Kreskin, take away the coke, heroin, crack etc... fine, one problem sort of solved. You know how easy it is to buy mouthwash and Spray Paint though?
Panhandlers
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Many homeless are simply unable to operate in normal society. There are programs in Vancouver where the social workers help people pay their bills on time because they are simply unable to comprehend that a bill must be paid by a certain date. In most other aspects, though, you wouldn't know they had this deficiency. I have a relative who is homeless and like this.
Also, some of the homeless are merely kids who run away from home because they don't want to live under the rules of their parents.
Many are addicts, some by choice some by circumstance.
And the rest are mentally handicapped.
Also, some of the homeless are merely kids who run away from home because they don't want to live under the rules of their parents.
Many are addicts, some by choice some by circumstance.
And the rest are mentally handicapped.
Bottom line: when panhandlers start to affect the quality of life in your community, they've crossed the line. Vancouver politicians should meet and discuss a workable solution. Just make sure they don't consult with Toronto officials; you do want to improve on the situation.
You see this is a nice example of someone who just doesn't understand the problem.
Kreskin you think that if you jailed some drug dealer for life that there would be no more problem? On any given day there are a thousand people who would gladly step into the drug dealers shoes. Go ahead and arrest them, there are plenty more where they come from. The money is that good.
But should we apply your concepts to alcohol, gambling, and other addictions?
There are screwed up people. Who gets to decide how screwed up is too screwed up? I bet someone could find something about you should they scrutinize you a little on the surface without getting to know you at all, that is screwed up. So what would you have them do? Sections of town you are not allowed to go to? Automatic arrest should you be found somewhere? Maybe wear a insignia so that everyone will know you are one of those screw ups?
Treatment for addiction works. Harm reduction works. Prison only makes things worse and more often than not escalates the problem into a violent one.
Go take a look at some of the dregs we leave to rot on the street next time you are over on East Hastings. Ask yourself which job you would like to interface with this person or that person in. Waiter, Parking valet, Cook, maybe car mechanic, or bus driver, or child care worker. No one in their right mind would hire such a person because their addiction and or mental condition is out of control. You might as well walk up to someone who is depressed and yell at them to cheer up.
They can't fix themselves. They need help. Not prison, real help with getting the basics sorted, getting the addiction under control and a process that takes action when they are going out of control.
It costs money to do that, but that amount is far less than it costs to house someone in a federal prison cell for a year. Pay their rent directly to the landlord, pay their utilities too, along with an account at a local grocery store, clothes, and take control of their drugs. Feed them what they need when they need it until you can modify the dosage and help them kick. When they go off the farm, they get picked up, dried out for a night or two and back in the saddle.
This is how you beat that problem. Then no one should feel obligated to drop a nickle in the paper cup or hat because there is a viable alternative to life on the streets.
What we have now is a far cry from that sort of thing. Like forcing you to fix a car with a few tools, two are for something else, one is broken and someone lost the instructions. On top of that the person handing them out is angry, hates you and doesn't want to be doing that job anyway.
Unforgiven, if you haven't been down to the Vancouver Eastside you should book yourself a vacation and take a look. Everyone down there is screwed up from drugs. That's why they are there. They are the result of the problem - drugs. Crystal meth, crack, heroin. People in Greater Vancouver, or western Canada for that matter, who have serious drug problems congregate in that area to find them or raise money to buy them. If they didn't have access to these drugs when they were in high school, or wherever it was introduced to them in the first place, they wouldn't be there. Most would've been productive members of society if drugs hadn't messed up their lives or their parents lives. Anyone caught importing herion or trafficking large quantities of heroin, for example, should be locked up for life with the key thrown away. Those pushing these products for profit are the biggest problems we have. The rest of the problems aren't even close. Nearly every B&E, shoplifting or robbery is the result of a drug problem..people trying to acquire the capital they need to buy drugs or pay drug debts. Those people are the result of the root problem - people who profit from them.
Yep. Fact is drugs are here and there is nothing you or anyone else can do about it. You really have to accept that fact before you can move on from that spot. Now the government in the US. has thrown over 30 billion dollars at the drug problem so far this year. They did the same last year and the year before that and so on and so on.
You can put someone in jail for life but there will be another person taking over that job of selling drugs before you even get the first one to the police station. Do you honestly think that will ever work?
I've been to East Hastings before, though it was some time ago. I know what you are talking about. But you are talking about symptoms not the illness.
Drugs are expensive when you have a large habit. Expensive because of the risk and punitive measures taken when arrested with it. If someone gave you the drugs for free, would you commit crime to get money to pay someone for them?
The problem isn't that people can get drugs. You can't have an effect on that no matter what you do. Drugs are everywhere including schools. While you may think that is wrong, it's a fact. And there is absolutely nothing you are going to do about that other than dry the market up.
Why do you think people will pay $10 for a pack of smokes? Now consider why people will risk probably a fine for buying untaxed smokes from some Indian for less than half of that.
Drugs are no different. People get addicted run into the problem when the drugs start taking more and more of their money until they crash and burn, and turn to crime to help support it.
Ask any addict who has managed to get control of their addiction, they will tell you that it isn't impossible, just damn difficult. That is where we should be putting our taxes.
One of the biggest problems in North America is that we as a society are addicted to cheap. If we really cared about quality there would be no
Wal marts. No made in China, no knock off merch. But this is the way we approach government. While those who work there manage to make a very nice living, the poorest of the poor are looked upon as a problem to be dealt with by the cheapest way possible. Because someone is ripping the system off and getting a little extra for nothing.
Drug addicts are manageable and what's more, under the right care, they can become productive again to the point of supporting themselves with but a few services to care for the things like drugs, medical and counseling. While that may run into the tens of thousands per year, it isn't even close to what it costs to keep someone in a prison cell for the same year.
You seem to have the time to talk to them (which I have volenteering at a soup kitchen and running a program at Christmas time for poor families) running your errands but no time to help? I'm not suggesting you literally pick them up yourself but pressure all levels of government to lend them a hand up instead of your handout.
Most people on the street have some severe issue menatlly or addictiction so the lazy ones are few but they are out there, my nephew is one of them. He just refuses to work and has ended up on the street when he comes from a strong family with many success stories....I don't feel sorry for him one bit.
No, I am not the other Avro, the only other forum I've really been to is CKA. I'm not sure how anyone has the time for more than one with running errands and all.
In 2002 it was estimated that he cost of property crime in Vancouver alone was 109 million. That's only the cost of property crime. What about the intangible cost of completely ruining peoples lives - the lost opportunity costs for kids brought up in drug invested households, where their futures are snorted by their parents. The cost to society for drugs is more than the cost of any prison system. North America has been too leniant on the scum who push hard street drugs, and everyone either knows it or perceives it as a slap on the wrist. It should be easy to see - you get caught with a crystal meth lab?..gone. Bye Bye, have a nice life. There should be zero tolerance for those dregs and the others who make a living out of ruining people and society.
I'm sure these people have all kinds of problems but paying panhandlers will not help anything. These people want you to think that if you give them just a bit more money, you will solve their problems and assuage your misplaced guilt at the same time. No you won't on both counts. Meanwhile let's get these people off the streets, clean them up, and find them some work to do. It has been proven to my satisfaction that this problem will not solve itself, so we have to solve it. Panhandling is not an acceptable calling for anyone.
Toro, you've hit a very large nail very hard. Of the large population of homeless in the vancouver downtown east side how many of them have Fetal Alcohol Syndrome? How many have other psychosi's from using solvents, spray paint, crystal meth? The problem is no longer a one of simply getting them a job. Many would simply be unable to hold onto that job.
I use to work for Esquimalt Neighbourhood House in Esquimalt (Victoria) The house operated a job search club which was mandatory for males on income assistance. The biggest problem we had was many of the long term recipients were malnourished and unable to pull a full 8 hour day in the classroom without passing out. How are they ever to work a full 8 hour day? If the individual is homeless how are they able to get up at the right time, shower and get to the job site on time? in an acceptable condition? and perform physical labour?
If I were living on the street there's no way in hell I'd want to spend every day sober and alert to my current situation. I'd be as high as a kite as often as possible. What a horrible horrible existance living on the street is.
