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Old Posted Jul 12, 2019, 3:54 AM
AviationGuy AviationGuy is offline
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Join Date: Dec 2011
Location: Cypress, TX
Posts: 5,315
Quote:
Originally Posted by edale View Post
It is surprising to see how many conservatives there are on this board. However, I think the responses to this topic are more a result of frustration of the new normal of life in most western cities. Those of us in West Coast cities walk by tents and crazy, unpredictable homeless people every day, and have seen these problems get worse and worse. In response, places like LA and SF continue to vote for tax increases to try to solve the problem, but have not seen conditions improve at all. When a new supportive housing project is announced, it's not uncommon for the per unit cost to exceed $600,000! Obviously that approach isn't going to fix anything unless the Federal governement decided to just start building housing en masse. At the same time, many of these cities have decided to stop enforcing camping bans on public streets. Los Angeles just decided that the city will stop sweeping up the camps downtown, as homeless advocates said that the homeless were having their possessions taken away from them. Nevermind that most of these possessions are literally trash that they hoard...because again, mental illness. But rather than having the courage to say "we are not going to let our streets and sidewalks turn into open sewers and garbage dumps" city officials are instead just caving to activist pressure and disguising it as compassion.

I'm a pretty liberal guy, but I'm pretty much of the mindset that something needs to change. We can be compassionate while still enforcing laws and maintaining some semblance of cleanliness. I don't think people from outside the west coast really understand the daily frustrations here. Especially as a daily transit rider, it gets very old very fast to always have to deal with people having mental episodes on the subway, stepping over shit and needles on the sidewalk, getting emails at work about avoiding the 'typhus outbreak zone' that has extended out from Skid Row. People shouldn't have to deal with that shit in a country like the US. It's kind of maddening.
You're right on target. But it's no longer just the West Coast cities. Pls see posts above about Austin, the latest city to go the same way. The filth has been here for a couple of years but has exploded in the last few months, and now the mayor and city council have rescinded the ordinances that were at least an attempt to preserve a somewhat civil society.

Our paper had a couple of letters to the editor today from some very prominent business owners who are dealing with the filth. It's affecting their business. The message was that we have lost our city.
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