Social Can homeless people be fined for sleeping outside? A rural Oregon city asks the US Supreme Court

[Limbo Pete]

The figure I quoted was for the PHB which is drawn from the City of Portland, not a pooled fund.

Funding for homeless services doesn't come 100% exclusively from Metro tax, but Metro specifically oversees the Homeless Service Tax, which funds a variety homeless services in the City of Portland and all areas under Metro jurisdiction. It's a huge tax that makes up a very significant portion of all funding for homeless services, and is allotted through different regional administrative agencies. That's why your initial complaint was disconnected from reality. And I get it, we have a very unusual way of doing things with this specific regional government situation. Incidentally, Multnomah county in particular is having issues not spending those tax dollars fast enough. They've had problems just sitting on millions of dollars.

 

[PeterGriffin]

Maybe the NIMBY and council folks could take in the homeless people, so they are not homeless anymore and solve their own problem.

Yes, some people are addicts and victims of their own consequences and shitty decisions. Not every homeless person is a lowlife degenerate, and the exponential rising costs of absolutely everything is forcing people out of their homes/apartments etc.

We have a rapidly growing homeless problem here in Nova Scotia, and sadly, I expect it will only continue and grow. Even though technically we live in a "have-not" province, I suspect this is an issue everywhere.

Fining people who have little-to-nothing is not just ridiculous, it's completely absurd as a solution. What's the end goal? So what... the person who has nothing and can't afford to pay the fine, so you incarcerate them and give them a warm bed and three meals a day? Quite the incentive to pay up, lol. How many homeless people to do think will pay fines if they have to choose between food and paying the fine to start with?

Is everyone who is so quick to suggest imprisoning them or committing homeless persons to an institution of some form also ready and willing to accept increased taxes to pay for solutions like this? I don't know what the sure-fire solution to curbing homelessness is, it's a complicated and costly problem, but I also don't think it's my job to make their already shitty situations even worse. I do what I can to help people in need or deserving of it, not find ways to kick them while they are down.

 

[Madmick]

Funding for homeless services doesn't come 100% exclusively from Metro tax, but Metro specifically oversees the Homeless Service Tax, which funds a variety homeless services in the City of Portland and all areas under Metro jurisdiction. It's a huge tax that makes up a very significant portion of all funding for homeless services, and is allotted through different regional administrative agencies. That's why your initial complaint was disconnected from reality. And I get it, we have a very unusual way of doing things with this specific regional government situation.

And here comes the bargaining after the fact once again.

You got the populations wrong, so now you retreat to this. If you notice, the figure I quoted covers from 2015-2023, and yet this tax you're highlighting covering the Portland Metro area (the one DoctorTaco wasn't originally referencing at all) was passed by voters in 2020. Furthermore, the homeless figure inflation I quoted wasn't for this Metro area. It's not me who is disconnected from reality, and symmetry of figures. As I said pages ago, apples and oranges.

So on yet another matter...concession accepted.

 

[Rob Battisti]

Like this post if you’ve ever consistently volunteered at a soup kitchen.

I have and not enough people do.

 

[ObsoleteSoul]

Like this post if you’ve ever consistently volunteered at a soup kitchen.

I have and not enough people do.

Yep, but I stopped... Need to again. I was living in Seattle and had nobody up there, so would help at the shelters around downtown. Would volunteer on holidays too, as I would just be sitting around by myself if not. Might as well help others while also alleviating loneliness. So maybe it was a bit of selfishness too, but it is at least something.

 

[Rob Battisti]

Yep, but I stopped... Need to again. I was living in Seattle and had nobody up there, so would help at the shelters around downtown. Would volunteer on holidays too, as I would just be sitting around by myself if not. Might as well help others while also alleviating loneliness. So maybe it was a bit of selfishness too, but it is at least something.

I read a bunch about Dorthy Day. Amazing woman. We should all take time to volunteer.

 

[Limbo Pete]

And here comes the bargaining after the fact once again.

You got the populations wrong, so now you retreat to this. If you notice, the figure I quoted covers from 2015-2023, and yet this tax you're highlighting covering the Portland Metro area (the one DoctorTaco wasn't originally referencing at all) was passed by voters in 2020. Furthermore, the homeless figure inflation I quoted wasn't for this Metro area. It's not me who is disconnected from reality, and symmetry of figures. As I said pages ago, apples and oranges.

