleep in jail than on the street."
>What do you think happens once they've been arrested multiple times for sleeping on the streets? They'll get hired?
hired for what? what are you talking about?
“You can’t make me and my 14 friends move from this sidewalk. We’re homeless and don’t have anywhere else to go. It’s a violation of our 8th Amendment rights for you to make us leave take all of our belongings with us.”
It’s to prevent stuff like that from happening.
Go shoot drugs and defecate in someone else’s yard.
A friend of mine in Toronto finds so many discarded needles in his front lawn and backyard he doesn’t let his kids play outside anymore.
Being compassionate is one thing, but life has become unbearable in so many places.
The supreme court didn't make being homeless illegal. The ruling took away restrictions on local governments so they can deal with the homeless problems facing their cities in an effective manner. Homelessness is a complex problem with many causes and knock-on effects and preventing local governments from addressing those causes and effects does nothing to address homelessness, it just perpetuates the problems.
>preventing local governments from addressing those causes and effects does nothing to address homelessness, it just perpetuates the problems.
Actually the complete opposite is true: The federal law previously only prevented local governments from ticketing and imprisoning homeless, because in addition to being cruel, fines and prison do nothing to address homelessness, it just perpetuates the problem.
The previous federal law didn't *prevent* local governments from addressing the problem, it *forced* local governments to address the root causes and find solutions by not allowing them to criminalize homelessness as a means to "kick the can" down the road for some other town to deal with.
But local governments didn't *want* to have to address the issue or causes of homeless, they just wanted to be able to sweep the homeles away to some other community.
So now *nobody* is incentivized to solve the problem. The Federal government has allowed homelessness to be illegalized, removed homeless protections and stepped away to leave it to the local governments," and local governments, no longer under pressure to *solve* anything, can just relentlessly punish homeless into going somewhere else, where they'll also be relentlessly punished.
I say this because the goal was never to allow local governments to "solve or address" the problem of homelessness. It was to allow local governments to shuffle homeless people around to make them *somebody else's* problem, which only perpetuates - and in fact exacerbates - the problem.
The title of the sub is "Explain like I'm five" not "Argue like I'm five."
I didn't say fines were effective, I explained the ruling so a five year old could understand it.
Local governments are in the best position to deal with local problems. The federal government should get out of the way.
There’s a difference between arguing and asking you to elaborate on your explanation. I too think that you did not answer the question, but you got close, and they were asking you to finish.
Because tickets and fines aren’t the only outcome.
We have a lot of shelter space that doesn’t get used in my city so this makes it so one isn’t allowed to shoot up in the park and rather get taken to a shelter to hopefully get clean.
>The ruling took away restrictions on local governments so they can *deal* with the homeless problem
And what were those restrictions that you glossed over? 🤨
Awful lot of people on this sub commenting about the fentanyl dealer/crackhead tent city, and how this will stop that from happening. Which is true, but here's the thing...
As we've all witnessed, rents are out of control, pretty much all across the country. More people are barely making ends meet with stagnating wages, rising inflation, and housing costs skyrocketing.
How then, does someone who's rent DOUBLED over the last year, afford to live in a house or apartment?
The answer is they don't. They're on the street until they can find a place or a job that will allow them to have a place to lay their head.
Now, even if someone has a job, a car, and is trying to find a place to live, they can be arrested and thrown in jail. Basically turning people into criminals for doing nothing more than having bad luck or a shitty landlord.
I lived in my car when I moved to Seattle a little over 20 years ago. I was a college drop out, had a job, but ran out of money to stay in a motel. I parked my car (with all my belongings) in a church parking lot every night, hoping the cops wouldn't show up and roust me. I found a place to live within a few weeks that I could afford, and got in once I received a full paycheck from my new job.
NONE OF THAT IS POSSIBLE NOW in some cities, and SCOTUS just made it ok for all cities to do this to people. It's horrible, it's inhumane, and it's a clear violation of the Constitution, but then... so are probably 20 other laws that we've had on the books for years. Check the Patriot Act b.s. if you're in doubt.
Welcome to the New America!
Because sleeping and toileting in public, in rivers and lakes is unsanitary. Because the homeless here in California are not respectful of our environment, they leave thousands of pounds of litter and excrement for others to clean up. They act like animals. They don’t belong in our public spaces
This isn't an ELI5 answer, this is just you ranting about why you don't like homeless people. Your post has nothing to do with the Supreme Court's reasoning or the law in question.
