Deaths put spotlight on growing US homeless population
bbc.com
The new survey comes after the recent arrest of a suspected serial killer in Los Angeles who targeted the homeless.
Separately, a California man attended court on Friday for manslaughter after allegedly filming himself shooting a sleeping homeless man.
The annual Point In Time survey, taken on a single January night each year, found that 653,104 people experiencing homelessness in the US. The Department of Housing and Urban Development report says that this is the highest number of people since the count began in 2007.
Nearly a quarter of the victims in Los Angeles homicide cases in 2022 were homeless, according to the Los Angeles Police Department. Unhoused people only account for 1.2% of the city's population.
Put a spotlight on it. Yeah right. Put a spotlight on it to NIMBYs who want all those "dirty drug addict homeless" out of their neighborhoods but don't want to do anything about actually helping anyone on the streets.
Here in Kansas City I used to see the occasional dude at a corner with a cardboard sign. Now as I drive around all day(its my job) I see probably 15 a day minimum.
Notice that most of them appear to be older. This is because many people don't have retirement savings anymore and the amount they get from social security has been whittled down to putting them well below the poverty line, so they end up on the streets.
We really need to strengthen the ability to get folks civilly committed.
If you're batshit crazy and, because of that, you're on the streets causing problems for folks... Then we should be able to get your ass medicated.
Not saying we need to lock them up forever necessarily, but at some point I'm fine with 'you get to take meds forever, sorry you had a bad roll of the genetic dice. Hey, it's better than killing you?'