On Oscar night, 82,000 will be sleeping on the streets of LA, the nation’s epice

[Freeper]

marmar  Donating Member  (1000+ posts)  Journal  Click to send private message to this author  Click to view this author's profile  Click to add this author to your buddy list  Click to add this author to your Ignore list      Sat Feb-26-11 09:37 PM
Original message
On Oscar night, 82,000 will be sleeping on the streets of LA, the nation’s epicenter of homelessness   Updated at 9:37 PM
   
from The Nation:




Homeless in Hollywood

Richard Pollak
February 24, 2011


Winter’s Bone, one of ten nominees for best picture at the Academy Awards, is not likely to win. It deals with a drug-addicted father who abandons his poverty-stricken family, leaving them on the edge of homelessness—subjects that rarely, if ever, prevail at Hollywood’s annual exercise in self-congratulation, where less troubling features like True Grit, The King’s Speech or The Social Network are favored to take the top prize. And when Hollywood’s haut monde arrives on waves of couture on February 27, it will not be fretting much about living in the nation’s “meanest” city in treating the homeless as criminals.

Los Angeles earned this distinction in 2009 when the National Coalition for the Homeless and the National Law Center on Homelessness and Poverty surveyed 273 cities in the country. They based their report, “Homes Not Handcuffs,” on the number of anti-homeless laws in a city, the enforcement of those laws and the general political climate, among other factors. Los Angeles emerged on top because of its strategy of ticketing, arresting and occasionally brutalizing or just ignoring many of its homeless—tactics that local social service agencies and civil rights leaders had been decrying for years as not only inhumane but also financially counterproductive.

The so-called “Safe City Initiative,” for example, assigned a police contingent of fifty to tackle crime on Skid Row, a fifty-square-block area east of downtown that has been a homeless domain for decades. This crackdown cost an estimated $6 million a year, at a time when the city was budgeting just $5.7 million to serve the homeless. As “Homes Not Handcuffs” reports, “Advocates found that during (an) 11-month period 24 people were arrested 201 times, at a cost of $3.6 million for use of police, the jail system, prosecutors, public defenders and the courts.” By some estimates, that money could have provided housing for 225 people.

Politicians have made the usual promises to furnish more housing and services for the homeless, and some progress has been made since the 2009 report. But LA remains the homeless capital of the country, suffering certainly from the national economic travail but perhaps more from a continuing lack of urgency on the part of many well-housed and well-fed local and state officials. Last year, some 254,000 men, women and children were homeless in Los Angeles County (population 10 million) at some point, and 82,000 were on the streets on any given night. Not surprisingly, almost half of them were African-American, though blacks constitute just 9 percent of the county’s population; Latinos make up 47 percent of the county and 33 percent of its homeless. As many as 75 percent of people on the streets are not receiving the public benefits to which they are entitled. Some 20 percent are physically disabled, 25 percent mentally so. ............(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.thenation.com/article/158838/homeless-hollyw...

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=439x518536

Interesting in the liberal mecca of the USA we have that many Bobo's.
You would think with all the caring compassionate liberals that live in LA that every empty room would be offered to a homeless person.
I can't believe the liberals of hollywood aren't taking care of these people since they aren't heartless like us conservatives are.

[thundley4]

Aaaaaaand we knew the Buick would show up.

bobbolink   (1000+ posts)             Sat Feb-26-11 09:43 PM
Response to Original message
3. I misread the headline... I thought it meant that thousands of protesters would be sleeping on the
   
streets of L.A. to draw attention to homelessness when all the glitteratti are assembled, with the media.

THAT would be s strong statement, and it is high time for people to do just that!

I'm not happy about a movie that continues the myth of homeless people as druggies and "mentally ill". It is waaaay past time to look at the reality---people just like any of us, who are without a home.

This article, however, points out the ridiculousness of paying a high cost to keep people homeless, rather than to do the right thing and provide homes for all.

And, of course, Obama is cutting funds for low-income housing.

