Salt Lake City: Official Development News Thread - Part 5

[Barack Obama]

Originally Posted by Comrade

Ah yes. It's the evil ACLU!

It couldn't be the fact that, for the last 40 years, the U.S. government has completely underfunded mental health. Nope. It couldn't be the fact, for the last 40 years, the U.S. government has completely underfunded social services that help assist not only in getting homeless people off the street but also employed. It couldn't be the fact that, for the last 40 years, the U.S. government has underfunded, intentionally so with the hopes of privatizing, the VA system, which means a great deal of homeless vets don't receive the treatment they need.

The homeless epidemic is a direct result of Reagan America, perpetrated by Bush and then Clinton and now Trump.

But yes. Let's blame the little ol' ACLU.

The ACLU isn't so little. They've caused many sweeping changes, many of them for the better but not all. Many mentally ill are out on the streets because they refuse to seek out care for themselves. Much of the reason we can't get them mental help is because the ACLU in the 70s fought against getting the mentally ill help against their will, and eventually because of their lawsuits it became illegal to do so, unless they were deemed "dangerous." Was that right of them? I don't know. But if we can't deal with seeing mentally ill on the streets, and we can't commit them against their will, what is there to do?

[DMTower]

Anyone taken any pictures of Hardware Station, or any of the other projects being built in the last few days?

[grasscom]

Originally Posted by airhero

This would be a great addition. I like it, but I'd love to see a taller structure there. I'm normally not the type to push for taller but I really hope they do in the "Station Center" area. Not downtown heights, but maybe 8-19 story buildings.

Just one question though. When Charlie Luke says "affordable housing," is he talking about income restricted housing?

Not as tall as downtown but between 8-19 stories tall? Our tallest building in utah is only 26 stories tall so if we get something thats 18 or 19 stories tall that would be about the same heights as downtown

[airhero]

Originally Posted by grasscom

Not as tall as downtown but between 8-19 stories tall? Our tallest building in utah is only 26 stories tall so if we get something thats 18 or 19 stories tall that would be about the same heights as downtown

That's 26 stories office. Tallest residential is 30 stories. If there were a 19 story building at Station Center that was primarily residential/hotel/not office it would be around 250-260 feet, making it shorter than 16 buildings currently located downtown. That would make the range of 8-19 stories significantly shorter than downtown.

[msbutah]

Y'all know you can perma-mute a user in the forum right? If you click on their name, click View Public Profile, click User Lists under their name, and then click Add to Ignore List. Their posts just collapse in the forums and you can still read them if you want, but you don't have to see them by default that way.

[Stenar]

Originally Posted by Barack Obama

The ACLU isn't so little. They've caused many sweeping changes, many of them for the better but not all. Many mentally ill are out on the streets because they refuse to seek out care for themselves. Much of the reason we can't get them mental help is because the ACLU in the 70s fought against getting the mentally ill help against their will, and eventually because of their lawsuits it became illegal to do so, unless they were deemed "dangerous." Was that right of them? I don't know. But if we can't deal with seeing mentally ill on the streets, and we can't commit them against their will, what is there to do?

"The ACLU's most important Supreme Court case involving the rights of people with mental illness was filed on behalf of Kenneth Donaldson, who had been involuntarily confined in a Florida State Hospital for 15 years. He was not dangerous and had received no medical treatment. In a landmark decision for mental health law in 1975, a unanimous Supreme Court ruled that states cannot confine a non-dangerous individual who can survive on his own, or with help from family and friends."

"Ennis' most sensational case while at the NYCLU began with a class-action lawsuit filed in 1972 on behalf of the 5,400 residents of the Willowbrook State School for mentally disabled children in Staten Island. At the time Willowbrook was the biggest state run institution of its kind in the United States. Filthy conditions and questionable medical practices and experiments prompted Senator Robert Kennedy to call it a 'snake pit.' Public outrage grew after broadcast journalist Geraldo Rivera exposed the abhorrent conditions in a video showing developmentally disabled children lying naked on the floor, many of them in their own feces.

The three-year-long legal battle against Willowbrook culminated in a 1975 consent decree mandating significant reforms; but it took years of tenacious litigation and advocacy to force officials to improve conditions and supply the funds necessary for reform."

[asies1981]

Originally Posted by grasscom

Not as tall as downtown but between 8-19 stories tall? Our tallest building in utah is only 26 stories tall so if we get something thats 18 or 19 stories tall that would be about the same heights as downtown

Yeah he's talking about affordable housing. I think we'd see a mix of AMI earners in a project like this.