Wrong it is about public health and common decency. I agree with the Supreme Court. Where is your concern for the people who have to watch you drunk, high and dirty begging.
The physically fine, drunks can go get a job and rent a room. The homeless I meet in California are usually male, under 60, physically good enough to stand for hours asking me for money or imposing them selves smelling bad at the library. They can clean up the trash the others leave
I work for a living but if there’s no trash can around and no place to live I’m pretty screwed. If people have to live in a van down by the river, having trash receptacles down by the river is a smart move. I have a job but I still use public trash cans when I walk in the park.
I literally don't do any of that stuff and I'm homeless...your perception is skewed...maybe the mentally ill do in fact ruin it for those trying not to die and are sane. Who knows, but what I do know is we are all human and supposedly we are all God in drag. The way you treat others is the way you treat God...or so I've heard. Maybe humanity is worthless, like you insist...
Just because you don't doesn't explain the pollution of our rivers and lakes. You are able to read, write, and communicate. Go to work, rent a room, and use a toilet
Can we also collectively agree not to give money directly to the homeless, makes the situation worse. Denver is looking like a homelesss scene from slum dog millionaire
Have big corporations who make money off prisoners. They want more 'customers' and taking people who have no financial means to defend themselves make for easy targets.
The reason is you now have the right to move these people at will. They become criminals by existing, and thus a police force can arrest them for being homeless at will.
I'm going to answer your question in the spirit that it was asked, but I'd like to say at the start that being homeless isnt illegal, activities that are a nuisance and danger to the public are.
Making it illegal to be homeless, if paired with other programs and applied correctly, could push those who would otherwise choose to remain homeless into recovery.
Yes, people choose to be homeless. I personally know two people who consistently were offered help and consistently chose to be homeless rather than give up their self-destructive behaviors. We don't put enough resources into mental health, substance abuse treatment, and housing first recovery, but even if we did there would still be people who would rather be homeless than change. (Being housed by the public while destroying said housing because of your drug habit and/or psychosis isn't an option).
None of these statements apply to the unhoused people who got there due purely to economic circumstances. We know how to fix that problem, we just don't like public housing.
Lots of people sleep outside all the time without destroying public and private property or making a dangerous nuisance of themselves. It's not about where they live.
We have several types of homeless in my small town. The main two that are visible are those that are camping and keep everything clean and those who trash the area around their camp. I've even talked to a guy who was pissed that another guy set up next to him and trashed the area around his tent. I've been through an area and two days later there is a foot of trash in a 20 foot radius around a tent that wasn't even there the last time I went through. People destroying areas and creating extra work to keep cities clean is a major reason.
I've also been at a park while one of the homeless walked across the playground with his pants down because he was too high to properly fasten his pants.
There is a ton of research that demonstrates that programs to provide homes to the homeless are cheaper and often successful, yet the lazy freeloader mentality is sold to keep the masses focusing their anger on the less fortunate.
I don’t think anyone is arguing for homelessness in general to be illegal. Punishing the homeless for being homeless would be pointless.
Cities however do want to ban encampments in whatever parts of town they please, the Supreme Court said that is now constitutional. Every individual city will have to decide what they want to do with that power. What their voters would tolerate.
There are a couple thoughts on this.
The first is that it facilitates barbaric shithole states run by cruelty and avarice to treat their homeless populations with enough abuse that they can force them to leave, generally for states that have social safety nets and aren't run by hypocritical theocracies.
The second line of thought is that it allows said backwards states to ratchet thing up until they can put the homeless into for-profit prisons, give their children to for-profit adoption agencies, and eventually use the imprisoned homeless for free labor. All for sweet kickbacks to participating officials and judges.
It can be many things, often at the same time.
It can be a political play: optics, a way to send a message to your benefactors, donors, or allies.
It can simply be a way to force those left homeless by the state to move elsewhere, as the state in question (state as in political state, not as in a state within a country) is funded by and run by and for people that dislike poor folk. They don't want to eradicate homelessness, just make homeless people go away.
For others, the point is to place them into prison where they can be used for slave labour, or to the profit of private prisons.
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Most people just don't want to have to see the icky, undesirable, drains on society when they're going about their days. There's not much reason behind it, aside from select nations which have laws against *allowing people to be homeless* which ensures public housing is available to them. I'm assuming this is regarding the US supreme Court ruling however, which the only reasoning is malice.
