” . . . up there, coming to save the homeless! Is it a bird? A plane? No! It’s a . . . word salad?”
When it comes to solving America’s growing homelessness crisis, what’s the difference between a bigger local political entity, such as Los Angeles County, on one hand and a smaller one, such as the city of Aurora, Colorado on the other?
We keep searching for evidence of solutions at affordablehousingaction.org. Hence our curiosity in comparing the homelessness strategies of different ‘locals’ — the level of community at which the tragedies of homelessness actually play themselves out.
Is it a striking truism or a mere coincidence that larger communities, with presumably greater resources, mask their impotence with the creation of “lumbering bureaucracies,” which either replace or layer upon others?
We’re using a term expressed by Los Angeles County Supervisor Kathryn Barger as she proudly advocates for an entirely new ‘not-lumbering’ bureaucracy, which could be created, based on the findings of a recent lumbering bureaucracy, the Blue Ribbon Commission on Homeless.
But then, what options do you have to pursue actual action to end homelessness, when your major weapons would seem to be task-force generated, researched, bloodless, quite probably expensive, abstract statistics: 2000 LA County homeless deaths in 12 months!
Contrast this kind of ‘big local’ solutions approach with that of Aurora, Colorado, City Council. Here, Councilmember Danielle Jurinsky flies into a rage when she discovers that Aurora’s Day Resource Center (Aurora’s homeless hub) will offer an unnecessary frill — half-court basketball — to the homeless who use the facility. She is mollified (though quite possibly not modified — thank you, spell checker) when another councillor explains that the hoop is already paid for, in place and in use.
Another Councilmember ventures that she understands (by some unstated process) that ID documents and other important papers languish uncollected when stored after a tent encampment destruction (‘sweep’ is the polite term). What, then, is the point of saving these documents when they can simply, if illegally, be destroyed along with tents and other meagre possessions of the homeless?
Other councillors are reported as apparently in agreement (nods? grunts?). But no formal vote.
What is are the relative benefit of the apparently contrasting approaches between LA County and Aurora? One abstracts the homeless problem by no-doubt carefully crafted research based upon hundreds and thousands of people in crisis. The other personalizes decisions via casual, thoughtless cruelty punctuated by occasional rabble-rousing outcries of (thank heavens!) humanity.
As to the ‘home’ part of homelessness, Aurora’s reality neatly sums up a world-wide crisis. Ten mats on the floor are currently available for occupancy in an existing shelter. That’s all that can be managed until next year! Similar stats can probably be mined without difficulty from LA County’s lumbering bureaucracies. How does that square, if at all, with the problem of finding/creating homes for the homeless?
For more food for thought on two different council processes that deal with homelessness without any significant supply of homes, read more in the Los Angeles Daily News: Los Angeles County looks to form new entity to solve homeless crisis and in NEWSBREAK: Aurora reserves only 10 mats for those displaced by camping ban
