Agreed. The purpose of the law may well be noble. Yet, that noble purpose does not make them immune to exploitation.
And any competition, begs to be exploited. We may prefer the phrase “find a competitive edge, and fill a market opportunity”. It’s still exploitation. Just like the pick and roll offense in the NBA. Substituting a lefty pitcher for a single batter. Lobbying to keep the IRS from offering free tax prep online. The sugar lobby. Need I go on?
Free speech exploitation…a PAC can say anything, true or false, in pursuit of winning the election. Heck, virtually all advertising is aimed at exploiting your emotions in pursuit of higher profits. I am not condemning it, but it is naive to think it isn’t happening.
Exploitation is a human condition the way you describe it.
Yeah, many humans try to exploit things and people.
Not all exploitation hurts others. Sometimes it’s someone in a lab trying to exploit some physical formula that causes more food to be grown, stuff like that. Sometimes it’s someone exploiting people’s nobler impulses, you choose your favorite leader who does that. Sometimes it’s people exploiting technology to deliver faster medical care, prevent mind-numbing clerical work, etc.
Some exploitation does hurt others, but then again, many avoid doing it and try to penalize the kind that does.
Not sure how we got to this, but none of this means that it’s right to lie, either to get free housing, or to get investors in your latest Trump hotel.
No doubt, it is wrong to lie. But holding out for rules that cannot be exploited is a fools errand. As you yourself point out,it is part of the human condition. Peeps gonna look for angles. It’s all good.
But rejecting the most efficient way to address homelessness because it could be exploited by some …that just isn’t rational. I know it sticks in your craw. Mine too. Still, the idea of shouldering the cost of arrest, prosecution, and potentially the cost of incarceration is silly. You can get much the same result at lower cost. Why turn it down?
I’m not sure that part about the lower cost is true.
I’d have to see studies by unbiased groups.
There is a point to making your rules less exploitable even if people keep trying.
Like there’s a point to having a lock on your door and possibly a burglar alarm even though a determined thief could probably figure out a way around those.
NYC does have guaranteed housing for all and they are drowning in demand for this from people who are technically able to work although due to their illegal status they can’t. That doesn’t seem like a success story of guaranteed housing to most.
The Finnish model of Housing First does seem to incorporate treatment and education as part of the model. Maybe that’s why in contrast it fails in the US because here Housing First advocates seem to think of it as more like Housing Only, since they often don’t have the spine to require treatment or accountability of any kind to be part of the program. (Unless I missed something that has worked here.)
Something else we can learn from the Finnish. (I very badly want to participate in one of their EduVisits so I can observe their education system in action. I just can’t afford it right now.)
We’ve housed two people who were going to be legitimately homeless, and they’re now in their own places, holding down jobs. One of them had been homeless and living out of her car for months in the past. There’s definitely a large mental illness (including addiction) component to homelessness, but there are also a lot of people born or who’ve fallen into shitty situations who can get it back together with some assistance.
We were just in Finland this winter so I did some research into this area (UK has same problems as US) as was curious about the % of homeless linked to mental illness.
Its 89% in this Finnish study.
Mental disorders and the use of primary health care services among homeless shelter users in the Helsinki metropolitan area, Finland
The overall administration of mental hospitals was a travesty. Lots of abuse. We have an especially prominent one in our city. When it was closed, everybody was just released to whatever conditions they had on the outside. And now we have our aforementioned homeless problem. It’s not entirely from the mental hospital but it started a boom.
I feel that closing them was a mistake, but their actual operations were very wrong.
We do have a history of doing terrible things to people (and animals) in the name of “science.”
There will always be an institution for the mentally ill. We as a society just have to decide if it should be a meaningful mental health field that actually nurtures people back to functionality, or if we’re okay with the criminal justice system and/or the streets being that institution. In general, we probably just really need to have a national conversation about what is important to us.
I don’t know that we’ll truly have that level of introspection in my lifetime.
We’re still dithering over doing ANYTHING over “another mentally ill person shot 12 children, if only anything could have been done”, other than hardening schools and sometimes adding metal detectors and armed guards.
There are two housing projects in Waterloo Ontario. To my knowledge they’re not paired with any treatment requirements.
In one facility with 50 housing spots, one person in the facility moved in and got stable housing. Hardly a success. What has happened is that thefts and car breaking are rampant in the area.
So from the move on and up perspective, not successful. From the 'people should have a roof over their head’s perspective, worked pretty well I think.
The US has a history of “Housing First” proponents and programs. Of course, “Housing First” may mean different things. Here’s a HUD report on three early programs. It’s interesting just for the date (2007). Wayback Machine
I think governments should provide indoor living options for everyone. If they do, then I’m okay with saying “no overnight sleeping on public property”.
People are homeless for a variety of reasons, we should have a variety of housing options. For people who aren’t disrupting their neighbors, housing first or supportive housing seem right for some people. Jail and involuntary commitment are the last options on the list.
For a metro area like San Francisco Bay Area, I’d like to believe this can be funded on a regional basis. I don’t think cities owe people housing the the neighborhoods they want to live in – some are just more expensive than others.
