Philly Leaders Say Homeless Camps Are ‘Untenable.' Residents Say They've Been a Lifeline

Disir

Platinum Member
Sep 30, 2011
28,003
9,605
910
In their push to disband three homeless camps that sprung up in the city this year, Philly leaders have cited drug use, unsanitary conditions and safety issues. They say after multiple rounds of talks, the situation at the camps has become "untenable" and gave the camps until 9 a.m. Wednesday to leave.

"We’ve gotten to a point where it’s just untenable to have this other health issue surrounding people in the outdoors, defecating outdoors, using drugs outdoors, in an environment that has created this situation," Mayor Jim Kenney said Tuesday of the camps on the Parkway, behind the Museum of Art and near the Philadelphia Housing Authority headquarters in North Philly.


But many residents of the camps don't want to go. They say they feel safer in the impromptu tent communities, supplied by organizers and full of people experiencing homelessness.

Food, clothing and other resources are easier to access there than in a homeless shelter, they say. Plus, some camp residents have been blacklisted from shelters and have nowhere else to go. Others don't want to compromise from their demand for permanent affordable housing.

Since the camps first formed, the city says more than 30 people from the camps were placed in hotel rooms reserved to house vulnerable populations. A total of 130 people from the camps were taken to shelters or drug treatment programs.

Ok. And go where? Someplace out of sight and out of mind? I'm torn here. I think that many people don't understand how much damn paperwork and jumping through hoops that homeless people have to go through. The housing authorities know they don't have enough housing but they have no intention of fixing that. Then there is the mentally ill which no one is touching because there is no profit to be made there.
 
THERE'S SO MANY possibilities for solutions in Philly. They just have have to ask if they don't see it for themselves I'd be glad to share my ideas, some which have worked there in the past that I was involved in. If Philly won't do anything then Ben Carson can just ask about what works or would work in that city and tie in with Hud's Interests.
 
THERE'S SO MANY possibilities for solutions in Philly. They just have have to ask if they don't see it for themselves I'd be glad to share my ideas, some which have worked there in the past that I was involved in. If Philly won't do anything then Ben Carson can just ask about what works or would work in that city and tie in with Hud's Interests.

Let's hear them! What do you have?
 
THERE'S SO MANY possibilities for solutions in Philly. They just have have to ask if they don't see it for themselves I'd be glad to share my ideas, some which have worked there in the past that I was involved in. If Philly won't do anything then Ben Carson can just ask about what works or would work in that city and tie in with Hud's Interests.

Let's hear them! What do you have?
Decaying Cities often offer dollar homes in order to fix them up, Philly has many abandoned row homes and structures like old factories that can be used for rehab programs on the bldg and the people. There used to be a program to teach people job skills in home improvement rehabbing buildings that gave the participants their first job experience to prop up their resume and teach them skills, I volunteered to teach rehab skills, so that type of program can involve the homeless rather then the youth labor or both.
Instead of tents, portable storage or garage units can be insulated and used as living structures with cots, camping self contained toilets and sinks and solar for electric, with a central communal shower and disposal bldg a community of temp shelter is possible on the cheap if they truly wanted to budget it. There's also modular block bldg material for similar concept and quick construction. Rioters and looters besides jail time can be forced community service to keep clean those communities when released in the stupid revolving door system.
Volunteers to help job search or addictions or mental health counseling, answering service system in place for job call backs, Goodwill sponsorship for clothes and items, etc
Food banks involved, counseling on available programs and assistance etc.
You probably can only offer these to Philadelphia residents or wherever you start these programs or else people far and wide will be coming to town to take advantage of their hosts.
 
Last edited:
The mayor can also ask for Ed Rendell's Advice or go outside of state for people who have solved this problem with creative programs and solutions.
 
Maybe all those Democrats there can show their charity toward the homeless by adopting a few and moving them into their homes....
 
Our neighbouring city, Chester, got tough on homeless people and cut drug programmes and homeless shelters, mainly to stop tourists from seeing these people.
So they all decamped to Wrexham where our services were overwhelmed.
You cant tackle these issues unilaterally.
 
