Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There is a homelessness crisis in our nation, but nobody wants to do anything about it. Instead, everywhere you look a new luxury condo/apartment complex is being built. Our country is pathetic.

There are overwhelming amounts of money spent on the homeless population. Money isn’t the issue.

+1. In fact, homeless people from all over the country are streaming to DC because of our generous handouts and permissive stance on open-air drug use and public defecation. It's basically a free for all!

I have repeatedly seen both men and women defecating on the sidewalk near the Van Ness metro in broad daylight. There are multiple open and free Starbucks bathrooms steps away and free and open bathrooms in Giant. Activists will say it is a matter of public bathrooms and housing but really it is a matter of addiction, mental illness, anti-social behavior and no consequences.

The 180% of market rate housing vouchers were great for landlords and until last month, a unit rented even 1 time for a month to someone with a voucher was permanently out of rent control. The middle class and elderly often occuply rent controlled (and still quite expensive) apartments in older buildings, how many were lost to the benefit of developers and corporate landlords. During the pandemic, rents would have fallen in DC but for the 180% voucher program. Now it isn't even rental buildings using it but investors who own condos who may not even live in the US. There are not staff in condo buildings to "manage" the "newly housed" nor a mechanism in place for eviction. If the vouchers were for market rate many more could be housed and there wouldn't be inflation of rents. Follow the money and see who benefits. It's not necessarily the unhoused, who may not be provided any services (they can always refuse as well) or even an air mattress and they may soon be evicted. All of the housing programs are fantastic for developers and landlords. How many of the unhoused end up back in tents or ODing?

It's gross to pass bathroom provisioning for the homeless on to Starbucks. That's way more wear and tear on a bathroom than regular customer use . God, those poor employees who have to clean it. People should be in their own housing, shelters, treatment or hospitals period.

Starbucks chose to take that on themselves.

How did they do that?

You don't remember this news story from 2018?
https://www.businessinsider.com/starbucks-bathrooms-open-to-everyone-2018-5

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Did anyone else read the piece in the Post the other day about the people in transitional housing who were displaced by fires in the building? So many kitchen fires because these people didn't know how to operate safely in an indoor kitchen.

And the main female in the piece had been in this housing for 8 years and now has a 4 year old and will not get vaccinated. She also thought that people in a hotel that she was moved to didn't like her because she is Black.

What do we do about this kind of mentality? On all parts? It seems so hopeless - you can't give people common sense or rational thought.

Here’s the simple truth. Once people reach adulthood they rarely change significantly. Some do. Most don’t. So what we do is not much because not much can be done. This woman won’t change. But her kid, and other young kids, may be influenceable.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:There is a homelessness crisis in our nation, but nobody wants to do anything about it. Instead, everywhere you look a new luxury condo/apartment complex is being built. Our country is pathetic.

There are overwhelming amounts of money spent on the homeless population. Money isn’t the issue.

+1. In fact, homeless people from all over the country are streaming to DC because of our generous handouts and permissive stance on open-air drug use and public defecation. It's basically a free for all!

I have repeatedly seen both men and women defecating on the sidewalk near the Van Ness metro in broad daylight. There are multiple open and free Starbucks bathrooms steps away and free and open bathrooms in Giant. Activists will say it is a matter of public bathrooms and housing but really it is a matter of addiction, mental illness, anti-social behavior and no consequences.

The 180% of market rate housing vouchers were great for landlords and until last month, a unit rented even 1 time for a month to someone with a voucher was permanently out of rent control. The middle class and elderly often occuply rent controlled (and still quite expensive) apartments in older buildings, how many were lost to the benefit of developers and corporate landlords. During the pandemic, rents would have fallen in DC but for the 180% voucher program. Now it isn't even rental buildings using it but investors who own condos who may not even live in the US. There are not staff in condo buildings to "manage" the "newly housed" nor a mechanism in place for eviction. If the vouchers were for market rate many more could be housed and there wouldn't be inflation of rents. Follow the money and see who benefits. It's not necessarily the unhoused, who may not be provided any services (they can always refuse as well) or even an air mattress and they may soon be evicted. All of the housing programs are fantastic for developers and landlords. How many of the unhoused end up back in tents or ODing?

It's gross to pass bathroom provisioning for the homeless on to Starbucks. That's way more wear and tear on a bathroom than regular customer use . God, those poor employees who have to clean it. People should be in their own housing, shelters, treatment or hospitals period.

Starbucks chose to take that on themselves.

How did they do that?

Anonymous wrote:This comment to the WP article suggests that lots of money is being allocated. How effectively is it being spent? I would have thought that families might be the group most able to be stabilized and most motivated to change circumstances. Perhaps not. Homeless Inc. is BIG business, how much waste, fraud, abuse and kickbacks are there in these programs? How many actually benefit/change?


