Skid Row Dumping Ground
In recent weeks, we've heard reports that a number of suburban law enforcement agencies have been dumping homeless people in Downtown LA's Skid Row.Now a few local hospitals are admitting they've done the same. Hollywood Presbyterian Medical Center, Kaiser Permanente West Los Angeles and Martin Luther King Jr./Drew Medical Center are among those who report that they have in the past dropped off homeless patients in the area.
LAPD officers have reported witnessing at least four different Los Angeles suburban police agencies dumping homeless in the area bound by Main, Alameda, Third and Seventh Streets. The agencies deny this and state they have policies in place to prohibit the practice.
Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa has ordered an inquiry into the practice and laws may be enacted, or sanctions sough against the cities and agencies who dump homeless.
Over a year ago, we reported on efforts by Santa Clarita to ship their homeless to the San Fernando Valley. The plan was later shot down by a Los Angeles County commission.
There are many reasons for homelessness and no one answer to deal with the problem. However, a significant portion of the homeless population is mentally ill. It was Ronald Reagan, while Governor of California, who shut down most of the mental hospitals in California, leading to the surge of homeless in the Golden State.
If we could open up facilities for the mentally ill homeless it would solve a lot of the problem. There may be costs to do so, but it could eliminate other costs borne by public agencies in dealing with the homeless.
Posted by Mayor Sam @ 11/26/2005 02:11:00 PM
11 Comments:
I agree it's very sad, and without medical care more people will end up homeless in the coming years according to some of my friends that work in mental health.
Any news on Prop 63?
Where should the hospitals discharge patients to? If they are homeless and from skid row then that is their home. That is where the services are. I don't understand what the issue is. It would make no sense to drop them off in the San Fernando Valley. Steve Lopez writes some columns and skid row is the cause celeb. There are heartbreaking stories everywhere. Let's fix our schools so kids have a chance at avoiding skid row altogether.
That's the point. Skid Row is a HIGH concentration of poor. Many are there because they need menal health care. If they had treatment to begin with, many would not be in Skid Row.
It's not LAUSD's fault that there are so many homeless in LA.
Just admit your problem is that you don't want them in your neighborhood. Where you think the other 70,000 homless in LA County stay.
I wouldn't deny that I don't want to live amongst mentally ill homeless people. Call me a snob.
Reagan belonged in a mental hospital. Eliminating many of them is proof.
But what's done is done so I don't see why we should spread them everywhere. They should be concentrated near shelters and there should be enough shelters to accomodate all of our homeless.
I like what Gavin Newsom did with the non-resident homeless people. He gave them a one way ticket back to the state they came from.
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The problem did not result merely from the closing of mental hospitals. Rather, the law was revised to give the mentally ill the "right" to refuse treatment. The result is sort of a "Groundhog Day" for them: get released from the hospital; stop taking meds; collapse in the gutter; get "found down" by EMT's; get taken to the hospital, cleaned up, and put on meds; ge released from the hospital, ad infinitum. We need to revise our laws so that mentally ill people who cannot take care of themselves can be institutionalized.
I wonder why when people write articles about dumping folks in central city east , they say dumping in skid row.
The headlines should read: dumping in Los Angeles. Have we forgotten that Central City East is a part of the Great City of the Angels?
Let's get real and get our heads out of our behinds : Skid row is a part of Los Angeles .
Like an above poster said where do the rest of the homeless reside if there are only 4,000 on any one given night in skid row?; The rest of Los Angeles.
Katrina Victims May Soon Join L.A.'s Homeless
(AP) LOS ANGELES The federal government says it will stop paying the hotel bills for Katrina evacuees on January 7th, and that has homeless advocates worried that the hurricane victims could soon add to already-overburdened services and shelters.
There are 150,000 Gulf Coast evacuees living in hotels and motels across the country, with nearly 4500 estimated to be in Los Angeles County.
L.A. County already has the largest homeless population in the country, with some 90,000 people out on the streets on any given day.
In September the Board of Supervisors voted to spend $10,000,000 to help Katrina victims who had informally relocated to the area.
That makes no sense. Why would they allocate $10 million of local money for an issue that is clearly the Federal govenments. I can see them doing it after a huge fight with the Feds but why offer it up?
BTW - what are hospitals suppose to do with patients from skid row that are well? Send them to Beverly Hills? I don't know why they are being accused of dumping.
Let's not forget that the LAUSD is home to more than 10,000 homeless children.
Let's not forget that there are hundreds of children and families that call Central City East (or skid row) home. We need to stop thinking of it as simply a dumping ground.
Estelle Lopez in the news today of Central City East, has it right it is a nightmare to have place all the city services in one location and to have centralized the problem. her quote " it is a nightmare, except for the rest of the city" She is right.
The children of Boyle Heights walk to school with the drug and alcohol addicts walking in their mist. They walk over the bridges in to BH and are on every street and alley of the community.
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