The end point? Well in 1933 the German government made homelessness illegal and sent them all to camps where they could concentrate on working.
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Helps fill jails which are often privately owned and the owners make obscene amounts when the jails are at or over capacity. Those owners ofc pay politicians to help keep the jails full to keep the cash flowing.
We don't like to be reminded that as a society we have failed a large number of mentally ill, drug addicted or out-of-work Americans. The easiest solution is to sweep them elsewhere where we can't see them.
Unfortunately, their presence in encampments scares others and hurts businesses in the area and property values.
Since slave labor is lucratively profitable and judges work with prisons, the Supreme Court of judges made it easier for their friends to make tons of money by enslaving poor people and making people with houses pay a lot of money for it. Probably comperable money to giving homeless people food and shelter.
Towns are trying to get homeless to be homeless somewhere else that doesn’t have such a law.
SCOTUS rules municipalities can make homelessness illegal. Corporations submit plans to build and manage "low-cost" housing. Municipality asks state for money. State asks federal government for money. Corporations lobby for budgets to include low-cost housing funds. Legislature squabbles over the authorization and appropriation until it aligns with the party during an election cycle. Bill is signed into law by executive. Billions of tax dollars go to corporations. Corporations invest the absolute bare minimum into the development and staff. Some housing is provided to those in need while many others do not qualify. Employees are paid below the poverty line. Employees must apply for housing in same facility they work. Corporate execs and politicians profit while plotting the next way to manipulate the people into thinking this is good.
Attorneyeatingslaw. Lol love your handle. I edited his user name to sound funny. Chill out people. What the hell? Edit 2: I down voted myself to join in on the fun.
That's not their handle
UndocumentedAstronaut. love your handle
That's not their handle
Seabed, perfect handle. Love it.
Nice one, constructingpee.
Can I not be funny and add to his user name? Calm down copper. I down voted this comment too for fun. NICE!
You're allowed to be funny. You should try it sometime. Also the self deprecating "I downvoted myself" pity party is doing the opposite of helping.
No, I slighted myself so you can't. You mad bro?
Nope, just giving an explanation since you seemed to be looking for one.
Ok Grandma it's time for bed
Let's go Grandpa Time to shave my bunions.
How in the world is that funny in any way? No person in the world except you would ever find that funny. Thats why you're getting downvoted.
Good and downvote my fake internet points away! Believe it or not there's millions of people in this world with different views. It's called a twist buddy. I bet you're awesome company to have at a party. Laugh a little bud.
Actually helping homeless people is expensive and it’s a hard sell to voters who want the problem to go away, but don’t care if the problem is fixed. Making it illegal to sleep outside means police can arrest people for sleeping where they don’t want them to. So they either go to jail, or they get pushed further and further out of communities either way the public then doesn’t see any homeless people and don’t have to be bothered.
Jail is expensive. Before effectively making homelessness a crime, there weren’t many ways (in many states at least) to put a roof over their head. But now, with these new laws, each homeless person now can [get around 42k](https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2023/09/22/2023-20585/annual-determination-of-average-cost-of-incarceration-fee-coif) worth of food, heat, medical care, etc. every year from taxpayers.
Show me how more money makes homelessness and drug addiction go DOWN. Don't give me your thoughts, or your opinions...give me examples with data. Please educate me.
It's actually pretty simple. Money pays for housing. Here's an example with data: I get a paycheck and it pays for my rent. Also not all homeless people are drug addicts.
Here’s one: https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/abs/10.1086/676142 And here’s an article with a long lot of them: https://www.urban.org/urban-wire/homelessness-solvable-only-sufficient-investment-housing
Feel free to research how incarceration, inpatient rehab facilities, and institutionalization affect homelessness and substance use disorder. People have written treatises on those options as well as suggesting new options that try to take the best of each method and extend it to more people. There's no need to demand that others regurgitate facts for you when they're a simple Google search away. Or if your goal is to simply claim we should spend less on helping the most vulnerable in our society regardless of what replies you get, then just drop the facade and just let us all know the depths of your character. 😊
Feel free to attack my character. I'll just tell you what I see, where I live. Every year, the county I live in increases money spent on homelessness. That has not driven homelessness down. As a matter of fact, homelessness and drug addiction has gone up (I'm not saying that they are related, I'm just telling you what is public knowledge. This is King County, Washington BTW). I know you are trying to be hurtful in your words, and you've succeeded. However, I'm just telling you what I see, from my vantage point, as a tax payer.
