If Trumpty Dumpty gets four more years, we're FUCKED.
TRUMPVID-19 must end NOW!

"Ordinary middle-class types (store owners, office workers, nurses, teachers) will give up and say: The situation is now impossible; please just get rid of their smells and their ugly poverty; we want our parks back, our walks back, our emerald city back."

This has already happened. Enough is enough.

What would shifting to the right look like in terms of dealing with homeless people though? Would Seattle just start shipping them to rural areas, a reverse of what those areas do? Whoever wins I think it ultimately depends on how population continues to shift in the cities, and right now I see a lot of older, more conservative democrats selling their Seattle homes while younger democrats (who have been probably timing the market) are snapping them up.

If he wins a second term the homeless crisis is only going to get worse, not better: tens of millions will lose their health coverage when SCOTUS guts the ACA combined with a staggering increase in COVID cases, plus all the environmental damage his cronies will cause sucking up the last drops of dinosaur juice out of the ground and you have a recipe for disaster of apocalyptic proportions. In which case we all will have to just get used to the stink of human waste mixed with despair everywhere we go.

@2: What's so funny about peace, love, and understanding?.. Or are you that morally bankrupt in caring about others?

Either way, something has to change with how the City and County address homelessness. The leftist approach has been a total disaster, and the backlash is building from residents across the political spectrum that are fed up with the City Council and homeless industrial complex pissing away billions turning Seattle into a magnet for drug vagrants.

@6 What leftist approach? The one concocted by the centrist democrats is all we've had so far. Their sweeps and shitty shelters have proven to not work.

It’s not our burden to save every homeless person in the world. If enforcing consequences causes those who have no interest in changing and/or partaking in the social contract that binds us a society than so much the better. They can move on to somewhere else that will tolerate their antisocial behavior and we can use our limited resources to help those that actually want some help. At some point those who live in this city will realize that making belligerent behavior acceptable only breeds more of that behavior and they’ll force those in power to act or vote in new people who will.

I guess the rightist approach to homelessness is operating on the theory that homeless populations spontaneously generate. And that if the cops are sufficiently cruel, they will de-spawn in response.

@5 Nothing is wrong with it, but it's a two-way street. If you aren't willing to quit the drugs and straighten up, then just die already. I'm perfectly willing to help those who help themselves and just need a boost. But chronic druggies, meth heads, and petty criminals can shrivel up and expire. I miss going to the parks.

@12 so how do you turn that into policy? Death squads? Might run afoul of an amendment or two.

Shorter @10,

"I lost my job because they outsourced to cheaper labor"

"Goddamn your fucking anti-social behavior!"

@13 Stop the criminal catch and release. Do a real crime, including possession of hard drugs like meth or heroin, go to jail. Prowl a car, go to jail. Rob a person or a house, go to jail. Public intoxication, go to jail. They can dry out in jail, or not.

@15 So we build and staff more prisons to, ahem, "house" them?

What if we give them apartments and save a few bucks on the guards?

https://www.vera.org/publications/price-of-prisons-2015-state-spending-trends/price-of-prisons-2015-state-spending-trends/price-of-prisons-2015-state-spending-trends-prison-spending

I read here that it costs 37 thousand bucks/year to keep a prisoner in Washington State.

@14 even shorter. I lost my job so it's my right to do drugs, steal from people and turns parks into junkyards.

Grow up. Your refusal to even acknowledge the problem is why you can't solve the problem

@17 Like I said, if you are someone who just needs a boost, that's fine. If you are a career junkie and criminal, that's not. Jail or a one-way ticket to Texas.

Another Stranger post on homelessness, another post where a CTRL+F search for "drug" produces "not found." And we commenters still haven't gotten the memo: we still mention drugs and stolen property as if they actually exist in Seattle's homeless camps.

We need to stop using our eyes and ears when we go outside, and pony up for more of The Stranger's journalism. Only a sustained diet of this will save us from our continued wrongthink.

"During the council races of 2019, Seattle successfully expressed a city-wide resistance to the law-and-order approach, which punishes the poor for being made poor by their culture."

Actually, here in West Seattle, we voted for the candidate who had called the police to remove a campers' trailer from in front of her house, and whose re-election campaigning had touted her success in funding the SPD. Once re-elected, CM Herbold simply ignored everything she'd said and done, and joined the chorus which Charles here celebrates for their failure to help the homeless.

