Last night I spent the evening on the streets of Skid Row in Los Angeles California. Los Angeles is home to the highest homeless population in the nation.
Click "Read more" to continue
Click "Read more" to continue
I spend a fair amount of time on these streets. I have spent time on the street since 2009. In that time I have met some amazing folks. There are a number of stories in my blog over the years on the subject. I have also taken photos over the years at times. I did not take the photo above but it has always been one of my personal favorites. Some of my own photos can be seen at:
I posted a Facebook status update and looking at the commentary I thought that I would like to port the dialogue into a blog piece.
Here is the post at the moment:
Last night I spent the evening on skid row. I walked the area, talked to folks, passed out a few healthy snacks and counted people.
The problem of homelessness is not going away. In fact, it is not getting better. It is getting worse.
The city of Los Angeles is allocating 3.7 million dollars to clean up skid row. Not to address the problem .... just to make the problem less visible for a few months.
The folks at places like Union Rescue Mission / Andy Bales and folks at The Midnight Mission / Larry Adamson can use your help. The situation will not improve using the same limited resources and thought processes that have failed for years. The reason I mention Andy and Larry is that hopefully our local city government can grab the two of them and form a committee that will listen to them blindly rather than continue to fail.
You can help. Look at these two organizations mentioned above. Learn more.
The problem of homelessness is not going away. In fact, it is not getting better. It is getting worse.
The city of Los Angeles is allocating 3.7 million dollars to clean up skid row. Not to address the problem .... just to make the problem less visible for a few months.
The folks at places like Union Rescue Mission / Andy Bales and folks at The Midnight Mission / Larry Adamson can use your help. The situation will not improve using the same limited resources and thought processes that have failed for years. The reason I mention Andy and Larry is that hopefully our local city government can grab the two of them and form a committee that will listen to them blindly rather than continue to fail.
You can help. Look at these two organizations mentioned above. Learn more.
Gary Eugene Thompson did you expect anything sensible from govt?
Dan Boul Myles, I'm proud to know you. The problem is so layered, complex, and changing. I'm not sure that a city council or local gov't could address it other than throw money at it. I would humbly suggest that you get in front of the City Council and offer some suggestions from an insider. I don't realistically believe that they have ANY grasp on what the realities are on skid row. Again, you're a good man who cares!
Bob Collum Empathy is a valuable and rare commodity. You rock Myles
Gary Eugene Thompson God bless you for your efforts, it makes me sad to think of people anywhere in the world that are hungry , cold and without a home or close family.
Tommy Dale In your opinion, what is the problem, or the cause of the problem of homelessness?
Myles Rose Tommy Dale - The issue is very complex and I have written a bit from my point of view - in a few pieces that can be accessed from this link - http://la-economy.blogspot.com/search/label/homeless
Myles Rose Tommy Dale - Andy Bales, the CEO of Union Rescue Mission is a great one to read or talk to on the issue. Some of his own thinking can be seen at -http://urm.org/category/rev-andys-blog/
Myles Rose Dan Boul - Your comment is a great one. Our city can throw money at the issue. Unfortunately it is sort of like a shotgun approach where most of the projectiles miss the mark. The money is not wisely spent. A few years back I spent a day at Union Rescue Mission in a meeting with Andy Bales, Don Petrosky Garza and General Jeff (Downtown LA Neighborhood Council, Resident Director, Central City East / Skid Row) trying to come up with some ideas. Some things were accomplished in spite of the political insensitivity of that current administration.
The problem is HUGE and 3.7 million dollars is a finger in the proverbial dam. BUT .... even small amounts are effective if properly allocated. Back to my shotgun analogy, in my era in Vietnam the number of rounds fired per kill was thousands. The number of rounds fired by snipers per kill was 1.7. $3.7 million dollars will be gone in a flash. In a few months there will be nothing to show for the expense other than some of the contractors upgrading their cars or procuring a bigger flat screen TV.
But .... these resources can be allocated much more effectively if, as I have said earlier, a committee was formed with folks on a board. Some of those I mentioned in the past would be substantial assets as board members. Andy Bales, Jacqui Groseth, Don Garza, Larry Adamson would make a great start.
If you look behind the proverbial curtain and spend a day or two at URM and look at where their money is spent you would see they know how to stretch a dollar. A full meal is $2.08. I have eaten these meals and (this is for you Dan Boul .... better than most meals any of my ex-wives produced when we were married) .... Housing, showers, health care (mental, medical, dental), legal services, counselling, family programs.
The list goes on and on. Look at Hope Gardens run by URM. - http://urm.convio.net/.../HopeGardens_LandingPage.htmlLook at how much can be done with money of the sort that the City of Los Angeles allocates for temporary action to an ongoing issue.
I could go on and on and on and on. Look at some of the links, talk to some of the folks I mentioned. Learn a bit more about the problems and how folks that know the issues spend money more effectively and wisely.
I guess this is the end of my diatribe .... for the moment.
The problem is HUGE and 3.7 million dollars is a finger in the proverbial dam. BUT .... even small amounts are effective if properly allocated. Back to my shotgun analogy, in my era in Vietnam the number of rounds fired per kill was thousands. The number of rounds fired by snipers per kill was 1.7. $3.7 million dollars will be gone in a flash. In a few months there will be nothing to show for the expense other than some of the contractors upgrading their cars or procuring a bigger flat screen TV.
