It seems inappropriate for me to blog my armchair ideas about homeless people, because I don’t know anything about homeless people. I’ve always lived and worked in enclosed structures with utilities, and I rarely consider abandoning it all to sleep under a bridge. It’s not a particular area of study or volunteerism for me, so I consider myself to be among the greater number of citizenry who see unemployed, homeless people and feel compassion without knowing how to express that compassion “correctly”.
My favorite hiking area near my house has only been a city park since ‘84. The neighborhood around it was built in the early ’60s, and before that, the whole place was just this little dairy farm between St. Ed’s and Post Oak Road. When the Sherwood Oaks neighborhood was built behind swanky Travis Heights, the unimproved forestland around the uneven creek bank was left untouched, save a cut-through for Burleson Road, and sold to home-buyers as a giant natural park. However, within five years of the first houses going up, the “park” was notorious for the established hobo camps within.
The neighborhood group worked through the Seventies to clear and clean up he park, but the hobos would not be dissuaded. Finally, the city was given the land, which was made into the Blunn Creek Nature Preserve. An astounding variety of native species of flora and fauna lurk within its 30 acres, as well as quite a few invasive species, such as modern homo sapiens sapiens. I know the location of three ‘usual’ campsites in this park (none of which are visible with Google Earth), and have encountered ‘guests’ on a few occasions.
I could expect that these incursions may also accompany some petty larceny and misdemeanors, but I can’t assume that just because someone is camping that they would want to endanger their position there. It’s probably extremely difficult to get a job when you live in a park, so my anticipation for economic engagement by these fellows is low. Whatever my feelings may be, fear of theft and violence from transient campers was the primary motivation for the city to take control over this and several other otherwise unimproved parcels of property, converting them into ‘nature preserves’ and putting curfews on them. The city does go through and periodically clean most of these out, but there are still quite a few that appear to be long term setups.
In the sense that these campers and squatters aren’t paying property taxes or rent or mortgage payments, their actions constitute theft. However, in the sense that they are occupying unimproved land with no services, it is difficult to assign an owner to whom payment would be owed. Frankly, I don’t understand why there isn’t more land set aside for long-term, primitive camping. If utility, health, and financial services were made available for them, I have no doubt that many would take advantage of these, thus assisting each to be productive contributors to the civic economy.
So is it helping the homeless if you don’t actually do anything to directly house them? Are you encouraging homelessness by providing civic services to them? How would you feel if more of your neighbors didn’t live in houses than did?
This is one of the top twenty most expensive cities in this country in which to live. It isn’t a big stretch to imagine a number of scenarios where camping is preferable to the alternatives. Homelessness isn’t something that people generally aspire to, but when folks find themselves in such a state is when they really need city services to stay human and even pull themselves out. Any that may game such a system are simply indicative of a generalized need for these services (utility, health, financial) to be provided to everyone.
Some really clever bastard is going to figure out how to organize the bottom 25% of those on the economic scale, and the rest of us are going to become just so much asphalt filling.
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9 Responses:
March 1st, 2008 at 8:03 am
I have thought in the past that there should be allowed to be tent ‘cities’ with public bathrooms/showers/bbq pits for cooking/water faucets.
Problem is is in regards to liability, potential for drug/AIDS/crime issues, risks of fires, etc.
When you give people freedom they are less easy to control (well, duh) and unless we change liability laws (get attacked/infected in public bathroom in said tent city? not our problem!) it won’t happen.
Not counting the visibility of tents/homeless lowers the ‘value’ of the city…it looks nicer to shelter (in homes, shelters or jails) out of the public or prospective newcomer eye.
March 1st, 2008 at 8:05 am
But someone was working on a trailer park for homeless idea I seem to remember in the past. I think trailer parks are a great thing and I totally understand many folks preference for this.
March 1st, 2008 at 8:16 am
Portland actually has such a “set aside” area called Dignity Village. I never got to visit it while I was living there, but a good friend of mine who was an architect involved with urban planning made a visit and said it reminded him of many of the most positive responses to urban poverty he had encountered while interning in India.
