Seattle wants to spend $5M for homeless tent

[rm.w/aview]

The rich would quickly learn two things: (1) they're not as independent as they think they are, and (2) they're not as indispensable as they think they are.
I prefer the old Roman "secessio", in which all the "commoners" would pack up and leave town, allowing the aristocrats to do everything for themselves. Since the aristocrats can't even do their own laundry in the morning, they were crying within days to have all the commoners come back.

nailed it Lenny, and reminds me of System Of A Down's "BYOB" and the lyrics "why do they always send the poor"  It's only 4:22 minutes and gets catchy within a minute. Since I have youtube on the dial here's a trailer from a 2006 documentary that was interesting, the numbers no doubt are lagging as it's thirteen years old already  Chalmers Johnson presented something with "When war becomes that profitable you're going to see more of it." Sort of like creating jobs and thinning the herd in one motion.

 

[QinReno]

OK, if you wanna add State spending on "handouts to the poor", then that gets compared to the total of all the rest of the State spending--which again makes it a mere drop in the bucket.

You still aren't looking at the numbers in the wikipedia article.

TOTAL cost in (billions) (2011)
$717
$210
$927

First figure is Federal ($717-B), second figure is State ($210-B).

We could well afford to spend enough to deal with all of our social problems. We simply don't want to.

$1-Trillion is the actual amount in **handouts** every year. That's a lot of money. Once again, $25,000 on average for every one of the 40-million poor in america.

 

[Moxadox]

The US has never spent a trillion on homeless people. The only thing we spend a trillion on is blowing people up by dropping bombs on them. "Helping the homeless" is, was, and likely always will be a minuscule part of the budget. As a society, we long ago made the decision that we simply don't give a shit what happens to the homeless, so long as they're not cluttering up our sidewalks.

Lenny, that's exactly why they're homeless in the first place. Society's throwaways. The ones nobody wants to deal with, so they're shunned. Problem is, just like plastic stuff that people toss away, they don't simply disappear...they end up in piles along the coasts, more and more and more. I've been homeless myself a time or two. I learned that there is only one kind of "help" offered: they will help you squeeze into their extremely narrow definition of what is "normal." But what if you just don't fit into that cubbyhole? What if you're a true square peg? They throw you out or put you in jail. And then you're right back where you were.

I feel that if a real effort was made to understand the needs of each individual who is homeless, meaningful progress might be made. Otherwise, to be honest, it's like trying to herd cats, because the homeless are an incredibly diverse group. Oops, I have to be careful...once I get on this topic I have a tendency to go on and on...

The Dire Wolfess

 

[John61CT]

A nice visualization of trillions for your viewing pleasure

https://informationisbeautiful.net/visualizations/trillions-what-is-a-trillion-dollars/

 

[crofter]

Hello again!  Interestingly, in the PNW and coastal cultures north of there, people used to gather in multi family housing called "longhouses" to survive the winters in community. There were really no walls, and families would just have areas along the walls to call their own, and the central spaces were communal. Drafty, smoky, and prone to the spread of diseases; but also a haven out of the rain. Culturally, the idea of gathering for shelter comes from that area.  How it would work as a residence of diverse individuals in modern times??    ~crofter

These modern longhouses are used for gatherings

https://www.duwamishtribe.org/longhouse/

http://www.sitnews.us/Kiffer/Kasaan/091416_kasaan.html

https://www.evergreen.edu/longhouse

 

[crofter]

"[font=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]said Stormy Hamar during the ceremony. “We didn't count them, but there's somewhere around thirty-seven-hundred billion.”[/font]

[font=Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif]He was talking about adze marks made when handcrafting the shelter.  Not dollars taken from others who will never see or use the shelter. ~crofter[/font]

 

[TexasWoman]

Dang ... free laundry, medical, tents with platforms, showers, bathrooms, etc. etc ??

Sounds like super glamping .. where do I sign up?

Oh wait .. it's in Seattle... never mind.
I like the sun too much.

I might consider it if they build a light therapy tent, a tanning booth and a mani/pedi kiosk to improve my self image.

Hell .. who needs a stinkin job?

 

[bullfrog]

It didn't go over to well for the inmates in Arizona!

 

[QinReno]

If I were homeless I'd go to Boulder CO. Those guys live like kings in the shelter there. I can tell you, it's "much" nicer than where I was living when I was in Boulder, LOL.
- https://bouldershelter.org/
- https://www.google.com/search?q=boulder+homeless+shelter&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X

 

[crofter]

 "much" nicer than where I was living 

There's nothing that says "home" like rows of bunkbeds.  The building design is nice though, and kinda reminds me of the Duwamish longhouse for some reason.     ~crofter

 

[travelaround]

Since when do kings have to live in bunk houses? For me, without privacy, there's no luxury.

 

[crofter]

Since when do kings have to live in bunk houses? For me, without privacy, there's no luxury.

I like your idea of buying the used vans to distribute - a permanent solution plus includes transportation if the vans run.  Sounds like the RV project they did last year included units that did not run.
If they got relatively new vans - $20k each, they could get 250 vans. The vans could be outfitted with the items they are already providing. Would also need a cheap heat source.