[Freeper]

bobbolink   (1000+ posts)             Sat Feb-26-11 09:43 PM
Response to Original message
3. I misread the headline... I thought it meant that thousands of protesters would be sleeping on the
   
streets of L.A. to draw attention to homelessness when all the glitteratti are assembled, with the media.

THAT would be s strong statement, and it is high time for people to do just that!

I'm not happy about a movie that continues the myth of homeless people as druggies and "mentally ill". It is waaaay past time to look at the reality---people just like any of us, who are without a home.

This article, however, points out the ridiculousness of paying a high cost to keep people homeless, rather than to do the right thing and provide homes for all.

And, of course, Obama is cutting funds for low-income housing.

How about doing the right thing Bobo, and providing a home for your self?
Go out find a job, and go on craigslist and look for someone who wants a rent out a room. In this economy more people than ever are willing to rent out a room fairly cheap to help pay for their mortgage and energy bills.

Or even better go stick up a 7-11 and you will get free room and board, and health care for 20 years or so. 

[Freeper]

bobbolink  Donating Member  (1000+ posts)  Journal  Click to send private message to this author  Click to view this author's profile  Click to add this author to your buddy list  Click to add this author to your Ignore list      Sat Feb-26-11 09:49 PM
Response to Reply #5
7. Mary, why can't there be 82,000 in the streets of LA on oscar night, protesting the lack of housing
   
and DEMANDING there BE that housing??!

WHY?

If unions can gather togethr that many people for themselves, WHY in god's name can't this be done for homeless people?????

How about you making a sign and go protest yourself?
Oh wait that would require effort on your part.
I bet you Bobo is too lazy to even masturbate because that would require some kind of action.
 

[Evil_Conservative]

I bet that bobo made this thread.  Good thing I didn't bet real money, someone would have been maybe $5 richer.

[md11hydmec]

How about you making a sign and go protest yourself?
Oh wait that would require effort on your part.
I bet you Bobo is too lazy to even masturbate because that would require some kind of action.
 

Dude,  I just threw up a bit just thinking about that!

[AllosaursRus]

bobbolink   (1000+ posts)             Sat Feb-26-11 09:43 PM
Response to Original message
3. I misread the headline... I thought it meant that thousands of protesters would be sleeping on the
  
streets of L.A. to draw attention to homelessness when all the glitteratti are assembled, with the media.

THAT would be s strong statement, and it is high time for people to do just that!

I'm not happy about a movie that continues the myth of homeless people as druggies and "mentally ill". It is waaaay past time to look at the reality---people just like any of us, who are without a home.

This article, however, points out the ridiculousness of paying a high cost to keep people homeless, rather than to do the right thing and provide homes for all.

And, of course, Obama is cutting funds for low-income housing.

Hell, I been misreadin' yer bull shit for 5 ****in' years! I thought ya was complainin' for the homeless! All this time, I thought maybe ya cared about yer fellow man.

Lord, was I wrong! You don't give a good Damn about anything but yourself! You don't try and help those around you who are less fortunate! Hell, if ya did, there'd be more than one of ya livin' in that aircraft carrier ya call a Buick!

Go rob a liquor store, ya degenerate POS! It's the only way for you to improve your surroundings!

Damn, I'm gettin' sick of this c*nt!!

[formerlurker]

Does anyone at the DU actually know Bobo (and can prove she is actually homeless)?   

[MrsSmith]

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=439x518536

Interesting in the liberal mecca of the USA we have that many Bobo's.
You would think with all the caring compassionate liberals that live in LA that every empty room would be offered to a homeless person.
I can't believe the liberals of hollywood aren't taking care of these people since they aren't heartless like us conservatives are.

[miskie]

Does anyone at the DU actually know Bobo (and can prove she is actually homeless)?   

some have tried to meet her, and she made it clear she wanted none of it. AFAIK, those who tried to help her, didn't even see her face-to-face.

[JohnnyReb]

82,000 sleeping on the street, huh?....damn, they have good weather in L.A..