"SOME’s CEO, said there is 'no portable voucher attached to this housing,' which is subsidized by the nonprofit Community Partnership for the Prevention of Homelessness, D.C.’s main contractor for homelessness services."
Community Partnership for the Prevention of Homelessness received $118 million in grants in 2018, 99.960% from taxpayers, and had an amazing $39 million in cash at the end of that year. SOME received 97.410% of its revenue from taxpayers.*
*Source: Form 990s

Anonymous wrote:Did anyone else read the piece in the Post the other day about the people in transitional housing who were displaced by fires in the building? So many kitchen fires because these people didn't know how to operate safely in an indoor kitchen.

And the main female in the piece had been in this housing for 8 years and now has a 4 year old and will not get vaccinated. She also thought that people in a hotel that she was moved to didn't like her because she is Black.

What do we do about this kind of mentality? On all parts? It seems so hopeless - you can't give people common sense or rational thought.

Anonymous wrote:This might be a silly question. Why isn’t the mall filled with homeless people panhandling?

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Anonymous wrote:

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Anonymous wrote:Penn Station says hold my beer.

Yes, last week I was stunned by the number of unhoused people at Union Station until I got off the train in NY and Penn Station was much worse.

"Unhoused people"

I'm not the poster you quoted, but that is the new politically correct term to use. I didn't know either until a friend told me a few months ago.

Well, they are both unhoused and homeless. Both are true and correct.

Anonymous wrote:Did anyone else read the piece in the Post the other day about the people in transitional housing who were displaced by fires in the building? So many kitchen fires because these people didn't know how to operate safely in an indoor kitchen.

And the main female in the piece had been in this housing for 8 years and now has a 4 year old and will not get vaccinated. She also thought that people in a hotel that she was moved to didn't like her because she is Black.

What do we do about this kind of mentality? On all parts? It seems so hopeless - you can't give people common sense or rational thought.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If you haven’t been to Union Station since Covid started why even comment? Union Station has always had a homeless issue but I never remember dozens of tents in Columbus Circle in front of it. It has fallen off a cliff in the past two years and I avoid it at all cost past nightfall.

+1

I lived right near there and took the Union Station metro to work in 2014-16. It had lots of eating options, was always busy with tourists and commuters and I really didn’t feel unsafe unless it was quite empty. There were homeless but nothing like the tent city that is being built during the pandemic. It just looks awful.

I used to commute via metro every day and walk from Union Station to my office, but I now drive. I do not feel safe on the public transportation available or getting off at Union Station and walking through the area near the homeless shelter. It is ridiculous that DC has allowed itself to devolve to this point. A once beautiful, vibrant city that had made so much progress has allowed itself to go to hell in a hand basket like it is back in the crack wars of the early 90s.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I wrote about the woman who has lived at the bus stop for 30 years. She's told me all these decades, she has never been able to get into a shelter. Even when offered laundry showers or clean clothes she won't accept. She won't apply for food stamps, a phone or stimulus checks either. She only will accept a free home in a high income neighborhood. She doesn’t want an apartment. She said she won't accept a job unless it is above $80k. She doesn't believe a lesser paying job is worth the effort and she's a "precious life" deserving of the best. Applying for benefits is offensive. She said she shouldnt have to jump through hoops, if she has a need it should be given to her by the government, corporations and the wealthy residents of upper NW. She would rather go from church to church for food than apply for food stamps or social security.

Her mentality is she shouldn't have to pay for anything ever

Continued...

She thinks there's a voucher for everything and should be given to her just for asking, no questions or conditions otherwise, she stays at the bus stop and isn't budging. Society owes her. She is a "precious life". Deserving of "the very best".

Can you imagine these people in apartments with the general population, using communal washers and dryers in an apartment complex ( if they even know how to wash clothes), in your neighborhood supermarket? Aren't you worried about your children playing in the neighborhood with them wondering the streets?

No apartment will solve their problems. They want to be our problem. Sometimes I get the feeling the "unhoused" live to be a nuisance. They are far more clever and manipulative than you could ever imagine. They have the churches and non profits fawning over them as if they are the most victimized, poor, helpless, innocent souls. They won't hesitate to steal are do bodily harm to anyone on a whim.

There should be a march to demand institutionalizing them. Trust me, most won't know the difference between an apartment or mental hospital. They'll be safe there. No more government money to the swindling, crafty landlords who never lose, and own the courts and DC government.

She's also another who claims their isn't enough public restrooms and wants those public restroom and shower booths on every street corner. She won't use one in a shelter or any other indoor location though.

When given a free chicken meal at the local church, she has to inspect the chicken cut on the tray and will only eat if she can choose the plate, even though they are all 100% the exact same.

I just don't see how any of these people can successfully live on their own amongst the general population.Everything is an argument, nothing satisfies her.

I think of her on cold days, a lot, but I know it's a hopeless situation. Sometimes people can't be helped. It used to bother me, but I'm just wasting my time and resources. Resources should go to those who can and want to be helped.