People with mental health and disability issues can often find programs where they can rent social housing based on a % of their income - generally 30%. But if someone elects to spend 99% of their income on drugs then there is no program for them other than homelessness. I'm afraid that moving these people out of there will just make more room for the next wave. It's time the root of the problem was dealt with. We wouldn't see the benefits for years but it would be worth the wait.
I went to football game last Thursday evening. We went to the pre-game tailgate party. Guess what... Two of them begging us for drug money. After the game I was confronted by two more on the way back to my vehicle. It was plain to see these people were in a drug induced stupor. You can't get away from that stuff anywhere down there.
I went to football game last Thursday evening. We went to the pre-game tailgate party. Guess what... Two of them begging us for drug money. After the game I was confronted by two more on the way back to my vehicle. It was plain to see these people were in a drug induced stupor. You can't get away from that stuff anywhere down there.
I don't know who is calling for an awards show for hard drug pushers. You seem to not want to follow along here. You can lock everybody up for life but eventually you get to the point where there isn't enough money to take care of them all. And still there will be more drug pushers. So what is it you would like to do? Try and see if you can lock all the bad people in the world who would come to Canada or the US and sell the drugs someone from another country gave them to bring and sell here?
No one is saying that an out of control heroin addiction is a good thing.
So repeating the phrase, lock them up and throw away the key, and Drugs are bad, doesn't do anything at all. Cripes Half a million people a year are arrested for pot alone. Do you think you can't buy pot from any high school in any city in Canada? Come on Kreskin, think it over. The war on drugs was lost. Long time ago. It's over, let it go.
You can't lie to kids and then expect them to believe what you say. You can tell them that drugs are bad and will wreck their lives, only for them to see people use drugs and get along fine. Just like alcohol, you can't say that drinking alcohol will make you an alcoholic and will ruin your life. Plenty of people enjoy alcohol and have no problem with it at all. Live fine upstanding lives and contribute to society. Same with other drugs. That some get messed up, is no reason to arrest everyone. They tried that during the prohibition years in the States and look what happened there.
Consider what it is that ruins someones life when drugs become a problem. It's the high cost of the drug. The stigma attached to a criminal conviction. Where will someone work with a record? Nothing but low end low pay jobs.
People don't suffer addiction for fun.
Profit margins on drugs are around 93%. How many multi ton shipments do you need to smuggle into the country and sell in order to make your investment back handsomely at the mark up?
The only way to stop that is to take control of the market. Like Gas, would you pay a buck a litre of you could buy it down town for 7 cents a litre? There would be no gas stations in sight in less than a year. Once done then you can control and regulate that market until it is under control like alcohol. While there are still alcoholics, there are facilities to deal with that. Though always given short shrift.
You may be right but making panhandling illegal would force us to deal with it. A few years ago a lot of these people would have been in Essondale. At least in that institution they had a bed and three squares. I think at least a part of the root of this problem, is that we put up with it. Vagrancy used to be against the law. It still is. It is time we enforced that law.
You see, you know nothing about addiction.
Why do you think that addiction is just someone choosing to do something?
It is as much that as it would be your choice to drink a glass of water every half hour with two BC Lions offensive tackle linesmen standing behind you putting the hurt on you every thirty one minutes until you drank the water.
Why do you think you can't get away from that stuff? Do you think that the two junkies have never been arrested? Chances are the've been through the "system" any number of times. Hence why I am saying that the current system doesn't and will not work.
Correct. But the problem is that no one wants to pay for it. So the poor, including the working poor get the shaft when it comes to services, because they won't lead a campaign against a government and personally lobby to get someone else elected to the position the current politician holds like those with money will.
You should read up on fetal alchohol syndrome and schizophrenia and many of the other mental illness's that affect these people. It's all well and good to say there are programs for these individuals. However with FAS it ruins comprehension and the more sever the affliction the less they understand consequences or correlations. Which means that they can't put together 1+1 and come up with 2. So regardless of how many programs are available to them they'll never figure out that they should go.
Giving people more access to heroin only creates more heroin addicts. Heroin addicts don't get along fine. None of them do.