Agree across the board. Fundamentally, the City has a serious of related situations it needs to address. Addiction is creating crime. Harm reduction isn’t interrupting that cycle at all. And maybe that’s not its intent, but it’s not. It might be worsening it. I think people are waking up to this and not liking it. I think a smaller minority of voters and policy-makers are saying we aren’t doing enough - we need more harm reduction measures.
I’ve gone to a number of neighborhood meetings, including ones attended by the DA, Chief and others. The public comments could be reduced down to a couple of themes but one certainly is - what does the City do when it offers homeless people services and shelter but they decline? If the answer is - a federal judge says we can do very little? We are in trouble.
Excellent observations. These days so much public conversation gets lost in attempts at pigeonholing responsibility and finger pointing which only further inhibits any direct action. Liberal, conservative, even Republican, Democrat, what’s the difference in actually getting effective response to growing problems like those you mention? Hope it’s just a stage our country is going through. Public innovations have always caused disruption before better organization and I hope that’s what we’re seeing with this twitter/facebook social media induced public cacophony where everyone is immediately and continuously inundated with everybody else’s latest opinion or “outing” of their latest connecting groupthink to whatever Party or whomever Who. Small conversations do occur and signs of understanding others are vaguely apparent. But so much opinion and conjecture based on misleading headlines or sarcasm or freudenschade, so much, all the time, everywhere. We need honest people. Willing to help each other. We need the fellow laying on the sidewalk to take charge of himself to be able to accept another way for him to go forward on his own feet. We need another place for that fellow to go to build his future. So many people. Too many causes. The better answers will come from people working together, the worst ones will come from people working against each other. Thanks for your article. Maybe I’ve said too much. Im older and I ramble. I’ll subscribe.
Agree across the board. Fundamentally, the City has a serious of related situations it needs to address. Addiction is creating crime. Harm reduction isn’t interrupting that cycle at all. And maybe that’s not its intent, but it’s not. It might be worsening it. I think people are waking up to this and not liking it. I think a smaller minority of voters and policy-makers are saying we aren’t doing enough - we need more harm reduction measures.
I’ve gone to a number of neighborhood meetings, including ones attended by the DA, Chief and others. The public comments could be reduced down to a couple of themes but one certainly is - what does the City do when it offers homeless people services and shelter but they decline? If the answer is - a federal judge says we can do very little? We are in trouble.
Excellent observations. These days so much public conversation gets lost in attempts at pigeonholing responsibility and finger pointing which only further inhibits any direct action. Liberal, conservative, even Republican, Democrat, what’s the difference in actually getting effective response to growing problems like those you mention? Hope it’s just a stage our country is going through. Public innovations have always caused disruption before better organization and I hope that’s what we’re seeing with this twitter/facebook social media induced public cacophony where everyone is immediately and continuously inundated with everybody else’s latest opinion or “outing” of their latest connecting groupthink to whatever Party or whomever Who. Small conversations do occur and signs of understanding others are vaguely apparent. But so much opinion and conjecture based on misleading headlines or sarcasm or freudenschade, so much, all the time, everywhere. We need honest people. Willing to help each other. We need the fellow laying on the sidewalk to take charge of himself to be able to accept another way for him to go forward on his own feet. We need another place for that fellow to go to build his future. So many people. Too many causes. The better answers will come from people working together, the worst ones will come from people working against each other. Thanks for your article. Maybe I’ve said too much. Im older and I ramble. I’ll subscribe.