This is so true and you have volunteers going out and cleaning up these camps, unprotected. When/if they become ill, they probably do not have any idea why. They are breathing in all of this contamination when the stir up the area during the clean up and they don’t even realize it.

1. There are the recidivist substance abusers. Mostly, the substance in question is alcohol, but other drugs such as meth, crack and heroine also play a part. More often than not, these folks have no interest in sobriety and have walked away from any supportive relationships which might have helped them get sober. At times they may have participated in some kind of treatment program, but dropped out or started using again. Right now, their primary interest is getting more substance of choice by whatever means they can.

2. Mental illness plays a huge part as well. Often people on the street suffer bipolar disorder and/or schizophrenia.

3. There are also the ‘social rejects’ for lack of a better term. These are the ones who are anti-authority, anti-society, anti-community, except with others who have the same set of views. These are the ones who just don’t want to have a job like ‘normal people’ or pay taxes, etc.

4. Then there are the legitimately jobless. These are the ones who are out of work for one reason or another and who have suffered most because of the bad economy. Sometimes they have family. Sometimes not. Many times, they are just too far away from genuine support structure or what support structure they may once have had is in just as bad a place as they are.

Many times there’s overlap. For instance, the second type often are drug users, self medicating because the don’t like the side effects of prescribed pharmaceuticals. Other times, the social rejects are also chronic drug users. Many times, too, they are also mentally ill, to a degree, but make a conscious choice to reject ‘society’. And sometimes the genuinely jobless are there because of drug use or mental illness. Also, because of how narcotics affect the brain, chronic drug users often present as though they were mentally ill (and, indeed have made themselves thus) but don’t respond to meds the same as someone who was born or became mentally ill without drugs.

Bottom line is this: the only ones I feel bad for are the genuinely mentally ill or out of work through no real fault of their own. They’re the ones who genuinely deserve or need help. In the case of the fomer, although it’s not PC, the best thing to do for them is put them in an institution. There’s better oversight, better meds, and better understanding of the patholgies involved. In fact, getting the mentally ill almost entirely out of residential care facilities and into institutions would also be a lot more humane. Frankly, almost without exception, the residential care facilities have been, maybe one notch up from living on the street. Yeah. they suck that bad.

For the rest, there’s the public health issue. We as a society certainly don’t owe them anything, and they are certainly not entitled to turn wherever they’ve chose to set up camp into the kinds of festering cesspools I’ve seen in parks, along creeks or under overpasses. All too often, the narrative when it comes to such things is that they’re entitled to live somewhere, so why not the park. Well, living somewhere – as opposed to out in the middle of nowhere, which is where vagrants USED to live – is a privilege, one which comes with some responsibilities. If a person chooses – as all too many homeless do – to abdicate the responsibilities of living in a community, then they’re certainly not entitled to any of the privileges that go along with living in a community, privileges such as access to parks, potable water, good food, etc.

I’ve seen how they live in those homeless encampments. All too often you need a hazmat suit to safely deal with the campsites and, even the homeless themselves, who often are so covered in vermin, filth and offal, that they, literally, are untouchable.

For the seriously mentally ill and the substance abusers, put them in institutions. Give them the bare essentials: shelter, food, water, basic medical and dental care and access to a library and an exercise area (sounds a lot like Agnews, right?). The ones who stabilize or get sober and are still mentally competent could be released back to the community, but this will happen far less frequently than not.

For the ones who are able-bodied, but just out of work, get them into a shelter, with the condition that they work for their shelter and food somehow. Public assistance is a privilege and a gift (albeit, often, a reluctant one). That privilege should be earned.

For the rest: they are violating so many statutes and public health codes that they can and should be prosecuted and incarcerated. The issue of what to do with their property ought not really be an issue at all. 99% of the time, it’s so contaminated and infested it should be handled by people in hazmat suits, placed into hazmat bags and incinerated like medical waste. Really. It’s that awful and unsafe.

About as effective as labeling theaters and schools as ‘gun-free zones.’

The only thing preventing community events from being held at Saint James Park is people’s phobia of homeless people.  They are our neighbors too..

I saw that sign, too, and it made me laugh.

You’re obviously mistaken because the park is clearly signed as a “drug free zone.” No way would anyone disobey such a rule.

Yes they are Mr. Rodgers, yes they are.

“Won’t you be my neighbor”——-Mr. Rodgers

http://video.pbs.org/video/1415187976/