Fresno moves to require permits for homeless encampments-few options other than church-run shelters

[The Straight Story]

Fresno moves to require permits for homeless encampments

Friday, June 22, 2007

By The Associated Press

FRESNO - Homeless people likely will have a harder time setting up encampments in the city under a law that has won preliminary approval.

The city council on Tuesday voted 5-2 to approve the ordinance, which would require people to get permits before they erect tents, tarps and trailers on public property.

Violators would be given a warning and a list of agencies that can help them, but if they don't leave, they could be fined $100. Fines would subsequently rise to $200 and then $500 for subsequent violations in the same year.

The approval comes after criticism over the city's treatment of the homeless and their property, after about two dozen residents of an encampment under a highway overpass were evicted by the California Highway Patrol.

Fresno's homeless population has few options other than church-run shelters, the American Civil Liberties Union argued in a federal lawsuit filed last year to stop the city's raid on homeless encampments.

http://maderatribune.1871dev.com/news/newsview.asp?c=217783

[JeffR]

1. How on God's green earth is a homeless person going to

pony up $100, never mind $500? And if they don't, what's the plan? Throw them in jail, and let taxpayers foot the bill for their incarceration? Further proof, as though any were needed, that America crawled up its own derriere long ago and couldn't be found with a compass and a flashlight at this point.

[Bluerthanblue]

2. ahup, "the land of the free"....

... the land where you MUST either pay money to someone for the privlidge of existing-
"Hell, we're an OWNERSHIP society"-

or pay by going to jail.

There is no "free parking" LEGALLY in the US anymore-
While the laws prohibiting "loitering" or "Vagrancy" sometimes haven't been strongly enforced- they preclude someone from living "legally" without either owning, renting, or being an invited guest of someone who does either OWN or RENT a plot of land, that offers housing which meets "housing code" guidelines.

This reality is pretty sobering when you see it being lived out by fellow humans- I've witnessed it- and it has left me without any answers.

There is a percentage of those who have no permenant shelter, who are in-eligible for any programs which are set up to assist the 'homeless population'- due to substance abuse issues, or inability to submit to religious indoctrination, the requirement to sleep in areas maintained strictly for males or females (families with parent of one sex, and young children of the opposite sex), sometimes just because there is a "family" which desires to stay together.

this should not be.

[EFerrari]

3. So, will the bad debt be a tax write off for fascist Fresno?

'Way to make living illegal. :sarcasm: