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Mentally Ill Problem - Andrew Yang Response (1 Viewer)
- Thread starter djmich
- Start date
Max Power
Footballguy
I think some people took it as not giving the homeless help. When he said psych beds, I understood it as giving them help.
Overall a good solution to the current problem.
Cowboysfan8
Footballguy
Seemed like a fine response to me
timschochet
Footballguy
I’ve noticed that a lot of conservatives I run into have admiration for Andrew Yang. It would not surprise me if he became our President at some time in the futures
quick-hands
Footballguy
Cowboysfan8
Footballguy
I should add ……he’s a politician running for office, he’s going to say whatever he thinks will get him elected.
If he wins, we’ll see how many promises he keeps
Desert_Power
Footballguy
I always like how Yang talks about housing affordability. There are a lot of local regulations reducing housing supply in many wealthy, liberal cities. This contributes to homelessness and it also is starting to erode the tax base (people leaving).
pollardsvision
Footballguy
I'm very ignorant and ask genuinely (I've never been rich enough to be able to live in a larger city run by liberals, except Detroit, I guess).
What do liberals do that adds to the homeless problem?
Terminalxylem
Footballguy
We definitely need more psych beds, but short institutionalizing the homeless against their will, that is unlikely to solve the problem. Moreover, the vast majority of mentally ill people aren’t violent.
I don’t know the solution, but preying on people’s fears of being accosted by crazy people isn’t super helpful IMO.
I don’t know the solution, but preying on people’s fears of being accosted by crazy people isn’t super helpful IMO.
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Alex P Keaton
Footballguy
Liberals favor policies that limit real estate development, including residential building in urban areas. Which contributes to housing shortages. Which leads to a scarcity of affordable housing.
Research has repeatedly shown that homelessness rates are directly tied to the cost of housing.
I’m not judging any of this, but it’s reality in large, dense US cities.
Sand
Footballguy
I respect him - when running for president he put everything out there. All his thoughts were on his page, so you could see what he thought about what. Pretty much the opposite of hiding in a basement and giving short, canned interviews with scripted questions that we have now.
dkp993
Footballguy
Yep. Did a long Rogen interview too and was totally down to earth. He’d be great for this hyper partisan and polarized country right now.
Terminalxylem
Footballguy
While I have no doubt what your saying is correct, I’ve not seen lack of affordable housing as a huge contributor to mental illness. Maybe it leads to substance abuse, but I’m not sure.
Yang is probably referring to chronically homeless individuals, who tend to fall into one or both of those groups. Good stats here.
Then again, I’m sure there are arguments liberal policies promote every societal failing.
Alex P Keaton
Footballguy
You didn’t ask about mental illness. You asked about the homeless problem. So I addressed homelessness.
Terminalxylem
Footballguy
The two are intertwined, and Yang’s comments seem to be addressing mentally ill homeless peeps specifically.Alex P Keaton said:
ETA. To be clear, I didn’t ask the question to which you originally responded. While I agree affordable housing is certainly an issue in transient homelessness, long term homelessness is a different animal altogether. The latter group needs mental health/substance abuse addressed first and foremost, IMO.
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Alex P Keaton
Footballguy
Fair enough. No disagreement.
My bad for mixing up who asked the original question.
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Alex P Keaton
Footballguy
Meant to reply to this earlier. Spot on. Yang is smart enough to know that his comments were preying on fear of a very small % of homeless people. That’s one of the things that was so disappointing about his comments.Terminalxylem said:
wikkidpissah
Footballguy
the left actually has a record on social issues. the right doesnt
rockaction
Footballguy
And the left's record was consistently and constantly against institutionalization in the '70s. Then given the budget constraints and lack of funds earmarked for social programs, de-institutionalization began to appeal to the right in the '80s, a lethal combination which just left the mentally ill homeless and indigent rather than free and productive as originally envisioned by the pie-in-the-sky activists of yore. Plenty of blame to go around.
