The scenes were emblematic of the crisis gripping the small, Oregon mountain town of Grants Pass, where a fierce fight over park space has become a battleground for a much larger, national debate on homelessness that has reached the U.S. Supreme Court.
The town’s case, set to be heard April 22, has broad implications for how not only Grants Pass, but communities nationwide address homelessness, including whether they can fine or jail people for camping in public. It has made the town of 40,000 the unlikely face of the nation’s homelessness crisis, and further fueled the debate over how to deal with it.
“I certainly wish this wasn’t what my town was known for,” Mayor Sara Bristol told The Associated Press last month. “It’s not the reason why I became mayor. And yet it has dominated every single thing that I’ve done for the last 3 1/2 years.”
Officials across the political spectrum — from Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom in California, which has nearly 30% of the nation’s homeless population, to a group of 22 conservative-led states — have filed briefs in the case, saying lower court rulings have hamstrung their ability to deal with encampments.
This lawsuit is idiotic considering the federal courts already ruled that you can’t apply penalties against sleeping outside unless there are enough shelter beds for everyone. That ruling was in our federal district covering Oregon…
Yes but this is the new “What the Fuck is a Precedent?” United States Supreme Court
Wonder if we could use Kickstarter to crowdfund bribes for the supreme court to give us our rights back.
Yes, let’s waste money on fining people, who will tell you they have nothing, but it’s no problem, because you will get them sooner or later once you have their address… Oh.
Fine them for having nothing, then jail them for not paying fines. Now you have an address for them. QED
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“Just stop being poor!” - that town
More likely, “go be poor somewhere else!”
I mean, for real. How long before the cattle cars come?
Guy at my old work was always saying we need to do this.
Plans like that always work until the metaphorical cattle car comes for them.
I genuinely believe these places should just give homeless people 1-way tickets to Hawaii.
Make it their problem.
Personally, if I was homeless and found out I’m now in debt from the greedy-fuckers who put me there…
I would just take the law into my own hands at that point.
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Regardless of how they hit there, how is it useful for anyone to attempt to fine someone for having nothing? Seems like just a pretense to jail people
There is political pressure from our corporate prison companies to fill their beds, so they can get their tasty government stipend. Indeed, jailing them is beneficial to both parties involved as it “solves” the homeless issue for the govt and makes money for the
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By their own fault? Do they just super enjoy living outside?
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The federal government needs to take over homeless support. Establish federally managed shelters.
Eminent domain land
Use the army core of engineers to build free public housing 200 miles outside of a metro location
run high speed rail from that to the metro.
You can be sure that these jailed homeless people will end up being forced into labor - enslaved - because you can’t let dirt-cheap labor go to waste, and you can’t let a poor person look like they’re getting something for nothing - mooching, free-riding - even if it’s not their choice. Handouts are legitimately only for the rich and their corporations after all. If someone’s fined+jailed and won’t work for some capitalist exploiter, what will be done? I would guess some kind of torture will be employed to change their minds, but wouldn’t be surprised if they’re simply executed, especially if they’re non-white.
You have an outlandish view of county jail in the US. None of that shit happens.
Yeah, you’re right, they’ll just tied you down and torture you for fun.
That’s a strawman argument. She wasn’t tortured to make her work, she was tortured by a sadist.
Look, you haven’t made any real argument here, so I was just following your lead. If you insist that I prove you wrong, here you go: https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=4228271
Yeah, that paper that famously pointed out that county corrections inmates are required to maintain the cleanliness of their living space.
Required physical labor you say?
I guess if your mom was imprisoned with you she could clean up after you.
I didn’t think they’d actually start setting up Sanctuary Districts in 2024, but it looks like that’s their eventual goal…
https://memory-alpha.fandom.com/wiki/Bell_Riots
Too bad we don’t have a Gabriel Bell.
have filed briefs in the case, saying lower court rulings have hamstrung their ability to deal with encampments.
Think it’s more about this, than actually collecting fines from homeless people that have no money.
What the fuck? They’re homeless. Sleeping outside is their only option. Shelters are often dangerous, very restrictive on who they let in and there aren’t anywhere near enough of them in the places they need to be.
Sleeping in public places isn’t a fucking crime. It’s not like they’d choose the park over an apartment if they had one.
It’s tricky, because allowing it to happen creates massive public health and environmental disasters:
These aren’t the “oh, poor innocent homeless, down on their luck” portrayed by advocates, they are drug addicts and thieves, leeching off society, and actively making life worse for themselves and everyone else.
Some, you assume, must be good people though, right?
You should build a wall.
Ideally, what I’d like to see is this… It would probably take 1.5 to 2 billion to pull off:
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You build and staff a state of the art medical facility for mental health and addiction treatment, including the ability to hold people long term if necessary.
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You build and staff a facility for job training and placement, including specialized support for people with criminal records. This would also need to include interview and resume skills. Assistance for email, phone, and Internet, but also clothing assistance, laundry assistance, and the like for interviews.
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You build and staff a facility for housing support. Like work assistance, there needs to be specialized support for people with criminal records. But also a permanent address for mail.
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Once all that infrastructure is in place, you sweep the streets.
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People who need mental health and addiction treatment get institutionalized and treated until they are healthy, then they get released to the job and housing programs.
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People who have no job get the job assistance program.
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People who have a job get the housing assistance program.
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People with warrants or otherwise engaging in crimimal behavior (stolen cars, stolen bikes, other material) get arrested.
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People who are otherwise able bodied, but who are homeless by choice because “I ain’t part of your system, maaaan!” get their asses kicked and pressed into service cleaning up homeless camps.
You started off this post so reasonably…
It is reasonable if you want a permanent solution.
Some might say making forced camps for a subset of people might be considered a final solution. But maybe I am just concentrating on the whole sweep the streets of undisrables part.
Camps that help people vs. camps that hurt people is a pretty significant difference. It’s clear they can’t or won’t help themselves.
But I’m open, you have a better solution than letting them live in squalor?
Your last sentence is what is so unreasonable. You are criminalizing being alive without a job, which means humans have no right to live without being in your system.
Pretty much, yeah, you don’t have the right to leech off everyone else. Contribute or GTFO.
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Yes, but if it’s criminalized you get to remove the eyesore of struggling poor people with the added benefit of fines and imprisonment.
How effective do they expect fining homeless people to be?
Can’t pay the fine, believe it or not, jail.
