Our homeless war: We either want to arrest them or shelter them – far away
Writing about the homeless is like diving into a bottomless pit of recriminations.
Everyone seems to have an opinion about the homeless people we see on our streets every day. But if my email and voice mails are any indication, most of those opinions are divorced from facts and reality. After writing about homelessness on March 24, I was inundated by warring constituencies who are equally angry, but for different reasons.
The “arrest these homeless people or put them on a bus to Roseville” crowd is angry because it thinks Sacramento is wasting time and money by coddling the homeless people. But those people are wrong.
The “I want to do something about the homeless but I don’t want them near where I live” crowd is angry because it doesn’t think Sacramento is doing anything about the homeless. But those people are wrong, too.
These constituencies are right to be alarmed and dismayed about the proliferation of homeless people in Sacramento. Believe me. I sympathize. For years I’ve been labeled the guy who “hates the homeless” because I have complained about the public health and public safety risks of homelessness in our community.
When Sacramento City Councilman Larry Carr, a fine man and a good public servant, says sincerely that he believes the city should only spend its resources helping people who want to help themselves, how can I disagree?
Carr’s values align with mine. My parents were immigrants who came to this country with almost no money and no language skills and yet found gainful employment, bought a nice little house, raised two kids, and contributed to community without requiring public assistance.
What is homelessness but a failure of community and society? And what do people do in the face of failure? They get angry and point fingers.
A reader named George sent this email to me: “The homeless are a result, not a solution, caused by two other basic problems – people with destructive dope addictions, and people who are mentally ill. The free-loaders who are able to work can be directed elsewhere. Sort them out. “ He added this: “The solution can be accomplished in one or more state facilities, each consisting of a large two-part building providing food, shelter and treatment while restrained or detained in each facility, given freedom only when recovery is perceived.”
Well, George, that is quite a mouthful. But let’s start with what we know. Since December of 2017, the city has operated a triage homeless center in north Sacramento on Railroad Drive. Of the more than 600 homeless people who have received shelter there, roughly 60 percent had some form of mental illness. And nearly half, 46 percent, were struggling with substance abuse. The vast majority, 86 percent, were homeless because of one disabling condition or another.
The reason the Railroad Drive numbers are important is because the center has accepted people otherwise turned away from other shelters around the county. The Railroad Drive facility has no requirement that the homeless be sober or that they relinquish their pets or enter the shelter without significant others. That means Railroad Drive has had a broader spectrum of people seeking shelter than other city and county shelters.
So based on the numbers at Railroad Drive, we’re not talking about a large number of what some might call “able bodied” people. We’re talking about people facing serious challenges. We’re talking people who need significant assistance to be able to function.
Remember the statement by Councilman Carr? That the city should help people who can help themselves and “enforce the law” on everyone else? I agree with him. What could be more logical? And elements of that sentiment could be realistically enforced.
For example, the city could speak in one voice and say this: The city will try to help any homeless person get off the streets, but that refusing help or treatment is not an option. No homeless person should be able to say he or she wants to stay outside. I’m sorry, but no. If you refuse treatment then you can’t stay here. It’s terribly unhealthy for anyone to be on the street and it’s unhealthy for anyone to be around someone living on the streets.
Refusal of treatment could be where Councilman Carr’s words are put into action because the city is undertaking an enormous effort to dedicate as much as $40 million, roughly $16 of it coming from a sales tax increase, to get people off the streets.
This effort means that no one can say that the city isn’t dong anything. And to the “arrest them” crowd, you’re wrong. The city isn’t in a homeless crisis because it’s doing too much. The city is in a homeless crisis because it didn’t do enough until now.
A reader named Dale wrote: “The homeless issue is a big problem, especially with a do-nothing government, weak-knee (sic) governor, and mayors we have today. (Sacramento Mayor Darrell) Steinberg simply wants to spend more money and create another growth agency. (Councilman Jay) Schenirer wants to park them in our neighborhoods, but not his neighborhood. “ Dale continued: “These are questions I would ask: Do we have vagrancy laws or ordinances on the books now? Do we have no camping ordinances in this city?”
The city does have ordinances, brother. And I am totally with you on enforcing laws. And deeply frustrating to me, as someone who loves this city, is seeing so many people on the street. Take a trip to City Hall right now and you’ll witness a slice of the Great Depression, with pieces like a little Hooverville, the shanty towns that sprung up in the early 1930s when the U.S. economy collapsed and President Herbert Hoover took the brunt of public outrage.
In a microcosm within our city limits, Steinberg probably has a little sense of what Hoover must have gone through. He’s the guy trying to attack the root causes of homelessness – mental illness and substance abuse – and yet he is the one everyone is mad at it whenever they encounter homeless people.
Even homeless advocates rage at him. I’ve heard city insiders say that the homeless issue wasn’t as bad as it is now until Steinberg made it a priority.
I’ve given that criticism a lot of thought for more than a year and it just doesn’t hold up. Look up and down the West Coast. From San Diego to Seattle, cities have seen major spikes in homelessness.
If you want to criticize anyone, you can criticize the occupants of the Oval Office going back to the 1980s. You can criticize former Gov. Jerry Brown for not doing enough. And you can put pressure on the current governor to do more.
Frankly, Steinberg and Schenirer would have an easier political time if they just played the incremental game. If they just tried to mitigate homelessness and ignored it as much as they could.
Instead, they both have taken it on and subjected themselves to endless abuse at community meetings. The most thought many of us give to homelessness is when we complain about it.
We want it to end and we don’t want it near us. And we don’t care about the incredibly complex details involved in combating homeless. The people at the Railroad Drive shelter have needed and received drug counseling and mental health counseling. We’re talking about people who, at least initially, can’t live under a roof without a lot of help.
Who wants to deal with this? Do you? I don’t. You want the city to incarcerate people for vagrancy? It’s not going to happen. By and large, cities don’t do that. Why? Because if they did, that’s all they would do.
Steinberg and Schenirer have calculated that doing nothing will cost the city far more in the long run. They have studied other cities such as Seattle and concluded that they suffered more through inaction and a lack of coordinated effort. They have taken on this issue even though it’s a loser politically. It opens them up to constant ridicule and second guessing from people who are not as far out on the limb as they are.
Does this sound like I’ve come around to Steinberg and Schenirer’s way of thinking on homelessness?
I guess it does. I don’t know if their ideas will work. But I know that I don’t have any. I know that other voices sound like they want to play the incremental game. Or they are focused – as I once was – on solely decrying the ill effects of homelessness.
One thing is for certain: Being mad about this issue isn’t gong to accomplish anything.
This story was originally published March 28, 2019 at 12:53 PM.