[Makid]

I think any residential/mixed use development in the Central Station area that includes affordable housing should be able to increase height. I think it would be better to see multiple 12 to 15 story buildings than a cap of 90' for the area. Especially with the transit options available.

[SLCLvr]

Originally Posted by Stenar

I have to say that I visit your site multiple times a week and the popup does show up every time. And it often pops up multiple times per day. You may want to check your settings or find a different solution.

I usually get to articles by clicking on the FB post so I get the popup even though I'm a member. My procedure at that point is to click the X in the top right hand corner and read the article. Using this process I can enjoy the article without experiencing any dramatic unhappiness in my daily life.

[Liberty Wellsian]

Originally Posted by Stenar

7 children is not above the replacement rate. Replacement has to include your spouses, so 12 children would be the replacement rate for you, your siblings, and spouses.

Late response

I should have clarified. Ages 32-20. The youngest don't even have spouses yet. I'm cool with saying that it's above replacement rate even if we technically have not gotten there yet. I am done having kids at 2 but I am not so certain that my wife is.

[Orlando]

Originally Posted by asies1981

Update on the public market. If the city council gets its way this would also include affordable housing which could increase the building's height.

I like the design and the whole idea, but the homelessness epicenter is right across the street. Here I go naysaying, but mark my words, this will not get built until they dramatically reduce the problem of the homeless. Forgive me for saying this, but they should just ship them all out to some remote place. Terrible idea I know, but SLC does not deserve to have them all congregate downtown in that location. I do think other cities ship them to SLC, but this shouldn't just be a SLC problem. It's not like all of the homeless people are from SLC. They come from all over. So, why not distribute these places throughout the valley and all over the Wasatch front metro??!! The homeless issue is killing vibrancy on the west side. The No Panhandling law should be strictly enforced to further discourage them.

[Liberty Wellsian]

Why should we limit height in the Rio Grande area at all? I know I wouldn't be the least bit upset about a new building of any height over there. How fantastic would it be if a developer wanted to build a big beautiful building over there? Why anyone would want to stand in the way of that is beyond me.

[Liberty Wellsian]

Srsly. When have you ever read The headline"property values plummet after developer announces plans to invest millions in neighborhood"?

When have you heard a local restaurateur complain " before this fancy new development I practically ran this place by myself. With all the new customers I have been so busy I have had to hire 4 new staff. It's really quite a burden."

[Comrade]

Originally Posted by Stenar

"The ACLU's most important Supreme Court case involving the rights of people with mental illness was filed on behalf of Kenneth Donaldson, who had been involuntarily confined in a Florida State Hospital for 15 years. He was not dangerous and had received no medical treatment. In a landmark decision for mental health law in 1975, a unanimous Supreme Court ruled that states cannot confine a non-dangerous individual who can survive on his own, or with help from family and friends."

"Ennis' most sensational case while at the NYCLU began with a class-action lawsuit filed in 1972 on behalf of the 5,400 residents of the Willowbrook State School for mentally disabled children in Staten Island. At the time Willowbrook was the biggest state run institution of its kind in the United States. Filthy conditions and questionable medical practices and experiments prompted Senator Robert Kennedy to call it a 'snake pit.' Public outrage grew after broadcast journalist Geraldo Rivera exposed the abhorrent conditions in a video showing developmentally disabled children lying naked on the floor, many of them in their own feces.

The three-year-long legal battle against Willowbrook culminated in a 1975 consent decree mandating significant reforms; but it took years of tenacious litigation and advocacy to force officials to improve conditions and supply the funds necessary for reform."

Important note. Thank you.

Our problem isn't forcibly detaining the mentally ill, which, yeah, is, and should be unconstitutional, but continually underfunding mental healthcare and making ANY type of care extremely difficult, if not entirely all too expensive, to attain. Many of the homeless people were normal at one point, but got off their meds or lost their job and couldn't pay for their meds anymore. Even cost-assistant medication faces long delays of up to three-months for someone with limited income.

This is a way bigger reason than blaming the damn ACLU and it's something we need to figure out or the homeless epidemic will only worsen, especially with more and more soldiers coming home from war.

[ajiuO]

Originally Posted by Comrade

Ah yes. It's the evil ACLU!

It couldn't be the fact that, for the last 40 years, the U.S. government has completely underfunded mental health. Nope. It couldn't be the fact, for the last 40 years, the U.S. government has completely underfunded social services that help assist not only in getting homeless people off the street but also employed. It couldn't be the fact that, for the last 40 years, the U.S. government has underfunded, intentionally so with the hopes of privatizing, the VA system, which means a great deal of homeless vets don't receive the treatment they need.

The homeless epidemic is a direct result of Reagan America, perpetrated by Bush and then Clinton and now Trump.