The relationship to homelessness was one of the major differences I noticed when I migrated here from Portland. In my neighborhood in Portland there were probably about a dozen “hobo camps” within walking distance of my house, but they were all out in the open, since there was a legal authority trying to break them up. Most of the warehouses between my house and the river let homeless people camp on their sidewalks and in their lots.
The city tried to keep campers out of natural areas, primarily under the pretense of ecological protection, but I think it actually created a safer situation with homeless people camping in the open, both for the campers and for residents. More importantly, it didn’t try to hide the homelessness and created a stronger rapport between the neighborhood residents and the campers.
While I think there is a significant minority, though, who choose to be without a house, most homeless people I chatted with didn’t actually choose that lifestyle (or, at least, didn’t perceive themselves as so choosing). One thing that people overlook is that once you exit the housing market its very difficult to get back in. If you’re older and don’t have a rental history, it’s much harder to get someone to rent to you. If you have no residence, it’s difficult to get a job to get the capital for the initial down — which is much higher if you don’t have credit, have bad credit, etc.
Homelessness isn’t something that people generally aspire to, but when folks find themselves in such a state is when they really need city services to stay human and even pull themselves out. Any that may game such a system are simply indicative of a generalized need for these services (utility, health, financial) to be provided to everyone.
You hit the nail on the head here. Any social service is going to be gamed by a few, but permissive systems actually tend to be cheaper, as the number of people who actually game the system tend to cost less then trying to create elaborate systems to control them.
And when it comes to housing, you know, even if someone games the system, they still are–you know–living in a friggin’ tent, so I figure people who get worked up that they are gaming the system should get a life.
March 1st, 2008 at 8:51 am
But…but…Cadillac-driving welfare queens! Multi-generational homicidal Satanists! Talking pink elephants!
March 1st, 2008 at 1:43 pm
I lived in a tent for a little over 6months when I was working the renfair circuit, it’s not the same but I think it gave me some insight into the conditions.
The biggest difference between that and even living in a trailer is how much more vulnerable to the weather you are. When it’s raining you just can’t get dry, even if you have a tent that doesn’t leak (and all tents leak after a couple weeks of continuous use) you carry water in with you and dew precipitates out of the humidity. Everything you have tends to get mildewed and musty and mud gets everywhere.
The biggest problem is other people. If you leave your stuff alone it walks off. If you piss someone off they can retaliate with all manner of miseries and you can never be sure what’s going to piss someone off since there are a good chunk of crazy people, mean drunks, and general scumbags floating on the margins.
Food’s pretty easy to get (warm food is a little harder) but having a place you can shower and do laundry gets really important.
I disagree about it being theft if someone is living on public lands, sales tax somes out of everyone’s pocket. From a civic point of view the more serious consideration is that if the community allows a squater to stay in a place for too long the community could loose title to the open space.
Austin does offer a fair number of services to the homeless:
http://www.frontsteps.org/
March 1st, 2008 at 3:07 pm
Trailer parks are an important step in the financial progression from poverty to middle-class, but are still a distant dream for those living in tents on the outskirts of society. If the trailers are provided and aren’t, themselves, somehow toxic (see Hurricane Katrina), then they can be an exquisite benefit.
March 1st, 2008 at 3:25 pm
Thank you for sharing your experiences. I hadn’t considered the problems of mildew or property security. Personally, I get cranky after camping for four days in a clean, secure environment, and can’t imagine what a nightmare it must be to live like that all the time without the options for cleanliness or security.
Of the cities I have lived in and traveled through, Austin is among the better in terms of services to the homeless. They make a good model for what is possible for other cities.
March 1st, 2008 at 3:27 pm
Thank you for pointing this out. Portland amazed me in how the community there really looks after the poorest among them. “Dignity Village” is such an obvious solution that it’s natural that only Portland has bothered to try it.