@ swiftress 15, 20: You are suggesting criminalizing poverty? I suppose that would be fair if you outlawed being in debt. Anyone who can't pay off their credit card, car loan, or mortgage tomorrow ought to be thrown in jail also. There's nothing so despicable as someone being in possession of something that one can't afford, right?!

Pa-the-tic.

I mean being $500,000 in debt on a house is 50000-fold worse than not being able to afford a bike, so surely we ought to make the jail sentences accordingly.

Swiftress:
"I'm perfectly willing to help those who help themselves and just need a boost."

Awesome! I volunteer at a homeless shelter, have I seen you there? We should connect!
If not, maybe you are one of the donors? Which shelter do you donate to? Post an image of your donation and I'll match it! I'm always thrilled when I find a fellow citizen that is perfectly willing to help!

If not a past donor, you're obviously super eager to step up. My match offer still stands!

Maybe you don't have time to look up a shelter because you're so busy posting on Slog today.. here's the one I donate to: https://rootsinfo.org/

I'm feeling particularly bitter and sarcastic today, but honestly, matching your donation would improve my spirits.

@24: "You are suggesting criminalizing poverty?"

Those comments had no suggestion of 'criminalizing poverty,' and I'm guessing you're smart enough to know that. Rather than tell us why persons who repeatedly steal for drug money should not be in jail, you launched into a series of bitter, snide, and holier-than-thou personal attacks against someone who observed that jail does exist as an option for thieves.

Seattle's homeless policy has completely failed on its own terms, and the results are needless suffering, both for the homeless themselves, and for any victims of crimes committed by homeless persons. (https://www.thestranger.com/slog/2020/09/17/44486928/slog-am-two-found-found-dead-in-cal-anderson-barr-explored-charging-durkan-for-chop-obama-to-drop-new-memoir) We don't need to spend $100M annually to get such results; homeless drug addicts can kill each other, and themselves, without us spending a dime. When anyone dares note this, the response is invariably of the type you provided. That's a 'tell,' indicating our homeless policy is completely indefensible.

So, what should we do to prevent needless human suffering on the streets of Seattle? Because $100M/year currently just buys us what we could have for free.

@22,

I don't know. Why don't you tell me what percentage of the homeless wants to remain homeless and receive no help?

@19,

Acknowledging the problem. That's a great idea!

Why are the homeless stealing from people and turning parks into junkyards?
Would they be doing that if they had a home?

Why are they homeless in the first place?

Could it be that wealth is unevenly distributed? That incomes for middle class and poor workers have remained stagnant for decades while costs still rise?

In a city that hosts the wealthiest man on the planet, why is anyone there homeless at all?

@27: "Why are they homeless in the first place?"

We've been over this already. According to the city's own survey in 2016 (http://coshumaninterests-wpengine.netdna-ssl.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/City-of-Seattle-Report-FINAL-with-4.11.17-additions.pdf) over two-thirds of Seattle's homeless are not originally from Seattle, a minority said Seattle was the place they most recently became homeless, and a majority reported drug use (including alcohol). A majority were either unemployed or unemployable.

So, a population of drifters arrived here already homeless, unemployed, and using drugs, (almost ten percent said they moved to Seattle for legal cannabis!) and mostly unable or unwilling to work. Hence, they are homeless.

There, that wasn't difficult, now was it?

@28,

I read that report again. I remember reading it a month ago or so.

I see that you hate people not like you. I pity you. You're a pitable person. Perhaps you should consider committing suicide? From your own comments, it seems if you ceased existing, both yourself and everyone you know would be happier. Guns are easy to get here. Try considering that!! Sorry to hear you're so sad!!! Buy Coca-Cola!

@29: At least this time you didn't fudge the numbers in the report to call me a liar. Progress. (Of course, you still didn't suggest how we here in Seattle deal with our actual homeless problem, when it turned out to be completely unrelated to your fantasy homeless problem @27. Oh well.)

Did you throw around disproven charges of lying because "you hate people not like you," or can you just not deal with facts which refute your beliefs? Your "kill the messenger" replies here suggest the latter.

Perhaps you should consider not commenting on Seattle's issues when you (a) live far from Seattle and (b) you've written nothing of any value whatsoever toward Seattle solving our civic problems?

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