So on yet another matter...concession accepted.

You're losing it. How much clearer can I be? Portland is IN the Metro Area, we pay the Metro tax, it funds our homeless services lmao. It's a massive amount of money.
Edit: Let me try and be even clearer here, somehow. "Metro" is a NOUN.

 

[Madmick]

You're losing it. How much clearer can I be? Portland is IN the Metro Area, we pay the Metro tax, it funds our homeless services lmao. It's a massive amount of money.

Duh! Holy bejeesus, it doesn't seem to matter how many times I explain this stuff to you guys. You two have botched population figures, total relevant government budgets, revenue collection chronologies, and more in this bungled attempt to undermine what was a simple, cohesive point.

My point was this: Portland has spent a tremendous amount of money since 2015 on supportive housing, and yet its homeless has skyrocketed. And while I did not claim it spent above the average relative to other major cities or metropolitan areas in the USA, since I didn't look into that, I did observe the figure relative to the population was so high it leads one to suspect this is the case. I provided evidence.

Do the two of you take issue with this? If so, go collect the data. Share the following:

1. How much has the homeless population increased or decreased since 2015?
2. How much was spent in total, all-inclusive, on government supportive housing during this period?
3. Is the second more or less relative to the average across the US per capita? First unadjusted, but second adjusted, if you prefer that figure, relative to Portland's income and spending power.

You can do this for the city of Portland, for the Oregon Regional government (your "Portland Metro"), the Portland MSA, or Multnomah County itself. I really don't care which you pick, but since the fact I observed this simple truth bothers you so much, and you keep fucking up your attempts to nitpick it, just do some legwork of your own.

Or...concede that I was right on all points.

 

[Limbo Pete]

Duh! Holy bejeesus, it doesn't seem to matter how many times I explain this stuff to you guys. You two have botched population figures, total relevant government budgets, revenue collection chronologies, and more in this bungled attempt to undermine what was a simple, cohesive point.

My point was this: Portland has spent a tremendous amount of money since 2015 on supportive housing, and yet its homeless has skyrocketed. And while I did not claim it spent above the average relative to other major cities or metropolitan areas in the USA, since I didn't look into that, I did observe the figure relative to the population was so high it leads one to suspect this is the case. I provided evidence.

Do the two of you take issue with this? If so, go collect the data. Share the following:

1. How much has the homeless population increased or decreased since 2015?
2. How much was spent in total, all-inclusive, on government supportive housing during this period?
3. Is the second more or less relative to the average across the US per capita? First unadjusted, but second adjusted, if you prefer that figure, relative to Portland's income and spending power.

You can do this for the city of Portland, for the Oregon Regional government (your "Portland Metro"), the Portland MSA, or Multnomah County itself. I really don't care which you pick, but since the fact I observed this simple truth bothers you so much, and you keep fucking up your attempts to nitpick it, just do some legwork of your own.

Or...concede that I was right on all points.

The actual problem, Mick, is that you referenced Metro services while whining ignorantly about the City of Portland, without understanding the actual distinctions we have here regionally for how these services are administered. If you did, you wouldn't be conflating or compartmentalizing the City of Portland itself as though it exists on a tax and service island apart from the rest of the Metro region.

 

[Madmick]

The actual problem, Mick, is that you referenced Metro services while whining ignorantly about the City of Portland, without understanding the actual distinctions we have here regionally for how these services are administered. If you did, you wouldn't be conflating or compartmentalizing the City of Portland itself as though it exists on a tax and service island apart from the rest of the Metro region.

Yet I did not! LOL, just now, you didn't even realize the tax you referenced didn't go into effect until five years after the budgetary range expenditure tally I highlighted began.

And now, after you have faceplanted supporting Taco for several pages concerning the population of a specific area that was undeniably referenced, I afford you the opportunity to contradict my point by specifically highlighting the total supportive housing spending and homeless population change for whichever area you choose to focus, and what do you do?

You whine, tuck tail, and run.

So I will say it one final time. Concession accepted.

 

[Limbo Pete]

Yet I did not! LOL, just now, you didn't even realize the tax you referenced didn't go into effect until five years after the budgetary range expenditure tally I highlighted began.

You did lmao you just didn't know what the fuck you were talking about
Dude, Metro didn't start existing with the Homeless Service Tax, and they didn't start providing those kinds of services with that tax. And you would know this, if you had literally any clue what you have been talking about this entire time.

No, housing isn't the isn't the sole root cause, LMFAO. Portland went to extraordinary lengths in the last two decades to provide free or low-cost housing to the homeless: through bond measures, or permanent free/subsidied supportive housing complexes like Findley Commons.

Do me a favor, Mick. Do me a favor and click that link _you_ provided. I want you to click that link, and then look closely at the page. Knowing what you know now (after I have explained it), I would appreciate it if you'd go ahead point your head the other direction when invariably barfing from rage lmao

Spoiler

 

[DoctorTaco]

You did lmao you just didn't know what the fuck you were talking about
Dude, Metro didn't start existing with the Homeless Service Tax, and they didn't start providing those kinds of services with that tax. And you would know this, if you had literally any clue what you have been talking about this entire time.

Do me a favor, Mick. Do me a favor and click that link _you_ provided. I want you to click that link, and then look closely at the page. Knowing what you know now (after I have explained it), I would appreciate it if you'd go ahead point your head the other direction when invariably barfing from rage lmao

Spoiler

oof

 

[Limbo Pete]

oof

 

[Madmick]

You did lmao you just didn't know what the fuck you were talking about
Dude, Metro didn't start existing with the Homeless Service Tax, and they didn't start providing those kinds of services with that tax. And you would know this, if you had literally any clue what you have been talking about this entire time.

Do me a favor, Mick. Do me a favor and click that link _you_ provided. I want you to click that link, and then look closely at the page. Knowing what you know now (after I have explained it), I would appreciate it if you'd go ahead point your head the other direction when invariably barfing from rage lmao

Spoiler

LOL, the sentence you highlighted referenced the past two decades. That was NOT the figure I cited for the 2015-2023 $1.7bn figure.

Indeed, Portland, a city of just 650K, spent over $1.7bn on supporting housing programs alone from 2015-2023, and yet their homeless population increased 65%.

That you might have found here:


Allow me to highlight you blathering imbecile:

Since first declaring a state of emergency on homelessness in 2015, Portland has invested $1.7 billion into homelessness. That’s billion with a b. This does not include State, County, or Metro numbers, which are not tracked by our City Budget Office.

 

[kenetics]

I don't see how you can possibly find a constitutional argument that allows for fining someone for sleeping or standing in a public space like a park. And I would struggle even more to find a textual or originalist argument for that given the country's rural start.

Agree. I mean their homeless , where else are humans are supposed to stay . Now we want to say they can't even sleep outside? I think the supreme Court will say they can.

The government has failed them by not providing the services.(Even though it will cost billions) We send that money to everyone else.

 

[Seano]

Agree. I mean their homeless , where else are humans are supposed to stay . Now we want to say they can't even sleep outside? I think the supreme Court will say they can.

The government has failed them by not providing the services.(Even though it will cost billions) We send that money to everyone else.

We already have laws against vagrancy.

 

[Limbo Pete]

LOL, the sentence you highlighted referenced the past two decades. That was NOT the figure I cited for the 2015-2023 $1.7bn figure.

That you might have found here:

Allow me to highlight you blathering imbecile:

So you cited Metro housing bonds you didn't understand in contradiction of yourself? Mick, this is like the worst panic wrestling i've ever seen lmao

 

[Madmick]

So you cited Metro housing bonds you didn't understand in contradiction of yourself? Mick, this is like the worst panic wrestling i've ever seen lmao

LMFAO. It's hard to hear you with that dick shoved so far down your throat.

This has been the most glorious thread. A glorious, glorious, glorious thread.

 

[Limbo Pete]

LMFAO. It's hard to hear you with that dick shoved so far down your throat.

This has been the most glorious thread. A glorious, glorious, glorious thread.

I think your resistance to learning has caused an actual stroke lmao

 

[Madmick]

I think your resistance to learning has caused an actual stroke lmao