Some of the recipients would just sell the van and use the money to feed their habit. That is the down side to providing a negotiable item as a solution. So the vans would not work for everyone.   ~crofter

 

[QinReno]

They don't live in their bunks, they live in the Hall of the Kings. Free bunks, free food, free movies every night, free cable, free bus passes, free clinics, free meds, and spending all day in the Boulder Street Mall, pan handling the tourists, drinking cappucino, and talking Philosophy. No work, nothin' but play. I had to pay my own way for all of that.

 

[B and C]

 How it would work as a residence of diverse individuals in modern times??    ~crofter

When Katrina hit NO, the people all went to the Superdome.  We know how that turned out. :s

 

[maki2]

They don't live in their bunks, they live in the Hall of the Kings. Free bunks, free food, free movies every night, free cable, free bus passes, free clinics, free meds, and spending all day in the Boulder Street Mall, pan handling the tourists, drinking cappucino, and talking Philosophy. No work, nothin' but play. I had to pay my own way for all of that.

They don't "live" there at all, they just get to sleep there. The place is shut from 10:00 AM until 5:00pm. Between those hours they are out on the street and in the winter that often means outside in the freezing cold. Putting up an architect designed shelter reassures the rich that the poor are living it up in luxury. But it is more about having a flashy image to display to the world promoting how great the city is than it is about a real solution. It would be much more effective for the homeless to have a place where they can get out of the cold 24/7. They are not worried about sleeping in a building that looks good, you can't see the building when you are asleep, they are worried about how it functions for sheltering them from the storm. Here is a more accurate picture of the situation they have in Boulder Colorado. http://www.dailycamera.com/news/bou...ss-worry-day-shelter-closes-and-boulder-plans

 

[crofter]

When Katrina hit NO, the people all went to the Superdome.  We know how that turned out. :s

True that.  Even with a knife in your belt, you are vulnerable when asleep.

And as native history tells us, not all good times in the longhouse. For one thing, the people were more easily victimized due to being gathered in one place, and also diseases spread more easily than if the people were geographically dispersed. 

Concern is that gathering a lot of people without a history of medical care into one place will promote the spread of disease, and cause many of them to be more vulnerable to both disease and victimization than if they were housed in dispersed locations.             ~crofter

 

[crofter]

If they got relatively new vans - $20k each, they could get 250 vans. 

correction: 
 Quote "[font=TiemposTextWeb-Regular, Georgia, Times, serif]The funds would likely hail from an [/font][font=TiemposTextWeb-Regular, Georgia, Times, serif]$89.5 million proposed budget[/font][font=TiemposTextWeb-Regular, Georgia, Times, serif] for curbing homelessness in Seattle"[/font]
[font=TiemposTextWeb-Regular, Georgia, Times, serif]If they got relatively new vans at $20K each they could get 4,475 vans if they spent their entire budget on vans.     ~crofter[/font]

 

[LivGolden]

This was a sad affair. During Katrina, I volunteered at a local church which accepted the poorest of the poor from hospitals which literally unloaded people in taxi cabs to them. In sheets, sometimes! People who were wearing nothing but sheets. One woman, a grand niece of Marie Laveau ( no joke) was so huge she could not be fitted in clothes. She was air-lifted by helicopter from a rooftop. Her clothes fell off and she was naked. Such humiliation I cannot imagine. It did not end there. Ms. Glapion took only one thing with her when the helicopter lighted on her rooftop - a Tupperware of spaghetti...Here she was, an enormous woman in a sheet with a container of spaghetti and a curse on her lips from her great grandmother, Marie LaVeau. What an amazing encounter. I loved her from the start! 

It turns out the big woman with the Tupperware was as gentle as anyone - no need to fear her. She spoke a broken French and gave incantations to children who were mothers who had been separated from their babies and - she left an impression. 

Don't judge a book by its sheet!

 

[maki2]

Hello again!  Interestingly, in the PNW and coastal cultures north of there, people used to gather in multi family housing called "longhouses" to survive the winters in community. There were really no walls, and families would just have areas along the walls to call their own, and the central spaces were communal. Drafty, smoky, and prone to the spread of diseases; but also a haven out of the rain. Culturally, the idea of gathering for shelter comes from that area.  How it would work as a residence of diverse individuals in modern times??    ~crofter

These modern longhouses are used for gatherings

https://www.duwamishtribe.org/longhouse/

http://www.sitnews.us/Kiffer/Kasaan/091416_kasaan.html

https://www.evergreen.edu/longhouse

 It is easy to think that the longhouse culture meant everyone was getting along and doing the same thing but unless you were there you would not know how many tribal members chose not to stay in the longhouse but had separate dwelling spaces. Or how many of the members born into a tribe went "walkabout" rather than staying with the rest of the group.  You can't get an accurate feel of what a society was truly like solely on oral history, artifacts or early photographs. You only get a glimpse of a portion of it and you might read or hear a best guess interpretation. But you can't see all of what went on between the individual members of that society. Are we really more diverse in personality types? I doubt that, I think that diversity has always been there in humans, we even see it in animals, our pets have their own diversity of personalities even within the same litter, so do human children born into the same family. There is a difference between cultural expectations and norms that have evolved in specific cultures and the diversity of personalities in the individuals, they are not the same thing and that has always been true.

 

[LivGolden]

Wow, that's interesting. Never heard of it. Thanks.