The naivete of the left in thinking one should de-institutionalize schizophrenia and other maladies mixed with a lack of desire on the right to spend the money necessary to keeping the indigent housed, clothed, and fed has led to the tent cities in LA, which sprawl everywhere and have just commandeered blocks upon blocks of otherwise valuable and decent property, forcing residents to step lightly in the very place they live and pay rent, lest they step in fecal matter or syringes.
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wikkidpissah
Footballguy
i guess we'll just have to wait until the right privatizes soup kitchens & dispensaries & flophouses cuz they done so good w prisons & schools and pay triple incentives instead of double outlays (a fella's got a right to make a livin') to keep the gutter crowd from harshing the co-op owners of the new urban Disneylands which have crowded the working poor into the streets. that's why i'm pushing the New Altruism, boyo - without the ethic, it's ALL windowdressing, maaaan ...inherently corrupt
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Godsbrother
Footballguy
The mentally ill homeless people is a problem that is shared by the left and the right. The bottom line is we really don't care about these people until we encounter them on the street or in our parks. Then we forget about them as soon as we have walked past them and they are out of our way.We need to do better. We need to build back psych wards and mental health medication should be free to all that need them.
The Answer To Homelessness
Utah is the fourth most conservative state in the union, according to a January Gallup survey. Only 15 percent of residents identify as “liberal.” Yet the Beehive State is on the cusp of ending chronic homelessness using a new method that would appear to come straight from the Nancy Pelosi playbook—by giving away housing.
In 2005, the Republican administration of Gov. Jon Huntsman introduced a “centrally led and locally developed” strategy to defeat long-term homelessness. Called Housing Works, the program began with 17 people who had lived on the streets at least once in the previous year. The goal was to lead them to self-sufficiency, but they kept the housing even if they failed to pull their lives together.
Today, this strings-free approach has decreased homelessness by 74 percent, and by 2015 the state hopes to reach all 3,000 cases of homelessness. Denver has seen success with a similar effort, and Wyoming, the most conservative of all states, is poised to follow suit.
Conservatives know that giving away handouts decreases incentives to work and that, generally, welfare is the enemy of freedom. As Lee Bright of South Carolina, who is challenging Lindsey Graham in the Palmetto State’s Republican primary this year, reminded us: welfare is “legalized plunder.” He insisted: “Liberty is just the right to keep what is yours. When you raise taxes and put that burden on people, you take away their freedom.”
In choosing to give away housing to those who did not earn it by their labor, Utah may appear to be a bastion of “legalized plunder” in which hard-working Utahns are victimized by a powerful state government believing that somebody else deserves what they have earned. But dig deeper and you find a pioneering effort that is, first of all, effective and, if viewed properly, honors the spirit and substance of conservatism.
The model for Utah’s program took shape years earlier in New York City. Clinical psychologist Sam Tsemberis had grown frustrated with orthodox methods that called for the homeless to overcome addiction, seek treatment for mental illness, and find work before getting housed. Tsemberis realized none of that was possible without housing first. So in 1992 he founded Pathways to Housing, a nonprofit group that has slowly transformed the ways municipalities address homelessness.
“The disengagement between the person wanting a place to live and a system that is offering treatment and sobriety and participation in programing as a condition for housing has failed people like this for years,” Tsemberis said during a 2012 presentation in Providence, R.I.
Tsemberis struck out to change that system. His strategy hinges on getting the homeless into permanent housing in order to establish ties to a community. The tenant agrees to pay a nominal rent of no more than 30 percent of whatever income he has. And he must abide by lease agreements, just as any other renter would do. Moreover, he is not forced to seek treatment for mental illness or addiction, but he is offered such programs by a full-time case worker who regularly visits to help the tenant negotiate his way through the maze of social services and charitable organizations.
“People are more likely to chart new paths if they have stable housing and meaningful choices from which to start,” Utah’s Homeless Coordinating Committee said in a plan-of-action report released in 2008.