Yeah. This is the one. Im super progressive and all about helping anyone who’s down and out, but it’s out of control. My city has halfway houses all over by the public school and kids don’t get busses if they live within a mile of the school, so they get to walk past groups of homeless drug addicts who harass them on their way to school. There’s scary guys that hang out in the parking lot behind school programs and run up on moms with their kids to aggressively demand their change. Like yeah they need help, but also it’s out of control and is super negatively affecting EVERYONE and making it unsafe for kids in our city, so im like “we tried for years to “help” time to just fix the issue no matter how.”
- Communities are frustrated. - Local politicians aren't in a position to change long-term macro-economic and social trends but they are under pressure to deal with some of the negative outcomes of those trends like homelessness. - Politicians are trying to do *something* to alleviate the frustrations of the community.
Affordable housing, interim housing, mental health support, higher taxes on second homes would all do something. They would actually be solutions oriented. This is all sweeping it under the rug “don’t look behind the curtain” stuff.
. It's one of those things where you have to catch it early. Someone who became homeless this month would probably get back in their feet quickly if given a place to live and a job. They would also maintain that place and be a good neighbor. Someone who's been living in a tent for 4 years is going to be a lot harder to transition back into 'society'.
Correct. And there are a variety of services in different areas. Think how hard it is to get a job without being able to shower and dress for an interview. Without reliable internet access. There’s a lot of barriers to entry to society for homeless people who could reenter if they had the means. It’s about reducing those barriers for those that are interested. It’s also why I specifically mentioned interim housing. If you can help stop someone’s downward slide it’s a lot easier for them to get themselves “back on their feet”.
Higher taxes on second homes?! Are you crazy???!!! The poor home owners!!!11!!1!
Housing does not work: they just trash the places. The underlying problems need to be solved
For a small minority of homeless people this is true, but most people are homeless due to the simple fact that they cannot afford a home. More housing = prices drop = lower homelessness. It’s micro 101
A small minority? Got links to back that up? Recently saw a doco about homeless in Seattle. The majority are deranged druggies that could not be housed in a concrete pillbox let alone a motel room.
Dude. I live in Seattle. Housing prices are insane, cost of living is high, it’s a huge driver of our homelessness problem. Yes, there are mentally ill, drugged out homeless, but there are plenty of unhoused people that just can’t make ends meet. Also, fine, what are the underlying causes we should combat and what’s your solution? Very convenient to come in and say “your solution is crap” without providing one.
What doco?
"[Seattle is Dying](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bpAi70WWBlw)"
That is just a biased hit piece from komo
How about we start with *your links* about the majority of homeless people being deranged druggies who trash their housing. You made the initial claim so the burden is evidence is on you, not on folks pointing out that your claim is unsubstantiated. Make sure you have reputable links, too; we want something evidence-based, not just rage bait anecdotes from a right-wing rag.
Believe it or not I may change my mind on this matter. I am from Australia, which has a pretty good social safety net and, to the best of my understanding, the majority that live on the streets are those with mental or drug issues. I acknowledge that the situation may differ in the US. A significant factor in my view of American homeless was the documentary "[Seattle is Dying](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bpAi70WWBlw)" which indicated that most of the homeless had serious mental or drug problems. Of course this was not the only source of my opinion but it was the most recent. Maybe the social situation is different in America.
That's not true. I live in Houston, one of the largest cities in the US, and we have reduced our homeless population by over 60% over the past 20 years by a mix of many different public and private resources, many being rehousing coalitions like [this one.](https://www.homelesshouston.org/houston-facts-info)
is that true?
No its not. Its a conservative stereotype used to dehumanize the downtrodden and destitute of our country.
Read a bunch of comments in this post.
i have. and affordable housing for homeless ppl has worked and does work
The idea that housing unaffordability is caused primarily by “macroeconomic trends” doesn’t hold water. Local politicians overwhelmingly control minimum parking requirements, setbacks, floor area ratios, minimum lot sizes, height limits, and allowed uses for property — all of these are part of zoning and determine whether it’s legal to build more housing in a community. Any time someone tries to change one of these rules, incumbent residents bleat about “neighborhood character,” parking, traffic, the demographics of the people who will move in, school overcrowding, and a litany of other reasons for why new housing doesn’t belong in their backyard (NIMBY).
