[jbrovont]

Unfortunately geography and a [somewhat] shared social perspective makes it everyone's problem to varying degrees. I've seen some interesting yet isolated and unscalable suggestions on this thread so far, but nothing that addresses the root of the problem yet.

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('vision-master', '
')Ain't my problem.

[Plantagenet]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('ReverseEngineer', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Plantagenet', 'S')quatting (trespassing) is a felony. It would be better to get these houses foreclosed on, and then sold cheaply at auction to private
buyers who need homes, or who are willing to rent the homes.

[MarkJ]

Local foreclosures and vacant homes are generally secured, winterized plus watched by sheriffs patrol and/or neighbors. Besides trespassing, people can't live their due health/safety issues such as no water, no sewer and no heat.

Even if you gave homes away, many people couldn't afford the property taxes, insurance, natural gas, propane, heating oil, kerosene, electric, water, sewer, maintenance, repairs and they couldn't comply with blight/safety/fire/occupancy/health codes.

Many of the low income people can't have the electric, gas or water turned on since they owe large past due bills. Often they've screwed friends and relatives by running up huge utility bills in their name as well.

Once a home has been vacant for a while, some plumbing, electric and safety codes are also retroactive. For example, before the utility provider would turn on the gas and electric, one of our customers had to spend a small fortune for an inspection, new weatherhead, service entrance cable, breaker box, wiring, gas lines, shutoff valves etc. When the city dug up the water shut-of valve, they discovered the sewer was damaged, so the customer had to pay for a new sewer line between the curb and the home which cost them a small fortune.

Many vacant homes have been trashed, or stripped of piping, wiring, appliances, cabinets, plumbing fixtures, electric fixtures, water heaters, furnaces, boilers etc, so the people would need to invest a small fortune just to have the utilities turned on and get a certificate of occupancy.

[Aaron]

I have posted many times regarding the communal nature of financial difficulties & the effect this has upon our plans for coping with these difficulties on an individual basis.

Any plan which does not encompass the majority is really no plan at all.

For all of the "back to the farm", survival doomstead tactics individuals may employ, I am hard-pressed to imagine a world where the disenfranchised masses will quietly pass from this world leaving the prepared to their own devices.

Directly & indirectly the starving masses will visit their misery upon everyone else.

It's a big shit sandwich & everybody is gonna have to take a bite.

[jbrovont]

I can't agree with you more here Aaron. Regardless of my personal feelings on the causal factors of this economic and social crisis, it's here and we need to find a constructive way to mitigate it's effects as best we can. Taking a social-dawinist approach in this situation is akin to thinking a spot of gangrene on your toe isn't your head's problem.

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Aaron', 'I') have posted many times regarding the communal nature of financial difficulties & the effect this has upon our plans for coping with these difficulties on an individual basis.

Any plan which does not encompass the majority is really no plan at all.

For all of the "back to the farm", survival doomstead tactics individuals may employ, I am hard-pressed to imagine a world where the disenfranchised masses will quietly pass from this world leaving the prepared to their own devices.

Directly & indirectly the starving masses will visit their misery upon everyone else.

It's a big shit sandwich & everybody is gonna have to take a bite.

[eXpat]

Bulldozing we go ho ho!
California "tent city" for homeless to be closed
$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'S')ACRAMENTO, California (Reuters) – The mayor of California's state capital unveiled plans on Thursday to shut down a sprawling "tent city" of the homeless that has drawn worldwide media attention as a symbol of U.S. economic decline. Sacramento Mayor Kevin Johnson promised to first make alternative shelter space available for the estimated 150 men and women who inhabit the squalid encampment near the American River, at the edge of the city's downtown.

Johnson, who toured the area with California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger a day earlier, said he hoped to have the ramshackle settlement cleared of tents and debris in the next two to three weeks. "We want to move as quickly as we can," he told a news conference, insisting the city was determined to treat the tent dwellers with compassion.

"They are people out there. We have to do whatever we can do," he said. "We as a city are not going to shy away from it. We're going to tackle it head-on." Advocates for the homeless applauded the mayor's action. Municipal authorities in Sacramento have been debating the fate of the tent city for weeks.

