Second Street Tunnel
JM, Second Street Tunnel, 12.18.07 • click image to enlarge
Joseph Mailander a guy in la • elsewhere • email
Try to tell me these folks camping in shelter of the Second Street Tunnel wouldn't benefit from yurts NOW, rather than an affordable housing lottery that may (or may not) get ONE of them into a home sometime in the next four years, whilst developers and contractors make off with the Affordable Housing Trust cash all through that time.
Ten yurts a day for a hundred days, along the river just south of downtown, where there are already enormous homeless encampments the media do not photograph. Then, after they're built, you start replacing them with cinder-block homes, so that the developers and contractors can make their money. What's wrong with that, Department of Housing?
Labels: a guy in la, affordable housing, los angeles politics
Posted by Joseph F. Mailander @ 12/19/2007 07:34:00 AM
15 Comments:
Oh my god. I want to go take them food and blankets and hot drinks. It's very telling that there are no posts on this horrific thread.
Can't take it, huh guys?
What doy you expect. It just posted less than 20 minutes ago. The housing used to work next to the freeway. Why were they taken down?
What's needed are garage doors at each end of the tunnel, it's now a home!
Which one of those guys is Zuma ?
3:15 YOU ARE PATHETIC!
You hide behind your anonymity to throw insults. Are you envious of the courage Zuma has and your lack of it?
Zuma: “3:15” This PEA BRAIN FOOL it is not worth of your attention.
Does he works for the Mayor, Huizar or another fool?
Isn't 3:15 a half an hour away? What are you jawing about?
I am 3:15 here to defend myself. yes I am late, but I will defend my honor. No Blogging Burro Butt-Kisser will defame my good name.
How amny Blogging Burros really give a damn about any home-less guy sleeping under a bridge. How many Blogging Burros have offered Zuma a room for rent? That is what I thought, nothing but a bunch of rumor mongering hypocrites.
Hey Joseph, I saw that driving through downtown on the way to a party Saturday night. What amazed me is how little of a transition there is between Skid Row and the Gallery District. You go instantly from abject poverty to yuppies sipping merlot in front of a lot of crappy art but spending big money to do so.
I almost think that a lot of the policy for the homeless enables homelessness. For years Skid Row was a dump because there was no market interest in the area. I think we should gentrify the area while providing yurts and housing for those who want it and willing to work their way up to get them and keep getting better housing as they progress.
The trouble is most of the homeless are not capable of this because they are drug addicts or mentally ill. We need to provide them with facilities - maybe on old military bases or closed hospitals - where they can live INDOORS WITH A ROOF - with good food and receive the treatment they need. How do you pay for it? How do you not? Its far more inhumane to allow and encourage these people to lay in a tunnel or on 5th street in a puddle of urine and shit.
Why aren't there more basic shelters?
Because if they weren't up to a certain standard, they'd be shut down and the residents thrown into the streets, the operators fined -- like with a sad looking family of formerly homeless just thrown out of a motel with 3 hours notice because it was found to have defective wiring, etc.
But there was no provision for where these people would go the first night after being put in a shelter for a night.
These people were trying to get back on their feet, had been there 3 mos. with 2 kids, and now what?
The yurt would have to meet so many fire and other codes, it would turn into a luxury campground first.
If a softie landlord gave these vagrants free rent for a month, Rocky would sue him at the first sign of a minor complaint about the accommodations.
If you put matt and mutt and their kind into one, they'd sue the city and operators the very next day, and get Carol Sobel or some ACLU ambulance chaser who makes a living suiing the city to take their case.
Liberal do-gooders like the ACLU their own worst enemies again. Thank them and other amoral lawyers who profit by pretending to help the poor and ripping off the city.
Have to agree with 4:52 for the most part. An attempted solution would have to include money for all problems and "unintended consequences" that would inevitably result.
One problem that needs to be worked on is that of many homeless who seem unable to cope with housing when it is provided. I would expect some- don't know how many- that could not even conform to using the temporary shelter accommodations offered by the missions.
Gentrification is happening all over, and it is affecting even people who are NOT homeless.
The mayor and council bend over quite readily to allow developers to ply their trade in exchange for money in various form, and then these politicians will preach compassion for the homeless and poor, whose demise the developments accelerate.
Tough situation, but there is never a shortage of people ready to exploit it, while also able to relieve the various governmental agencies of tax dollars for the attempts.
Questions for Joe concerning Yurt Town:
Where exactly is this land "along the river south of Downtown?" Do you have Assessor's Parcel Numbers, or at least some cross-streets?
Who owns the land? If the City does not own it, how long will it take to acquire it? Can it be acquired through eminent domain?
Do the yurts comply with building codes? Does the entire development comply with zoning codes? If not, how long will it take to change the building codes, change the zoning codes, and/or rezone the site? What are the political ramifications of such efforts?
Who will maintain and police the yurts and the grounds they sit on? Taxpayers?
What policies must be put into place to force the homeless off Skid Row and into yurts?
How would social services be provided in Yurt Town? Who would pay for them?
Joe, you bring up Yurt Town every so often on this blog but you are woefully short on details. If you are truly behind this concept, you will answer these questions.
Political will cannot rise from ambiguous, half-baked pleasantries, even if accompanied by heart-breaking photographs.
There's a group run by the Westwood Presbyterian Church called PATH, which provides short-term shelter with just the kind of training poster mentions: from learning how to cook in the group kitchen, look for a job (basics like showing up for an interview -- you'd be surprised how often a volunteer lines up a job but the seeker never shows up), dressing appropriately to make a good impression, opening a bank account once you have a job, etc.
They can stay for 3 months if they keep with the and stay sober, otherwise they're booted out for someone ready to take advantage.
None of the 3 Pests who haunt this blog and pass themselves off as crusaders and geniuses would pass any of those steps.
So of course, they skip right to the top: ranting at City Council and offering advice to LAUSD and Zev.
Oops -- Zuma is careful to point out he's the only one to include LAUSD and the Supes in his sights: even he has his standards, and sets himself well above matt and hunt in dignity and decorum.
When Zuma becomes a paradigm for good taste and decorum, pigs will fly.
My gift is my song, and...
this one's for you. (click video link)
Yours in Good Tasted and Perfect Decorum,
ZFP
This Am @ 7 AM, police were forcing out the tunnel dwellers.
Maybe they should be given flyer on where an empty police car is parked that they can sleep in.
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