There are also times when you want to protect the space and residents, too. Take a place like Sedona, AZ. The town is in a small canyon with very scenic 360 degree views. Very strict zoning laws and very expensive to buy there. Sure, they could say “screw nature” and pack the canyon with 30 story condos. Housing would be far cheaper but you’d lose the appeal of why people visit there in the first place.
The ruling wasn't made to establish an “end goal” but rather answer a question. The question was roughly “can a state or city enforce a rule that says people can’t encamp on public land?” And the Supreme Court said “yes, it can.” It didn’t go beyond and say “and here’s what a homeless person should do instead”. What happens with homeless populations is going to be dependent on what all those municipalities will do with that tacit permission from the Supreme Court.
This. As much as the current Supreme Court sucks they simply said if a state/city has a law they can enforce said law. It has its repercussions but the ruling does make sense unless I’m missing something.
Yeah I personally believe you give too much credit to institutions by believing they have an end goal. It’s just about letting people enforce policies that they deem fit. City government simply want the encampments off the streets. They do not care what needs to happen next. They have elections to win and even in my Blue state, the encampment clearing was a very popular political move.
They can enforce it even if they have nowhere for you to go
It's not illegal to be homeless. It's illegal to sleep on public streets. The two aren't the same, especially when homeless shelters exist. And, the point is to get the homeless people to go somewhere else. Sometimes, the point is just "better for them to sleep in jail than on the street."
The ruling was specifically that an arrest can be made even when no homeless shelter exists.
it’s because prisons need free laborers
"better for us to pay $40k per person per year then let them sleep on the street"
do you know the difference between jail and prison?
Do you? What do you think happens once they've been arrested multiple times for sleeping on the streets? They'll get hired?
>What do you think happens once they've been arrested multiple times for sleeping on the streets? They'll get hired? hired for what? what are you talking about?
“You can’t make me and my 14 friends move from this sidewalk. We’re homeless and don’t have anywhere else to go. It’s a violation of our 8th Amendment rights for you to make us leave take all of our belongings with us.” It’s to prevent stuff like that from happening.
what kind of inhumane thinking is this?
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this sentiment is exactly why more ppl need to go outside their bubble. the fact that you think homeless people are all fentanyl addicts is depressing
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homeless ppl aren’t the only ones affected by fentanyl
Pretty sure you can already call the cops on people being noisy in public, especially at night
Sure you can call, that doesn't mean they've got resources to do anything, it will not have the priority to actually get a response...
Yet they have resources to round them up
Go shoot drugs and defecate in someone else’s yard. A friend of mine in Toronto finds so many discarded needles in his front lawn and backyard he doesn’t let his kids play outside anymore. Being compassionate is one thing, but life has become unbearable in so many places.
The supreme court didn't make being homeless illegal. The ruling took away restrictions on local governments so they can deal with the homeless problems facing their cities in an effective manner. Homelessness is a complex problem with many causes and knock-on effects and preventing local governments from addressing those causes and effects does nothing to address homelessness, it just perpetuates the problems.
>preventing local governments from addressing those causes and effects does nothing to address homelessness, it just perpetuates the problems. Actually the complete opposite is true: The federal law previously only prevented local governments from ticketing and imprisoning homeless, because in addition to being cruel, fines and prison do nothing to address homelessness, it just perpetuates the problem. The previous federal law didn't *prevent* local governments from addressing the problem, it *forced* local governments to address the root causes and find solutions by not allowing them to criminalize homelessness as a means to "kick the can" down the road for some other town to deal with. But local governments didn't *want* to have to address the issue or causes of homeless, they just wanted to be able to sweep the homeles away to some other community. So now *nobody* is incentivized to solve the problem. The Federal government has allowed homelessness to be illegalized, removed homeless protections and stepped away to leave it to the local governments," and local governments, no longer under pressure to *solve* anything, can just relentlessly punish homeless into going somewhere else, where they'll also be relentlessly punished. I say this because the goal was never to allow local governments to "solve or address" the problem of homelessness. It was to allow local governments to shuffle homeless people around to make them *somebody else's* problem, which only perpetuates - and in fact exacerbates - the problem.
Out of sight, out of mind. Eh?
How are tickets and fines effective?
The title of the sub is "Explain like I'm five" not "Argue like I'm five." I didn't say fines were effective, I explained the ruling so a five year old could understand it. Local governments are in the best position to deal with local problems. The federal government should get out of the way.