The city officials should kick them all out of the city. Let em build a tent city somewhere else.
 
The mayor can also ask for Ed Rendell's Advice or go outside of state for people who have solved this problem with creative programs and solutions.
Or put them on a bus and drive them over the bridge to Camden, N.J. and drop them off. There are cities that have used that as a solution.(sardonic)
 
There really isnt a good solution to the homeless problem.
The only thing I can think of has been mentioned,give them a plot of land out of sight of the general public and tell them it's here or jail.
Of course the bums wont like that because it puts the people they panhandle off of out of easy reach.
But it would also give those who are willing to help them a place to send their support.
 
Recalling the musician from LA who built many tiny homes and placed them on the street. The city's property, they were confiscated, which means deterritorialization: the structure is less important than ownership of the real estate under the structure, a fact that the city well knows.

The psycho-xian-surgeon, Carson, knows very well that housing across the planet has become unaffordable, and likes the gig. Yes, some of us deliberately self-evicted rather than give the rent pimp another dime, especially when these psychos were putting people in serious Chinese-virus jeopardy, whilst what is rare is to see homeless Asians in America.

Tent cities in Wisconsin are indeed served by drive-by depositions of goods and food. But real urban stealth campers would never go into a tent city, and not even god gets to know where they get horizontal and unconscious at night.
 
In their push to disband three homeless camps that sprung up in the city this year, Philly leaders have cited drug use, unsanitary conditions and safety issues. They say after multiple rounds of talks, the situation at the camps has become "untenable" and gave the camps until 9 a.m. Wednesday to leave.

"We’ve gotten to a point where it’s just untenable to have this other health issue surrounding people in the outdoors, defecating outdoors, using drugs outdoors, in an environment that has created this situation," Mayor Jim Kenney said Tuesday of the camps on the Parkway, behind the Museum of Art and near the Philadelphia Housing Authority headquarters in North Philly.


But many residents of the camps don't want to go. They say they feel safer in the impromptu tent communities, supplied by organizers and full of people experiencing homelessness.

Food, clothing and other resources are easier to access there than in a homeless shelter, they say. Plus, some camp residents have been blacklisted from shelters and have nowhere else to go. Others don't want to compromise from their demand for permanent affordable housing.

Since the camps first formed, the city says more than 30 people from the camps were placed in hotel rooms reserved to house vulnerable populations. A total of 130 people from the camps were taken to shelters or drug treatment programs.

Ok. And go where? Someplace out of sight and out of mind? I'm torn here. I think that many people don't understand how much damn paperwork and jumping through hoops that homeless people have to go through. The housing authorities know they don't have enough housing but they have no intention of fixing that. Then there is the mentally ill which no one is touching because there is no profit to be made there.


We have a similar conversation going on in our town with a homeless encampment in my town, totally agree with you here. And the housing crisis is much more severe in some of the big (expensive) cities. They want to move the homeless shelters OUTSIDE the cities, but then they are far from the services they need.

 
The trend is isolated sequestration. Pathologies must be locked out of this personal space, and structures made available for (ownership[italics]), which will require a real estate understanding (duh). Tinies of the future will be modular (the modular concept has already been mentioned in this thread) enough to allow for transport at low cost (duh), and piece-meal so that they can be stored in storage facilities if need be until another site is found. What should also be boycotted are the predators who make much too much profit by moving tiny homes. Lightweight materials (duh) that could even be transported via bicycle-trailer.

The ownership of a home is a concept that is deeply American, and is psychologically rewarding, as is, unlike the charity-mafia food lines of shelters, the preparation of one's own meal.
 
THERE'S SO MANY possibilities for solutions in Philly. They just have have to ask if they don't see it for themselves I'd be glad to share my ideas, some which have worked there in the past that I was involved in. If Philly won't do anything then Ben Carson can just ask about what works or would work in that city and tie in with Hud's Interests.

