Anonymous wrote:The bigger issue is why does ward 3 have to be burdened with a dreadful facility like this? Ward 3 pays more in personal income taxes than all of the other wards combined - that shoud buy freedom from a facility housing poors prone to violence and criminality. I never understood why the ward whose culture spawned the shelter residents in the first instance (chiefly wards 7 and 8) should not get to “enjoy” the fruits of their labor.

It is odd to me to house in an expensive neighborhood for a different reason - it is not likely where these families will end up living in the short term . If the goal is stabilizing, why get them in different schools, routines etc that won't be sustainable as they transition to permanent housing (maybe down the road, but likely not in the short term).

The bigger issue is why does ward 3 have to be burdened with a dreadful facility like this? Ward 3 pays more in personal income taxes than all of the other wards combined - that shoud buy freedom from a facility housing poors prone to violence and criminality. I never understood why the ward whose culture spawned the shelter residents in the first instance (chiefly wards 7 and 8) should not get to “enjoy” the fruits of their labor.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have zero issue with supporting adults holding jobs. Is this a requirement for shelter residence? Pls verify. Otherwise, yours is the "rant".

So if the adults don't have a job it would be good policy to force they and their families out onto the street? How would that benefit the homeless or the city?

Or is this just about re-enforcing your sense of moral superiority?

You claimed they would be gainfully employed. NICE backstroke.

Nope stated something that has been widely researched and is commonly accepted - that most homeless people in fact are employed.

Again you need to get our of your paranoid mind the notion that all homeless people are drunk smelly people begging for money on the street.

The thing is, you simply make stuff up. Please speak to the homeless families in DC. How many are employed? How will the shelter support them in this? Will the shelter require employment or another pathway to self sufficiency? Please share facts. Thank you.

Why are you fixated on the work requirements? I'm worried about families with children living on the street and getting sucked into a cycle of poverty and hopelessness they can't break out of.

How about this:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/07/09/AR2010070902357.html

Please read the entire article since you seem kind of clueless (though that will do little about your paranoia and self righteousness) but here is the relevant excerpt:

3. Homeless people don't work.

According to a 2002 national study by the Urban Institute, about 45 percent of homeless adults had worked in the past 30 days -- only 14 percentage points lower than the employment rate for the general population last month. The number of working homeless would probably be even higher if "off the books" work was included. Whether scavenging for scrap metal or staffing shelters, many homeless people adopt ingenious ways to subsist.

A recent job loss is the second most common reason people say they became homeless. In a study my colleagues and I are completing, we observe a steep drop in earned income in the year prior to the onset of homelessness. Interestingly, those people who return to work show a steep recovery in earned income three years after their initial homeless spell. Our preliminary data also suggest that about a third of the chronically homeless eventually end up working, thanks, quite likely, to substance-abuse recovery.

Because work - or activiely seeking work/training, education and/or treatment break people out of the cycle of poverty. And their children. Are these requirements for recieving taxpayer funded shelter in one of the 8 new planned "family shelters", yes or no?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have zero issue with supporting adults holding jobs. Is this a requirement for shelter residence? Pls verify. Otherwise, yours is the "rant".

So if the adults don't have a job it would be good policy to force they and their families out onto the street? How would that benefit the homeless or the city?

Or is this just about re-enforcing your sense of moral superiority?

You claimed they would be gainfully employed. NICE backstroke.

Nope stated something that has been widely researched and is commonly accepted - that most homeless people in fact are employed.

Again you need to get our of your paranoid mind the notion that all homeless people are drunk smelly people begging for money on the street.

The thing is, you simply make stuff up. Please speak to the homeless families in DC. How many are employed? How will the shelter support them in this? Will the shelter require employment or another pathway to self sufficiency? Please share facts. Thank you.

Why are you fixated on the work requirements? I'm worried about families with children living on the street and getting sucked into a cycle of poverty and hopelessness they can't break out of.