But .... these resources can be allocated much more effectively if, as I have said earlier, a committee was formed with folks on a board. Some of those I mentioned in the past would be substantial assets as board members. Andy Bales, Jacqui Groseth, Don Garza, Larry Adamson would make a great start.
If you look behind the proverbial curtain and spend a day or two at URM and look at where their money is spent you would see they know how to stretch a dollar. A full meal is $2.08. I have eaten these meals and (this is for you Dan Boul .... better than most meals any of my ex-wives produced when we were married) .... Housing, showers, health care (mental, medical, dental), legal services, counselling, family programs.
The list goes on and on. Look at Hope Gardens run by URM. - http://urm.convio.net/.../HopeGardens_LandingPage.htmlLook at how much can be done with money of the sort that the City of Los Angeles allocates for temporary action to an ongoing issue.
I could go on and on and on and on. Look at some of the links, talk to some of the folks I mentioned. Learn a bit more about the problems and how folks that know the issues spend money more effectively and wisely.
I guess this is the end of my diatribe .... for the moment.
Myles Rose Steve Seifert - Thank you very much for sharing this post on your page. Since you are local, free amp checkup and free amp biasing for you for life (my life ... not your life ... so perhaps not such a great offer)
Diane Rainbowitz One can't underestimate the serious mental illness issues that may contribute to homelessness, along with the marginalization of anyone who believes in true democracy and knows that resources are allocated more equitably in countries like Sweden for example. Re serious mental illness read about Rep Tim Murphy's HR 3717
Myles Rose Diane Rainbowitz - Yes, there are mental illness issues, drug and alcohol issues as well. Unfortunately, the vast majority of the public believe that these stereotypes are the main reason for the problem. This may have been the case years ago. It is no longer the case today.
The people on the street are folks that used to be our neighbors. They are folks we ate lunch with in the company cafeteria. They are the young men and women our country sent to fight in the Mid East and turned their back on when they came home. They are families and children. The face of homelessness since around 2008 has it's roots based in the economy, job loss and economics.
I suppose mental illness will always be a major factor that people walking by will attribute to the problem. Spend two weeks living on a sheet of cardboard covered with carpet felt as padding, no shower and a diet worse than that of a pigeon in a McDonald's parking lot and you too will be mentally unstable and changed. You will also look a bit different than you did in your clothes that were washed recently, your hair and your blackened hands and feet make you look.
Bottom line .... the serious mental issues impact a small percentage of the folks at the start of their tenure on the streets of Los Angeles but everybody that spends more than a few weeks living on the street will graduate with serious mental issues.
Diane Rainbowitz Which is why I urge everyone to learn about HR3717.
The history of mental illness in this country is that mental hospitals were emptied out under Kennedy and Reagan, supposedly to "free" those individuals for release to community care, which never materialized. It's true, the wholesale institutionalization for life of people with mental illness was awful. It's also true that with proper treatment, people with such brain disorder can rehabilitate and recover their function.
Unfortunately now if a person is psychotic, they may be hospitalized for a couple of days (but ONLY if they're a danger to self or other). They may be released back to the same place they were in before, without having gotten any measure of help for their condition. The community resources (and hospital beds) are woefully inadequate to meet the needs of people whose brains have been affected by combat, joblessness, homelessness, drug and alcohol abuse.
The other placement of choice is jail. People with mental illness occupy 30-40% of current prison beds. Again because the resources and knowledge to help them is scarce.
The efforts of Midnight Mission, Union Rescue Mission are a pitiful drop in the bucket of what is needed to heal these wounds. The homelessness problem in L.A. and other metropolitan areas is the ultimate shame of our society, as destructive as it is to the human spirit.
Sorry to elaborate on your wall, Myles. You were saying that it is complex and complicated and it may be better to leave it at that. Please accept my apologies and please feel free to delete this if you feel it is inappropriate to your intention.
Tommy Dale I think it also has to do with how a nation looks at it's citizens. Societies that look at the population in a "family way" will not accept people dropping out against their will, just like a family will help each other when a member is in trouble.
To put i simple: how can I sleep at night knowing that other people sleep on the street two blocks away..
Myles Rose Diane Rainbowitz. There are many problems in the world. Mental illness is one. Cancer is one. There are many. You can only address a fraction of the problems the world faces. I generally choose to address an issue where I feel an improvement can be made and something where I can get directly involved. That happens to be the homeless issue in the city where I live and the city where I was born.
HR "anything" implies government intervention. I personally feel our government is ineffective and does little more than perform actions that are little more than smoke and mirrors in regard to this problem.
If YOU want to make a difference, give URM a hand. Lord knows it is only people like you that can feed, clothe and provide a bed to somebody today, even if for only today. Our government is not going to do that. Hopefully our new mayor will enlist the help of folks likeAndy Bales to head up any program our local city government wants to attempt to enact to address the problem of homelessness in the City of Los Angeles, the city with the highest homeless population in the nation.
-end for now-
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment