Tent encampments may have moved much closer toward being realized


	This map which was published with the Bee article will be replaced with SacHo's own map as soon as is possible.

Legal campsites for homeless citizens within the county of Sacramento have moved a big step closer toward being realized, based on news reported in a front-page article in today’s Sacramento Bee.

The Sacramento city and Sacramento county governments are moving toward recognition that persons rent homeless are not criminals by result of the circumstance of impoverishment.

The Bee article, written by the reporter assigned to the homelessness beat, Cynthia Hubert, tells us that the leaders and police in the city and county, and higher-ups in so-called homeless-advocate organizations, are now scouting for possible locations where encampments may be established.

Prime spots being considered include a location within the American River Parkway, close to the Blue Diamond nut processing plant, and just a little more than a half-mile from Loaves & Fishes. [See map.] Another idea is to establish an indoor tent city inside a now-empty warehouse.

There was a lot of optimism expressed in the Bee article that opinion has coalesced toward creation of a tent encampment for the homeless. Mark Merin, the lead attorney in a long-standing lawsuit on behalf of the homeless, against the city and county, is reported saying that he is now optimistic something will get done.

Our city’s new major, Kevin Johnson, appears to be fully supportive. His knowledge of success with a homeless encampment in Phoenix, where he lived while playing for the Suns basketball team, assures him that such a project can be successful.

However, enormous opposition to any set plan is certain to emerge. Home and business owners near any proposed encampments are sure to complain bitterly about any perceived cost to their happiness, safety or livelihoods. It’s the well-known (and at least somewhat legitimate) NIMBY argument: Not wanting anything In My BackYard that is undesireable and can possibly negatively affect one's happiness or livlihood.

Comments posted online in response to the Bee article were overwhelmingly negative toward the establishment of any tent encampments. Many of the comments were quite nasty and demonstrated a profound ignorance of what causes homelessness and what homeless people are like.

Comments

Loaves & Fishes implicates Buddhism and Jack Kornfield in its June Donations Plea.

The Sukhothai Traimit Golden Buddha was found in a clay-and-plaster overlaid buddha statue in 1959, after laying in wait for 500 years. It's huge and heavy: just under 10 feet tall and weighs 5 1/2 tons. At the beginning of their June newsletter , Loaves and Fishes relates a story, taken from the beginning of renowned Buddhist teacher Jack Kornfield's 2008 book The Wise Heart: A Guide to the Universal Teachings of Buddhist Psychology . The first part and first chapter in Kornfield's book is "Part I: Who are you really?" and chapter 1 is called "Nobility: Our Original Goodness," which ought to serve as a clue to what the beginning of the book is about, not that that sentiment isn't strewn through-out the chapter, section and book such that what Kornfield is telling us should be crystal clear. Somehow, the not-ready-for-primetime management at Loaves & Fishes have managed to use Kornfield's wise and kindly words in a way that mangles th...

In an act of Collective Punishment, Loaves & Fishes closes its park in the morning on New Year’s Day

Calvin [a "green hat" in Unfriendly Park] makes the argument for continued incompetent management. Hobbes represents me — only, in real life, I don't have that good a coat . In an act of Collective Punishment, Loaves & Fishes closes its park in the morning on New Year’s Day In one respect — and only one — that I can think of, Loaves & Fishes is NOT hypocritical: The management hates the way America is run and wants to turn it into a backward communist country . Consistent with that, Loaves & Fishes’ management runs its facility like a backward communist country. The People’s Republic of Loaves & Fishes. A seemingly minor thing happened on New Year’s Day. A couple of people smoked a joint in Loaves & Fishes’ Friendship Park and one of the park directors, or both of them, determined, at about 10am, that, in retribution, they would punish all the homeless there by closing the park for the day. This is something the managers of the park do all the ...

Far-left visionaries at "Homeless Power Forum" hope to transform America [into Bulgaria?]

Poster from " Hobo Art Show " at Western Regional Advocacy Project website. Paul Boden, a keynote speaker at the Homeless Power Forum, is WRAP's Executive Director. Yesterday, "Homeless Power Forum: Vision & Survival" was held at the Delany Center at Loaves & Fishes. Thinking it was about to end (I should read my literature, dummy!), I stayed for only the first hour-and-a-half of a 5 1/2 hour program. But that was enough to hear the "keynote speakers," Ethel Long-Scott and Paul Boden, and to sound alarm bells about the direction of the Safe Ground effort. Today, I believe that the confusion that is implicit in the many meanings that have been given to safe ground , also spelled capitalized [Safe Ground], and as one word [SafeGround], is intentional: to lead people in the homeless community in Sacramento from the most positive and favorable meaning, a legal homeless campground, to a hopelessly-naive political far-far left Utopian vision o...

Sacramento Homeless blog

Search This Blog