Yeah I'm sure they'll develop a really thoughtful response. Give me a break. At this point, anyone being honest with themselves knows that without council members with the courage and conviction to uphold the law, fairly and impartially, as well as a populace willing to hold them accountable, the only thing that is going to happen here is managed decline, and more of the same (but worse).

It's ironic that the SLOG Shit Bags most critical of society helping the indigent, mentally ill and addicted are the same shut-in losers with the most clearly exhibited mental illnesses posting here compulsively every day when, if they were adjusted and fully employed, they would be be too busy working.

So they just figured out they need to develop an approach to address the problem? Maybe the threat of prosecution does result in action.

The continued focus on the addicted obscures the whole point of the debate. The council and the city can set up all the diversion and recovery programs they want but you can't force people into treatment. This notion that the lack of programs, housing, resources is what is keeping these people on the street is patently false. What is keeping them on the street is their addiction and the fact that many times they are incapable of rational decision making. The point of laws like this is not to force or even encourage addicts into treatment. It's an ineffective use of resources. The point is to protect the rest of us from their behavior. People should be able to walk down the street without breathing in second hand fentanyl smoke or take their kids to the park without having to worry about needles laying around. Do all the drugs you want in your tents or your tiny house. No one will bother you there but if you are going to lay around on the street using in public then you should be cited. We need to have an acceptable level of behavior for society to function and expecting the rest of us to simply put up with this shit until an addict is ready to accept help is not an acceptable outcome.

It's ironic that the anti-tax suburbanites are trying to raise our taxes to subsidize their non-existent travel to Seattle.

War on drugs doesn't work, guys. Build your fancy treatment centers in your suburbs, not in our city.

Confiscate. It won't solve the long-term addiction problem for fentanyl users or make much of a dent in the supply, but it might get the packs of fiends off our city streets and sidewalks.

Toby, you and I have known each other for a long time.

Regardless of anything else, jailing people for simple possession is an aggressive action. State violence must be held to the same standard as private violence. We allow private violence for things such as self-defense because we recognize that it is sometimes necessary when there is an urgent situation that involves imminent harm. But we do not tolerate private individuals to escalate the situation into violence when it was not previously violent - this includes not only "beating up someone on the street", but also forcibly taking someone to a second location and trapping them there at gunpoint. Because we recognize that compelling action with a threat of violence is violence, even if the person capitulates due to the threat alone. We have this standard not because violence makes us feel bad, but because we recognize that the use of violence has horrific consequences to society, and escalating situations into violence will make things worse in the long run even if they resolve the immediate situation. These consequences are real regardless of whether the violence is committed by a private individual or the state. We must hold state violence to the same standard as private violence.

@15: Jailing someone for simple possession of drugs is not good policy, but neither is it “aggressive” or “violence.” You seem to have real difficulty understanding who the violent actors are in these scenarios you create.

@9 we tried that. You wouldn’t let them have tents either.