Tsemberis’s program attracted the attention of Republican governors around the country because it ultimately saved money. Lots of taxpayer money. When Utah officials added up the amount going into medical treatment and law enforcement, the cost to the state per homeless individual was more than $216,300 a year in 2007 dollars, according to Housing Works. The cost of housing, rent assistance, and full-time case management, meanwhile, was just $19,500.
But fiscal restraint wasn’t enough to persuade some in Utah. After all, this is a deeply conservative state, and there’s something offensive about the idea of someone getting a free handout, especially something as valuable as housing. Surely skeptics were correct in assuming some kind of failure of character.
“There is an implicit assumption that because that person is homeless, it is [due to] something about them. Perhaps they didn’t work hard enough or what had been given to them had been squandered.” Tsemberis said in his 2012 presentation, acknowledging the proclivity among citizens and policymakers to “hold [the homeless] accountable for their suffering.”
Lloyd Pendleton, director of Utah’s Homeless Task Force, once agreed. But he’s now working with Wyoming officials to replicate his state’s success. He said in public remarks last year that he used to tell homeless people to find work. Then he found his views being challenged by the depth and complexity of the problem. His experience moved him to push aside one part of his conservatism, personal responsibility, and more closely embrace another. “These are my brothers and sisters,” he said. “When they’re hurting, we’re hurting as a community. We’re all connected.”
Eventually, Utahns like Pendleton came around to seeing the wisdom of providing housing without strings attached. Though it may at first sting a bit to see someone getting something he didn’t work for, over time most recipients of free housing take responsibility for their lives, Tsemberis says. Once they have the stability of housing, they can beat addiction, manage mental illness, seek more education, or find employment. Housing, critically, must come first.
In that spirit, Tsemberis argues that the Housing First model doesn’t just help the homeless. It helps the rest of us. “There’s a price that we are paying for homeless,” he said in 2012. “Not noticing is costing not only the people still homeless on the streets but it’s costing us. If we take for granted the feeling of seeing a homeless person and walking by, we have to shut down part of ourselves in order to tolerate the pain we’re walking past. In that we are together in a shared suffering, that actually can be alleviated.”
wikkidpissah
Footballguy
the exception that proves the rule. yay, case closed - hey, i'm good at this. next!
You want more? Look at Florida and the huge drop in homelessness the last 8 years under Republican leadership. Then look at New York and California... The difference between red-state and blue-state homelessness
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wikkidpissah
Footballguy
there's always more. there's also always that half the country wouldnt support those efforts with a gun to their heads. you want someone to cite cases with you, find someone else. efforts matter, politics dont anymore
wikkidpissah
Footballguy
The Commish
Footballguy
Just want to throw out a clarification here in terms of Florida and I can only speak to Central Florida, but our local municipalities have done a REALLY good job in starting to address homeless populations. It's a mix of Dem and Repub lead municipalities, but they are all following the same essential game plans suggested by private groups like United Way and Salvation Army. The private sector continues to address the root problems here and fortunately the local politicians are listening and it's working. We've had little guidance from our state level officials.
It's always comical to me when Florida gets brought up because most of the decisions in this state happen this way. The state (rightly) leaves it to local municipalities (GOP and Dem alike) to do what they think is correct for their situation. It's one of the things the "state" as gotten right in it's approach IMO. It's always funny when the "state" then swoops in to take the credit for the work of others. There are countless organizations working this issue across the state. That much I know. What I am uncertain of is success of those groups in other parts of the state.
ETA: If there's one thing to take away from our local success stories, it's that local groups of people you've never heard of are consistently outperforming the elected officials in Tallahassee. This is why voting and focusing on local elections is probably the MOST important thing a person can do. THAT is where change is made.
It's always comical to me when Florida gets brought up because most of the decisions in this state happen this way. The state (rightly) leaves it to local municipalities (GOP and Dem alike) to do what they think is correct for their situation. It's one of the things the "state" as gotten right in it's approach IMO. It's always funny when the "state" then swoops in to take the credit for the work of others. There are countless organizations working this issue across the state. That much I know. What I am uncertain of is success of those groups in other parts of the state.