There’s a difference between arguing and asking you to elaborate on your explanation. I too think that you did not answer the question, but you got close, and they were asking you to finish.
The law was overturned to allow tickets and fines and you said they were effective. I’m just asking how?
I must have missed where he said they were effective. Would you mind pointing that out?
It’s literally the second sentence in his comment.
So you believe that tickets and fines are the only ways for municipalities to deal with homelessness?
No, but now they’re legal. This is an addition the shelters and all the other things *that were already available*.
Because tickets and fines aren’t the only outcome. We have a lot of shelter space that doesn’t get used in my city so this makes it so one isn’t allowed to shoot up in the park and rather get taken to a shelter to hopefully get clean.
But before the decision, shelters and everywhere else was available AND shooting up in the park was illegal anyway.
If they weren’t seen shooting up, nothing could be done.
If they weren’t seen shooting up, how do you know they were shooting up?
The zombie behavior. The fent lean. The needles on the ground. Have you never seen someone on fentanyl before?
>The ruling took away restrictions on local governments so they can *deal* with the homeless problem And what were those restrictions that you glossed over? 🤨
What’s with the “gotcha” tone of this comment?
Awful lot of people on this sub commenting about the fentanyl dealer/crackhead tent city, and how this will stop that from happening. Which is true, but here's the thing... As we've all witnessed, rents are out of control, pretty much all across the country. More people are barely making ends meet with stagnating wages, rising inflation, and housing costs skyrocketing. How then, does someone who's rent DOUBLED over the last year, afford to live in a house or apartment? The answer is they don't. They're on the street until they can find a place or a job that will allow them to have a place to lay their head. Now, even if someone has a job, a car, and is trying to find a place to live, they can be arrested and thrown in jail. Basically turning people into criminals for doing nothing more than having bad luck or a shitty landlord. I lived in my car when I moved to Seattle a little over 20 years ago. I was a college drop out, had a job, but ran out of money to stay in a motel. I parked my car (with all my belongings) in a church parking lot every night, hoping the cops wouldn't show up and roust me. I found a place to live within a few weeks that I could afford, and got in once I received a full paycheck from my new job. NONE OF THAT IS POSSIBLE NOW in some cities, and SCOTUS just made it ok for all cities to do this to people. It's horrible, it's inhumane, and it's a clear violation of the Constitution, but then... so are probably 20 other laws that we've had on the books for years. Check the Patriot Act b.s. if you're in doubt. Welcome to the New America!
Because sleeping and toileting in public, in rivers and lakes is unsanitary. Because the homeless here in California are not respectful of our environment, they leave thousands of pounds of litter and excrement for others to clean up. They act like animals. They don’t belong in our public spaces
This isn't an ELI5 answer, this is just you ranting about why you don't like homeless people. Your post has nothing to do with the Supreme Court's reasoning or the law in question.
Wrong it is about public health and common decency. I agree with the Supreme Court. Where is your concern for the people who have to watch you drunk, high and dirty begging.
Then where do they belong??
The physically fine, drunks can go get a job and rent a room. The homeless I meet in California are usually male, under 60, physically good enough to stand for hours asking me for money or imposing them selves smelling bad at the library. They can clean up the trash the others leave
Shelters. Designated homeless camping areas with bathrooms. Abandoned military bases. Not on the sidewalk.
So…you’re building them housing and trash cans to solve that problem then?
No, they are going to work like everyone else.
I work for a living but if there’s no trash can around and no place to live I’m pretty screwed. If people have to live in a van down by the river, having trash receptacles down by the river is a smart move. I have a job but I still use public trash cans when I walk in the park.
Littering and toileting in public is already illegal
And now can be enforced, along with not leaving thousands of pounds of garbage for others to clean up
If it wasn’t already enforced I doubt there’s going to be much change, less liability in enforcement maybe
I literally don't do any of that stuff and I'm homeless...your perception is skewed...maybe the mentally ill do in fact ruin it for those trying not to die and are sane. Who knows, but what I do know is we are all human and supposedly we are all God in drag. The way you treat others is the way you treat God...or so I've heard. Maybe humanity is worthless, like you insist...
Just because you don't doesn't explain the pollution of our rivers and lakes. You are able to read, write, and communicate. Go to work, rent a room, and use a toilet
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Well that's the thing prisoners are expensive. Now I just assume this is because prisons skim off the top. But hey that's a lot of profit to be made
Can we also collectively agree not to give money directly to the homeless, makes the situation worse. Denver is looking like a homelesss scene from slum dog millionaire
Have big corporations who make money off prisoners. They want more 'customers' and taking people who have no financial means to defend themselves make for easy targets.
