As of about 5 weeks ago, I'm inside for the first time in a few years.
I shower every day. I got rid of the bugs that were eating me alive. I'm able to lay down when I study, and I have a place to be during the day, and to organize myself.
These are the things which help make a home a home, not just being indoors at night.
But I feel the change already. I find myself reviewing old comments or passing people I maybe previously flipped off, and I realize, wow, I had a chip on my shoulder. But that is what it does to you -it puts you in war mode when you have to experience agencies like ODOT or the police crippling your ability to establish yourself anywhere, stripping away the people you found a sense of safety, trust and belonging with. Then you're left sleeping alone with a pick-axe next to your head looking over your head every five minutes.
Then I got to read in papers about other people discussing what to do with my life. About how shelters and overpriced apartments so small I'd never even be able to invite a friend over are the solution to homelessness rather than the underlying cause.
It is experiences like these that made me want to come out to public meetings and say," hey, you're killing me". But when I show up to these meetings, for example, after watching the county board kill 45 minutes patting one another on the back I was told to please keep it to two minutes because we're running out of time.
Now we're discussing handing three million dollars to an agency that has not involved homeless people in their decision making process. On the contrary; when I went to their meeting a couple months back TPI was actively turning homeless people away at the door.
This is job security for him, not solutions for us. And this is taking the easy way out for you politicians involved. You think shelters are solutions to homelessness - short term or long term -then go try being homeless in bigger towns that have been there done that.
The problem as I see it begins with the founding fathers. James Madison said it was the primary role of government to protect people's rights to property. But who put what in place to protect people from property ownership itself? This was not such an issue in the 1700's, but today it is.
Land use has hit unprecedented heights. Exit options have not narrowed, they've dissapeared. This is going to get worse before it gets better. And it will not get better until someone tries something different.
I'd like to thank you Ted, for going out of your way to go to a ground level and getting to know the people you deal with. I don't speak for all homeless, but real solutions begin with real observations.
I shower every day. I got rid of the bugs that were eating me alive. I'm able to lay down when I study, and I have a place to be during the day, and to organize myself.
These are the things which help make a home a home, not just being indoors at night.
But I feel the change already. I find myself reviewing old comments or passing people I maybe previously flipped off, and I realize, wow, I had a chip on my shoulder. But that is what it does to you -it puts you in war mode when you have to experience agencies like ODOT or the police crippling your ability to establish yourself anywhere, stripping away the people you found a sense of safety, trust and belonging with. Then you're left sleeping alone with a pick-axe next to your head looking over your head every five minutes.
Then I got to read in papers about other people discussing what to do with my life. About how shelters and overpriced apartments so small I'd never even be able to invite a friend over are the solution to homelessness rather than the underlying cause.
It is experiences like these that made me want to come out to public meetings and say," hey, you're killing me". But when I show up to these meetings, for example, after watching the county board kill 45 minutes patting one another on the back I was told to please keep it to two minutes because we're running out of time.
Now we're discussing handing three million dollars to an agency that has not involved homeless people in their decision making process. On the contrary; when I went to their meeting a couple months back TPI was actively turning homeless people away at the door.
This is job security for him, not solutions for us. And this is taking the easy way out for you politicians involved. You think shelters are solutions to homelessness - short term or long term -then go try being homeless in bigger towns that have been there done that.
The problem as I see it begins with the founding fathers. James Madison said it was the primary role of government to protect people's rights to property. But who put what in place to protect people from property ownership itself? This was not such an issue in the 1700's, but today it is.
Land use has hit unprecedented heights. Exit options have not narrowed, they've dissapeared. This is going to get worse before it gets better. And it will not get better until someone tries something different.
I'd like to thank you Ted, for going out of your way to go to a ground level and getting to know the people you deal with. I don't speak for all homeless, but real solutions begin with real observations.