How about this:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/07/09/AR2010070902357.html

Please read the entire article since you seem kind of clueless (though that will do little about your paranoia and self righteousness) but here is the relevant excerpt:

3. Homeless people don't work.

According to a 2002 national study by the Urban Institute, about 45 percent of homeless adults had worked in the past 30 days -- only 14 percentage points lower than the employment rate for the general population last month. The number of working homeless would probably be even higher if "off the books" work was included. Whether scavenging for scrap metal or staffing shelters, many homeless people adopt ingenious ways to subsist.

A recent job loss is the second most common reason people say they became homeless. In a study my colleagues and I are completing, we observe a steep drop in earned income in the year prior to the onset of homelessness. Interestingly, those people who return to work show a steep recovery in earned income three years after their initial homeless spell. Our preliminary data also suggest that about a third of the chronically homeless eventually end up working, thanks, quite likely, to substance-abuse recovery.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have zero issue with supporting adults holding jobs. Is this a requirement for shelter residence? Pls verify. Otherwise, yours is the "rant".

So if the adults don't have a job it would be good policy to force they and their families out onto the street? How would that benefit the homeless or the city?

Or is this just about re-enforcing your sense of moral superiority?

You claimed they would be gainfully employed. NICE backstroke.

Nope stated something that has been widely researched and is commonly accepted - that most homeless people in fact are employed.

Again you need to get our of your paranoid mind the notion that all homeless people are drunk smelly people begging for money on the street.

The thing is, you simply make stuff up. Please speak to the homeless families in DC. How many are employed? How will the shelter support them in this? Will the shelter require employment or another pathway to self sufficiency? Please share facts. Thank you.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have zero issue with supporting adults holding jobs. Is this a requirement for shelter residence? Pls verify. Otherwise, yours is the "rant".

So if the adults don't have a job it would be good policy to force they and their families out onto the street? How would that benefit the homeless or the city?

Or is this just about re-enforcing your sense of moral superiority?

You claimed they would be gainfully employed. NICE backstroke.

Nope stated something that has been widely researched and is commonly accepted - that most homeless people in fact are employed.

Again you need to get our of your paranoid mind the notion that all homeless people are drunk smelly people begging for money on the street.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I have zero issue with supporting adults holding jobs. Is this a requirement for shelter residence? Pls verify. Otherwise, yours is the "rant".

So if the adults don't have a job it would be good policy to force they and their families out onto the street? How would that benefit the homeless or the city?

Or is this just about re-enforcing your sense of moral superiority?

You claimed they would be gainfully employed. NICE backstroke.

Anonymous wrote:I have zero issue with supporting adults holding jobs. Is this a requirement for shelter residence? Pls verify. Otherwise, yours is the "rant".

So if the adults don't have a job it would be good policy to force they and their families out onto the street? How would that benefit the homeless or the city?

Or is this just about re-enforcing your sense of moral superiority?

I have zero issue with supporting adults holding jobs. Is this a requirement for shelter residence? Pls verify. Otherwise, yours is the "rant".

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If this is a serious question, there are African-American's living throughout the Ward in every neighborhood. Obviously not is an high of percentages as in other parts of the city, but that is changing, for the better.

The rich blacks- a handful. You all trying to stop the shelter bc you dont want the ghetto blacks.

Well, obviously people who choose to live in NW DC (black, white or other) are not choosing to live in a poor neighborhood. I highly doubt that anyone is planning to "hang out" with the residents, mostly because I doubt the city is going to manage the shelter well. They could forge work/resident relationships like asking local businesses to open entry level jobs to shelter residents, search for host family partnership, have conditions for residents like maintaining jobs or gainful education or counseling as needed (which would both move them forward in life and off dependency)- but they won't. The whole thing is opaque. I 've lived next to group homes and subsidized housing in DC where residents sat on the stoop every day and collected checks and the city hasn't indicated this will be any different, so yeah, some people will probably feel annoyed by that because it doesn't seem to achieve any discernible positive goal. But primarily I think people who disagree with the plan are disturbed that DC, which could not administer ONE shelter efficiently, has now taken it upon themselves to administer 8 with "free money" from taxpayers . They are also disturbed by the haphazard way the site was chosen. Ward 3 is large and this is not necessarily the best site for another poorly administered city shelter.

