Saturday, November 22, 2003
Fun City
Mike vows homeless crisis fight0 comments
Most likely without intention, today's New York Daily News has run a group of articles that encapsulate a great deal of what living in today's New York City is like.
The city currently shelters 38,000 people, 17,000 of whom are children - the largest homeless population in city history.
Those 17,000 children number more than many of your whole school districts around the country.
38,000 is a decently sized town.
But today in New York City, these are just the folks with no home to go to, many of them families like yours.
The mayor named a 10-member blue-ribbon committee to draw up a 10-year plan to attack the causes of homelessness.
"I don't think anybody is under the illusion that that goal is going to be something that's easy to reach or that it will be inexpensive," Bloomberg said.
So, these 38,000 folks shouldn't plan on being anywhere like home anytime soon, right? We can also safely assume, then, that many of these 17,000 children will no longer be children if and when they finally end up with a bed to sleep in that doesn't have to be fumigated regularly.
Bloomberg conceded there are no easy solutions to the crisis.
"God knows, homelessness is truly a difficult problem," he said. "But I don't think it is an unsolvable one."
Today's gratuitously stupid quote.
Of course, you can "solve" homelessness.
You start by building affordable housing. I know, no flash of brilliance there. But, it is that simple.
I think it's safe to assume that the bulk of the families showing up at the shelters were priced out of their former apartments, or have lost their jobs and thereby lost the means to pay for the ones they did have. It continues to be a safe assumption that most, if not all, of the families who are currently homeless, might find it a stretch to buy a decent apartment in the city for the going price of $1 million+; or be able to rent one for $2,000 to $5,000/mo. I dunno, just a guess here.
As per Bloomberg et al., you either build it, or you pipe down. Everyone with an income of $150,000 and above, and a pleasant, warm home to go to each night must avoid all comments to reporters about the problem if you've not going to take the simple steps to curb the real estate greed that paralyzes this city.
Either that, or invite a few folks over to the house from the shelter each night. Then, you'll truly look concerned.
More to come on today's Daily News articles in a later post.
Pop Quiz:
When's the last time that your representative in Congress,
or your Senator represented YOUR interests?
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posted by Gotham 8:08 PM
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