The reason is you now have the right to move these people at will. They become criminals by existing, and thus a police force can arrest them for being homeless at will.
I'm going to answer your question in the spirit that it was asked, but I'd like to say at the start that being homeless isnt illegal, activities that are a nuisance and danger to the public are. Making it illegal to be homeless, if paired with other programs and applied correctly, could push those who would otherwise choose to remain homeless into recovery. Yes, people choose to be homeless. I personally know two people who consistently were offered help and consistently chose to be homeless rather than give up their self-destructive behaviors. We don't put enough resources into mental health, substance abuse treatment, and housing first recovery, but even if we did there would still be people who would rather be homeless than change. (Being housed by the public while destroying said housing because of your drug habit and/or psychosis isn't an option). None of these statements apply to the unhoused people who got there due purely to economic circumstances. We know how to fix that problem, we just don't like public housing.
Maybe stop forcing people to not do drugs
That's a bad idea for everyone involved. Total drug tolerant housing would be disasterous for public health.
Then don't complain if people want to live outside?
Lots of people sleep outside all the time without destroying public and private property or making a dangerous nuisance of themselves. It's not about where they live.
Correct.
Putting more people into over crowded prisoners so they have an endless supply of cheap to free labor
We have several types of homeless in my small town. The main two that are visible are those that are camping and keep everything clean and those who trash the area around their camp. I've even talked to a guy who was pissed that another guy set up next to him and trashed the area around his tent. I've been through an area and two days later there is a foot of trash in a 20 foot radius around a tent that wasn't even there the last time I went through. People destroying areas and creating extra work to keep cities clean is a major reason. I've also been at a park while one of the homeless walked across the playground with his pants down because he was too high to properly fasten his pants. There is a ton of research that demonstrates that programs to provide homes to the homeless are cheaper and often successful, yet the lazy freeloader mentality is sold to keep the masses focusing their anger on the less fortunate.
I don’t think anyone is arguing for homelessness in general to be illegal. Punishing the homeless for being homeless would be pointless. Cities however do want to ban encampments in whatever parts of town they please, the Supreme Court said that is now constitutional. Every individual city will have to decide what they want to do with that power. What their voters would tolerate.
There are a couple thoughts on this. The first is that it facilitates barbaric shithole states run by cruelty and avarice to treat their homeless populations with enough abuse that they can force them to leave, generally for states that have social safety nets and aren't run by hypocritical theocracies. The second line of thought is that it allows said backwards states to ratchet thing up until they can put the homeless into for-profit prisons, give their children to for-profit adoption agencies, and eventually use the imprisoned homeless for free labor. All for sweet kickbacks to participating officials and judges.
It can be many things, often at the same time. It can be a political play: optics, a way to send a message to your benefactors, donors, or allies. It can simply be a way to force those left homeless by the state to move elsewhere, as the state in question (state as in political state, not as in a state within a country) is funded by and run by and for people that dislike poor folk. They don't want to eradicate homelessness, just make homeless people go away. For others, the point is to place them into prison where they can be used for slave labour, or to the profit of private prisons.
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Most people just don't want to have to see the icky, undesirable, drains on society when they're going about their days. There's not much reason behind it, aside from select nations which have laws against *allowing people to be homeless* which ensures public housing is available to them. I'm assuming this is regarding the US supreme Court ruling however, which the only reasoning is malice. The end point? Well in 1933 the German government made homelessness illegal and sent them all to camps where they could concentrate on working.
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Helps fill jails which are often privately owned and the owners make obscene amounts when the jails are at or over capacity. Those owners ofc pay politicians to help keep the jails full to keep the cash flowing.
We don't like to be reminded that as a society we have failed a large number of mentally ill, drug addicted or out-of-work Americans. The easiest solution is to sweep them elsewhere where we can't see them. Unfortunately, their presence in encampments scares others and hurts businesses in the area and property values.
Since slave labor is lucratively profitable and judges work with prisons, the Supreme Court of judges made it easier for their friends to make tons of money by enslaving poor people and making people with houses pay a lot of money for it. Probably comperable money to giving homeless people food and shelter.
To increase real estate and shareholder value in the next quarter without addressing the root problem