You keep posting a version of this rant in every fora where there is a topic to raise these complaints.

This in fact is a pretty good location for the shelter - the city has relatively few parcels of land with some spare buildable space on it, particularly this close to a major transportation corridor. And though there is no reason to believe the population at this shelter will pose a safety issue to anyone it should mollify any safety concerns that this shelter is literally right next to a police station.

And as I've responded to you multiple times when you've posted different versions of your concerns the vast majority of homeless people are in fact employed. We can keep explaining this to you but there are two groups of homeless people - a small group of long term homeless who typically have mental and substance abuse issues and a much larger group of homeless who because of unfortunate circumstances suddenly find themselves without places to live. Most of the people in the former group have trouble getting and holding jobs while the opposite is true for the latter.

The Ward 3 shelter will be designed for the latter and getting these families sheltered asap so the adults can hold their jobs and the kids can continue going to school will help to keep these families stable and from becoming part of the long term homeless population which is the group with the greatest societal costs.

Ironically there is a facility in Ward 3 which serves the long term homeless that has been operating without controversy for decades also on Wisconsin Avenue and also in a very affluent neighborhood.

I get that you are terrified that McLean Gardens is going to be overtaken by drunk, smelly and aggressive pan handlers. Even drunk, smelly and aggressive pan handlers have better places to hang out than McLean Gardens.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If this is a serious question, there are African-American's living throughout the Ward in every neighborhood. Obviously not is an high of percentages as in other parts of the city, but that is changing, for the better.

The rich blacks- a handful. You all trying to stop the shelter bc you dont want the ghetto blacks.

Well, obviously people who choose to live in NW DC (black, white or other) are not choosing to live in a poor neighborhood. I highly doubt that anyone is planning to "hang out" with the residents, mostly because I doubt the city is going to manage the shelter well. They could forge work/resident relationships like asking local businesses to open entry level jobs to shelter residents, search for host family partnership, have conditions for residents like maintaining jobs or gainful education or counseling as needed (which would both move them forward in life and off dependency)- but they won't. The whole thing is opaque. I 've lived next to group homes and subsidized housing in DC where residents sat on the stoop every day and collected checks and the city hasn't indicated this will be any different, so yeah, some people will probably feel annoyed by that because it doesn't seem to achieve any discernible positive goal. But primarily I think people who disagree with the plan are disturbed that DC, which could not administer ONE shelter efficiently, has now taken it upon themselves to administer 8 with "free money" from taxpayers . They are also disturbed by the haphazard way the site was chosen. Ward 3 is large and this is not necessarily the best site for another poorly administered city shelter.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Mary Chen lost me with her pious insistence on supporting the no tip restaurant legislation, despite the vocal opposition from her own community. She doesn’t represent “us” any more- the people who actually pay the taxes to fund the city.

Nope, she does not. She's been representing San Francisco/Portland/Seattle for a long while now.

What are the heck are you talking about?

Anonymous wrote:Mary Chen lost me with her pious insistence on supporting the no tip restaurant legislation, despite the vocal opposition from her own community. She doesn’t represent “us” any more- the people who actually pay the taxes to fund the city.

Nope, she does not. She's been representing San Francisco/Portland/Seattle for a long while now.

Mary Chen lost me with her pious insistence on supporting the no tip restaurant legislation, despite the vocal opposition from her own community. She doesn’t represent “us” any more- the people who actually pay the taxes to fund the city.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:If this is a serious question, there are African-American's living throughout the Ward in every neighborhood. Obviously not is an high of percentages as in other parts of the city, but that is changing, for the better.

The rich blacks- a handful. You all trying to stop the shelter bc you dont want the ghetto blacks.

I am the PP you are quoting. I have no issues with the shelter, though I think the old WAMU building in Tenley would have been a better location. Closer to metro, jobs aplenty right there and schools for all ages right there.