Sacramento has one of the highest mortgage foreclosure rates in the United States, and the homeless total in the city and surrounding county is estimated to have jumped nearly 10 percent last year to nearly 2,700. About half are believed to be living outdoors, according to a local survey.

[paimei01]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('MarkJ', 'I')n order to house the masses, they need affordable homes, which require having a good paying steady job. Many of the good paying unskilled or semi skilled jobs have been eliminated since we don't need as many unskilled/semi-skilled laborers..

[paimei01]

[ReverseEngineer]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('paimei01', '[')img]http://themartyrindex.com/wp-content/uploads/2007/02/Sitting-Bull-Sing-Loud.jpg[/img]

[EnergyUnlimited]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('ReverseEngineer', '
')The white man USED to know how to make everything. He forgot, and now he has nothing left to distribute. Except Toilet Paper. Distributed by Helicopter.

Reverse Engineer

[Fiddlerdave]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'U')nfortunately there's no long term solution to house many low income people since their roadblock to employment & income is based on their their lack of education, skills, experience, mental/physical discipline, mental/physical health, spending/savings/investment discipline, work ethic, ability to learn, reliable transportation, ability to pass pre-employment screening (psych/drug/background check), driver's license, driving record, physical appearance etc.

[MarkJ]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Fiddlerdave', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'U')nfortunately there's no long term solution to house many low income people since their roadblock to employment & income is based on their their lack of education, skills, experience, mental/physical discipline, mental/physical health, spending/savings/investment discipline, work ethic, ability to learn, reliable transportation, ability to pass pre-employment screening (psych/drug/background check), driver's license, driving record, physical appearance etc.

[FourOfSwords]

Aaron, what was your purpose for posting this?
Alex
~ Realize deeply that this present moment is all we ever have...~

[ReverseEngineer]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('MarkJ', 'E')ven in the best of times, we've still had dozens of job applicants and a few overqualified job applicants competing for relatively modest paying office and warehouse jobs. The chance of job applicants with the above mentioned qualification challenges finding good paying, steady, long-term jobs with benefits is slim.

[Blacksmith]

How things have changed. Years ago when you were laid off that was the time to go camping, work on the car, do repairs and get the "honey do list" done.

[uNkNowN ElEmEnt]

I don't see why they don't just acknowledge the problem and assign preemptively areas for tent cities in every city. These people have to go somewhere. Unless, they are going to wait until things get real bad, then the pres can implement a state of emergency like Hoover and these are the people that get a stay at a fema camp. Taht would make sense. How else are the gov't buddies going to profit from this.

[Aaron]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('FourOfSwords', 'A')aron, what was your purpose for posting this?
Alex
~ Realize deeply that this present moment is all we ever have...~

[FourOfSwords]

Fair 'nough. I wasn't judging, just curious knowing the type of responses that would be elicited around here...
Alex
Realize deeply that this present moment is all we ever have...

[MarkJ]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('ReverseEngineer', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('MarkJ', 'E')ven in the best of times, we've still had dozens of job applicants and a few overqualified job applicants competing for relatively modest paying office and warehouse jobs. The chance of job applicants with the above mentioned qualification challenges finding good paying, steady, long-term jobs with benefits is slim.

[vision-master]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'B')y Emily Bazar, USA TODAY
PINELLAS COUNTY, Fla. — Jim Marshall recalls everything about that beautiful fall day.
The temperature was about 70 degrees on Nov. 19, the sky was "totally blue," and the laughter from a martini bar drifted into the St. Petersburg park where Marshall, 39, sat contemplating his first day of homelessness.

"I was thinking, 'That was me at one point,' " he says of the revelers. "Now I'm thinking, 'Where am I going to sleep tonight? Where do I eat? Where do I shower?' "

The unemployed Detroit autoworker moved to Florida last year hoping he'd have better luck finding a job. He didn't, and he spent three months sleeping on sidewalks before landing in a tent city in Pinellas County, north of St. Petersburg, on Feb. 26.

Marshall is among a growing number of the economic homeless, a term for those newly displaced by layoffs, foreclosures or other financial troubles caused by the recession. They differ from the chronic homeless, the longtime street residents who often suffer from mental illness, drug abuse or alcoholism.