Let's hear them! What do you have?
Decaying Cities often offer dollar homes in order to fix them up, Philly has many abandoned row homes and structures like old factories that can be used for rehab programs on the bldg and the people. There used to be a program to teach people job skills in home improvement rehabbing buildings that gave the participants their first job experience to prop up their resume and teach them skills, I volunteered to teach rehab skills, so that type of program can involve the homeless rather then the youth labor or both.
Instead of tents, portable storage or garage units can be insulated and used as living structures with cots, camping self contained toilets and sinks and solar for electric, with a central communal shower and disposal bldg a community of temp shelter is possible on the cheap if they truly wanted to budget it. There's also modular block bldg material for similar concept and quick construction. Rioters and looters besides jail time can be forced community service to keep clean those communities when released in the stupid revolving door system.
Volunteers to help job search or addictions or mental health counseling, answering service system in place for job call backs, Goodwill sponsorship for clothes and items, etc
Food banks involved, counseling on available programs and assistance etc.
You probably can only offer these to Philadelphia residents or wherever you start these programs or else people far and wide will be coming to town to take advantage of their hosts.

Nice!!! Add some sort of lock box for birth certificates, social security cards etc. that is an address with that answering services system and that is a job waiting to happen.
 
Last edited:
In their push to disband three homeless camps that sprung up in the city this year, Philly leaders have cited drug use, unsanitary conditions and safety issues. They say after multiple rounds of talks, the situation at the camps has become "untenable" and gave the camps until 9 a.m. Wednesday to leave.

"We’ve gotten to a point where it’s just untenable to have this other health issue surrounding people in the outdoors, defecating outdoors, using drugs outdoors, in an environment that has created this situation," Mayor Jim Kenney said Tuesday of the camps on the Parkway, behind the Museum of Art and near the Philadelphia Housing Authority headquarters in North Philly.


But many residents of the camps don't want to go. They say they feel safer in the impromptu tent communities, supplied by organizers and full of people experiencing homelessness.

Food, clothing and other resources are easier to access there than in a homeless shelter, they say. Plus, some camp residents have been blacklisted from shelters and have nowhere else to go. Others don't want to compromise from their demand for permanent affordable housing.

Since the camps first formed, the city says more than 30 people from the camps were placed in hotel rooms reserved to house vulnerable populations. A total of 130 people from the camps were taken to shelters or drug treatment programs.

Ok. And go where? Someplace out of sight and out of mind? I'm torn here. I think that many people don't understand how much damn paperwork and jumping through hoops that homeless people have to go through. The housing authorities know they don't have enough housing but they have no intention of fixing that. Then there is the mentally ill which no one is touching because there is no profit to be made there.


We have a similar conversation going on in our town with a homeless encampment in my town, totally agree with you here. And the housing crisis is much more severe in some of the big (expensive) cities. They want to move the homeless shelters OUTSIDE the cities, but then they are far from the services they need.


Yeah, if you move it too far away there is less of a chance for any type of success.
 

It isnt a complex issue. Homeless people need a home.

It is NGOs such as the “Y-Foundation” that provide housing for people in need. They take care of the construction themselves, buy flats on the private housing market and renovate existing flats. The apartments have one to two rooms. In addition to that, former emergency shelters have been converted into apartments in order to offer long-term housing.

“It was clear to everyone that the old system wasn’t working; we needed radical change,” said Juha Kaakinen, Director of the Y-Foundation.

Homeless people turn into tenants with a tenancy agreement. They also have to pay rent and operating costs. Social workers, who have offices in the residential buildings, help with financial issues such as applications for social benefits.

Juha Kaakinen is head of the Y-Foundation. The NGO receives discounted loans from the state to buy housing. Additionally, social workers caring for the homeless and future tenants are paid by the state. The Finnish lottery, on the other hand, supports the NGO when it buys apartments on the private housing market. The Y-Foundation also receives regular loans from banks. The NGO later uses the rental income to repay the loans.

“We had to get rid of the night shelters and short-term hostels we still had back then. They had a very long history in Finland, and everyone could see they were not getting people out of homelessness. We decided to reverse the assumptions” said Juha Kaakinen, Director of the Y-Foundation.

That's a nice set up right there!
 

New Topics

Forum List

Back
Top