Visited Portland, please explain the sacred homeless people and crazy bicyclists to me (Phoenix: 2015, neighborhoods)

[leastprime]

My son's home in Seattle, displaced 3 low income housing and replaced it with 11 townhouses.

[leastprime]

it's as bad in Seattle and Salem.

[Leisesturm]

Originally Posted by redguard57

I'm not a pdx resident, but I have to say that when I do go into the city the homeless problem seems... I'll call it "less bad" than Seattle or most big California cities. I've had much worse run-ins with homeless in other cities - Dallas, Houston, San Francisco... all worse. Oh, and Chicago.... MUCH WORSE.

This past year I went to see a decent number of Blazers games and would stay downtown overnight afterwards... I was actually expecting to see a kind of homeless armageddon in the steel bridge, Waterfront park area based on what I read on internet forums. As I walked from my DT hotel to and from the Moda Center, I was pleasantly surprised to see it not that bad. There were a few homeless camped out on my route but they minded their own business.

Didn't PDX send some kind of delegation to San Antonio to check out their homeless resources? Seems like they returned and did nothing. They built a homeless campus there that seems to have reduced their problem somewhat. Although I will say this - the homeless of San Antonio would crowd the downtown library there a lot worse than I've ever seen them in the Multnomah central library. So I have yet to be convinced that PDX has disproportionately bad homeless problem. Every city has a problem with them.

Thank you for your perspective. Sadly many of the most strenuous opinions on how things are in Portland are from people that have never gone out of the state recently (or ever). Certainly not out of the PNW. Every few months a sofa, or end tables, or pile of car tires winds up on the end of my street, with or without a 'For Free' sign on it. Friends, that is illegal dumping. Pay the $25 and take your unwanted junk to the landfill. Thank you very much. This is the exact same mentality exhibited in wanting Portland officials to round up homeless people downtown, transport and release them in Idaho or Colorado in the wee hours of the morning. I wouldn't feel very good knowing that high ranking officials in my city were on board with that kind of Civic Irresponsibility. Let's have rational solutions put on the table or none at all. My solution would work, btw.

Portland needs $100M for a water filtration plant. They tried to argue with a straight face that they didn't need one. They succeeded for awhile, but its time to pay the piper. I would have been saving up for the inevitable, but no, there is no money allocated for this necessity. <snap!> I know! Revisit the $100M tax break that was negotiated with Intel last year...

[Yankeemama]

Originally Posted by Leisesturm

Thank you for your perspective. Sadly many of the most strenuous opinions on how things are in Portland are from people that have never gone out of the state recently (or ever). Certainly not out of the PNW. Every few months a sofa, or end tables, or pile of car tires winds up on the end of my street, with or without a 'For Free' sign on it. Friends, that is illegal dumping. Pay the $25 and take your unwanted junk to the landfill. Thank you very much. This is the exact same mentality exhibited in wanting Portland officials to round up homeless people downtown, transport and release them in Idaho or Colorado in the wee hours of the morning. I wouldn't feel very good knowing that high ranking officials in my city were on board with that kind of Civic Irresponsibility. Let's have rational solutions put on the table or none at all. My solution would work, btw.

Portland needs $100M for a water filtration plant. They tried to argue with a straight face that they didn't need one. They succeeded for awhile, but its time to pay the piper. I would have been saving up for the inevitable, but no, there is no money allocated for this necessity. <snap!> I know! Revisit the $100M tax break that was negotiated with Intel last year...

The OP says he lives in LA area in Glendale and insists our homeless problem is worse but when I was in Glendale/ Burbank/ Pasadena and LA proper last summer... I don't think so. Maybe the OP wears rose colored glasses everyday at home in LA but his perspective is off.

[karlsch]

Originally Posted by redguard57

............
Didn't PDX send some kind of delegation to San Antonio to check out their homeless resources? Seems like they returned and did nothing. ...........

I referred to the San Antonio program in this post: //www.city-data.com/forum/46907573-post41.html

The last link is about the Portland delegation. Yes!! they did nothing because: "I don't think our ethos would allow it," she says.

I guess the ethos allows the current Portland homeless situation.

[freemkt]

Originally Posted by ccjarider

Sure dude, that is the reason downtown Portland looks and acts like a 3rd world country. Not enough Socialism.

INSANE Comments.

I thought homelessness was an inherent feature of capitalism - a feature, not a bug.

Maximizing profit guarantees a non-zero vacancy rate.

[ccjarider]

Originally Posted by freemkt

I thought homelessness was an inherent feature of capitalism - a feature, not a bug.

Maximizing profit guarantees a non-zero vacancy rate.

Nope - you fail.

Maximizing profit does guarantee a zero vacancy rate. A vacant unit makes no $. Rates would adjust to ensure unit is not vacant. If demand goes down, rate would go down. This is evidenced in many cities such as Detroit and Buffalo.

Also as to homelessness, in a pure unfettered capitalistic marketplace, there would be a homeless solution because someone would be able to make a profit from it.

It may or may not be a solution that bleeding hearts would look fondly on but it would be a viable solution.

We live in neither a pure capitalistic nor a pure socialistic marketplace, thus there are holes.

[Leisesturm]

When Shooting Feels. What possible relevance does this have to the discussion at hand? Use your imaginations.

[Leisesturm]

Originally Posted by ccjarider

Nope - you fail.

Maximizing profit does guarantee a zero vacancy rate. A vacant unit makes no $. Rates would adjust to ensure unit is not vacant. If demand goes down, rate would go down. This is evidenced in many cities such as Detroit and Buffalo.

Also as to homelessness, in a pure unfettered capitalistic marketplace, there would be a homeless solution because someone would be able to make a profit from it.

It may or may not be a solution that bleeding hearts would look fondly on but it would be a viable solution.

We live in neither a pure capitalistic nor a pure socialistic marketplace, thus there are holes.

No, neither one of you fail, to use your logic. To a Capitalist, more Capitalism looks like the way to go, and vice versa. What if it isn't so black and white? I doubt that it is. We have the EVIDENCE of Democratic Socialist economies kicking our Democratic Capitalist butts in every social metric that matters to the overall happiness index of a human being.

I lived for the better part of a year next to a perfectly fine vacant two bedroom unit in close-in NE. My conversations with the renting agent were informative. "We never lower rents. We may offer move in incentives during periods of low demand, like an LED TV, or Basic Cable, or 1/2 off the first months rent, but we never actually lower rent on a unit". They did, in fact, lower rent on that vacant unit, but I guess that didn't count since there wasn't a tenant in it.

I don't know that a vacant unit makes no $. I am certain that the tax attorneys of rental management companies have ways to show a loss that actually pays them back the money they are losing. In fact the very poster you are responding to suggested some kind of tax on individuals or companies that carry vacant units on their books for an entire tax year. I think that is a brilliant idea. Incentivise actually renting apartment units at, or below (what a concept) market rates so they can be rented.

Every week my supermarket throws 30lbs of unsold Avocados in the dumpster. At $0.80/$0.99 they only sell so fast. About half get sold. The other half rots. I look at the waste. The manager of the franchise looks at the fact that at the retail price point set they made at least 15% profit on the 1/2 of the total shipment sold. Capitalist greed is responsible for a lot of wasted human and material potential in this country.

I for one cannot see the harm in moving things over to the left a little bit... ok, a lot to the left. But that's me. What I absolutely do not believe is in moving any further to the right as it sounds like you are itching to have us do.

[ccjarider]

Originally Posted by Leisesturm

No, neither one of you fail, to use your logic. To a Capitalist, more Capitalism looks like the way to go, and vice versa. What if it isn't so black and white? I doubt that it is. We have the EVIDENCE of Democratic Socialist economies kicking our Democratic Capitalist butts in every social metric that matters to the overall happiness index of a human being.



I for one cannot see the harm in moving things over to the left a little bit... ok, a lot to the left. But that's me. What I absolutely do not believe is in moving any further to the right as it sounds like you are itching to have us do.

EU countries are (or were) mono-cultures and thus relatively easy to get all parties on board with whatever type of gov't/society desired. These are small countries where costs are not as exorbitant and these expenditures would not be possible in large USA. Eastern European/Asian immigration is destroying their mono-cultures. Turmoil is already evident in EU and happiness indicators are dropping.

EU countries have enjoyed a below market survival cost (military) thanks to benevolence of USA since beginning of WW2. This low survival costs has allowed "investment" in social welfare, not possible in USA.
Those days are over and EU will be increasing military expenses.

In other words, you are referencing dated information. Perhaps one could say EU had a good 50-60 year ride but it is ending. This is good. Liberal Socialism only works with other people's money.

As to your last point - Yes.