But yes. Let's blame the little ol' ACLU.

The biggest problem is drug addiction... at least 90% of the homeless people I see on the street are obviously on drugs. I think it’s just getting more attention lately because they are becoming much more aggressive. Aggressive panhandling is actually illegal. There was a lot of aggressive panhandling going on outside of the Starbucks at the Crandall building. Then I started noticing the police there a lot. I’m not sure if Starbucks or somone else started calling.

New it trailer that came out Wednesday was dope as fuck BTW.

[bob rulz]

The biggest problem is that everyone recognizes it's an issue but nobody is willing to invest the resources necessary to tackle homelessness BEFORE it becomes an issue. Comrade is absolutely right.

Obviously drugs are a big issue, but not all homeless are there because they're drug addicts. Some of them are drug addicts because they're homeless and we've allowed the drugs to spread throughout the homeless camps, often in broad daylight. The War on Drugs has been a disaster, but looking the other way over there has not done them any favors and it's caused people to feel that the area is unsafe.

Unfortunately I worry that the mental health and drug control systems in this country are so broken that nothing short of a herculean effort can fix the problems we've allowed to perpetuate in this society. We toss people who need help onto the streets, and then when people point out that it's an issue, we say that if they really wanted help they would have gotten it. Meanwhile, like Comrade said, we slash social services, we slash assistance programs, we tell them to "get a job" then encourage businesses not to hire anybody with a criminal record.

Then, when homelessness becomes an issue, people say we should just round them up and ship them away somewhere. Instead of blaming the issue on systemic problems within our governmental and economic system, we say that other states "shipped them to us". Perhaps it's because of a society that teaches people that their mistakes are their own fault, that if you make bad decisions, you deserve to be in prison or on the streets, that tells these people that if they want assistance from the government than they're just a leech.

Face it, our homelessness problem is a result of an economic and political system that is rotting from within, that encourages greed and selfishness and tells people that everyone is entirely responsible for their own failures, and that we share no responsibility as a society to help those who didn't catch the same breaks in life that we did.

[stayinginformed]

https://www.ksl.com/?sid=45194073&ni...sible-stabbing

This is the outcome of "Operation Diversion", diverting the violent crime in the Rio Grande area closer to neighborhoods. Put pressure in one area and it releases somewhere else. There is a permanent homeless camp about 50 feet from where this happened and included those who live there. I was out walking my dog, and was 300 feet away when I heard the gunshots and called the police on this incident.

[Liberty Wellsian]

Originally Posted by stayinginformed

https://www.ksl.com/?sid=45194073&ni...sible-stabbing

This is the outcome of "Operation Diversion", diverting the violent crime in the Rio Grande area closer to neighborhoods. Put pressure in one area and it releases somewhere else. There is a permanent homeless camp about 50 feet from where this happened and included those who live there. I was out walking my dog, and was 300 feet away when I heard the gunshots and called the police on this incident.

I fail to see the correlation between the two. operation diversion was an ultimatum given to drug addicts by police. Jail or inpatient treatment you decide. How did that cause this shooting?

[Marvland]

Originally Posted by Comrade

As bad as anything in urban America? C'mon now. Using hyperbole to make your point only undermines your argument.

Salt Lake has a very big problem but Jesus Christ, some of you have either never visited another city or are completely obviousness to reality if you truly believe the Rio Grande is as bad as some of the worst places urban America has to offer.

LOLZ AGAIN! It's like magic, Comrade. Every time you talk crap: boom, bang stab! Let's try it again. Three.. Two... One.

[Marvland]

Originally Posted by bob rulz

Do you have anything to back up your statement or is it just a "hunch"?

Obviously the area has gotten bad. I'm not going to argue that. I am NOT saying it's not in need of some serious improvement. But to say it's as bad as anything in urban America sounds like blatant hyperbole to me. Unless you can provide factual basis behind saying "crime is vastly underreported" (vastly underreported enough to make it comparable to big city crime regions) then you just sound like a scaremonger.

Sorry, no hard data. That's the very nature of "un-reported" unfortunately. The wife is in law enforcement and I'll leave it at that.

I do urban brownfields development among other things. I'm in a new city every two to three weeks. I actively pursue marginal areas in cities to see the affected area and how it interfaces with non-affected areas across social, development and environmental spectra. Believe, me, and I repeat myself, RIO GRANDE IS AS BAD AS ANYTHING IN THE COUNTRY and it bleeds into neighboring areas constantly. Read that until your teeth turn white, people. Or continue to deny it. It is not as large and the encampments in LA, for example, but it is unique in it's concentrated sheer suckiness.