ETA: If there's one thing to take away from our local success stories, it's that local groups of people you've never heard of are consistently outperforming the elected officials in Tallahassee. This is why voting and focusing on local elections is probably the MOST important thing a person can do. THAT is where change is made.
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timschochet
Footballguy
wikkidpissah
Footballguy
dkp993
Footballguy
Sand
Footballguy
It's really not a homeless problem. It's a drug problem. More specifically it's a fentanyl problem. So many of these folks won't go into homes because of the no drug rules.
And our current leadership has rolled out the red carpet for fentanyl smugglers.
AAABatteries
Footballguy
AAABatteries
Footballguy
It’s hard to take your posts serious GB when you post stuff like this. Nobody does this on any side of the aisle.
dkp993
Footballguy
It may be only anecdotal data but it’s close to 15yrs of anecdotal data. But I ran a restaurant/nightclub in downtown San Diego for close to 15yrs. As one could imagine SD and it’s ideal year round weather is a homeless Mecca. (SD for the record is very purple, been a pretty even mix of D&R Mayors) I can tell you with VAST experience the overwhelming majority of long term homeless are mentally ill.
The Commish
Footballguy
The main thing they try and do is provide opportunity. Affordable housing, job fairs, volunteer groups to teach the basics of personal finance (this is how I am mainly plugged in these days), temp agencies etc. Here, the primary issue is homes/apartments to put people in. People like to think of "homeless" as the guy panhandling on the side of the road or the guy living in a tent under a bridge. Of the two dozen individuals I work with weekly, ONE of them is in that situation. All the others live in their cars or go from shelter to shelter. They live on couches of friends/loved ones. All those scenarios go into the "homeless" category here in Florida.
There are organizations that raise funds to incentivize developers to build affordable housing. There are organizations that help with food insecurity or providing clothes. There are organizations that provide simple personal finance classes (how I am currently plugged in). All kinds of different things. It takes a village and it is only going to work from the bottom up. It's never going to happen from the top down. Of that, I am 100% confident.
Alex P Keaton
Footballguy
Just because you don’t know doesn’t mean it isn’t true. There is meaningful statistical evidence that homelessness rates are closely tied to housing affordability.
Sand
Footballguy
Let's put it in more clinical terms we can all agree on. The blue team has decided that the southern border shall be open. We all know the reasons, but that's immaterial to this discussion. This has enabled large, organized cartels on our border to use immigrants as decoys to enable said smuggling. Both of these facts, that we have well organized cartels to our south and that they smuggle fentanyl, are well known. The blue team has done nothing to stem the flow of either immigrants or smuggling of illegal substances as they have decided that the importation of said substances is incidental to their goal of an open border. I don't see how any of these facts are much in dispute.
Obviously the red carpet was figurative - if you didn't read that way, my apologies on that part of it.
Sand
Footballguy
That must be hard these days. With the shortage of housing I'm surprised much but McMansions get built. I know the construction of "starter houses" has plummeted in recent years.
The Commish
Footballguy
Yeah, it's hard, but that's what is necessary. Home ownership is shown time and time again to be one of the core things that gets people right. Ownership, responsibility, problem solving is all wrapped into it. Even having something they RENT is beneficial. We have a local program that does "rent to own" which has been unreal. The tough part is getting developers to do that because, well, money.
Sand
Footballguy
Yeah - money. Other sectors of that market are so much more profitable.
BTW, my thoughts on home ownership that I posted the other day.
The Commish
Footballguy
Can you point me to the studies suggesting this. My son had a project on "drug abuse" he did just this last school year and from what I remember, there are no real meaningful "ties" to either "side" in this. Fentanyl started it's meteoric rise in late 2015 and has skyrocketed since and continues to skyrocket today. I'm not exactly sure how you're assigning responsibility to the "sides" here, so maybe explaining that would help?
