Free Republic

Missing from the picture, though, is the violence and disorder that makes these camps untenable from the get-go. They’re crime dens. They’re dangerous. They’re places no human should live, and places that the public should not have to subsidize. Even though police run patrols, and community groups run outreach programs, tent cities tend to be “governed” by gangs. In Vancouver, gang members set up tents in the community as an outpost for dealing. In Calgary, a gang took over a camp near a drop-in centre — resulting in beatings of campers and assaults on centre workers. In Edmonton, gangs are...

Fox News California teachers union pushing for homeless access to school parking lots amid looming strike The Fresno school district says it does not plan to meet the union's demands Kassy Dillon October 5, 2023 A teachers union in California is pushing for the Fresno Unified School District to allow homeless families to park their cars in high school lots amid a looming strike. The demand is included in the Fresno Teachers Association's "last, best, and final" contract offer to the superintendent. The document also asks for the district to allocate $500,000 for security in the lots. "We do not...

For a while during the runup to the elections last month, it looked as if former Republican real estate developer Rick Caruso might pull off a miracle and defeat Democratic Congresswoman Karen Bass to become the next Mayor of Los Angeles. In the end, Bass squeaked out a six-point victory and will be inaugurated as the first female Mayor in the city’s history. Out on the campaign trail, Bass made a point of repeatedly promising to tackle the city’s endemic homelessness crisis. Not coincidentally, a large group of homeless people have been living in an encampment that activists set up...

Video of homeless camps surrounding the White House...

PORTLAND, Ore. (AP) — Makeshift shelters abut busy roadways, tent cities line sidewalks, tarps cover broken-down cars, and sleeping bags are tucked in storefront doorways. The reality of the homelessness crisis in Oregon's largest city can't be denied. "I would be an idiot to sit here and tell you that things are better today than they were five years ago with regard to homelessness," Portland Mayor Ted Wheeler said recently. "People in this city aren't stupid. They can open their eyes."

Cyclists searching for stolen bikes in Denver's homeless camps Cyclists turn to social media to find bikes By: Jaclyn AllenSep 28, 2020 DENVER -- A homeless camp or a bicycle chop shop? In Denver, they can certainly at least appear to be one and the same. So many bikes have been stolen across the city, some people -- encouraged on social media -- are now going from camp to camp looking for their property. "I would rather have my car stolen than this," said Carter Haun, pointing to his custom mountain bike. "It would be easier to get another car."...

A San Francisco law school, business owners and local residents are suing the city to force it to clean up the Tenderloin neighborhood — alleging an almost 300 percent spike in homeless shanty towns, drug dealing and feces-covered sidewalks have made conditions “insufferable.” The lawsuit, filed in federal court May 4 by a group of plaintiffs led by the University of California Hastings College of the Law, seeks a court order to stop the city from using the neighborhood as a “containment zone” for homeless encampments. “Open-air drug sales and other criminal activity, plus crowds of drug users and sidewalk-blocking...

Police and city crews on Thursday began dismantling the nation's largest homeless encampment, notoriously named "The Jungle," in a controversial move that aims to move hundreds of transients from the center of San Jose and find them affordable housing. Police and city crews on Thursday began dismantling the nation's largest homeless encampment, notoriously named "The Jungle," in a controversial move that aims to move hundreds of transients from the center of San Jose and find them affordable housing. Streams of homeless people wheeled their lives out of the encampment on Story Road, their shopping carts full of their belongings. Some...

A sheet of plastic laid over a clothesline. A mini-fortress of milk crates stacked under a tree. A thin mattress on a flimsy crate lying in a dark tunnel. On the edge of Baltimore's woodlands, dozens of the city's transients live in makeshift homes which they consider safer than homeless shelters. Photographer Ben Marcin has captured some of the shanties in his thought-provoking photo essay, 'The Camps', documenting the struggle, loneliness and ingenuity of Maryland's people of the woods.

CONCORD - Officers from six police agencies swept through 24 homeless camps early Tuesday in a new push to get people off the streets and into shelters and help programs. Four teams of officers arrived before dawn at camps near bridges, creeks and trails in Concord, Pleasant Hill and Pacheco. They warned camp residents to pack up and leave within 48 hours or risk being evicted and arrested. Shortly after 6 a.m. Thursday, county crews will move in to close the camps, hauling out mattresses, bedsprings, camp stoves and other debris left behind. The operation reflects a shift in strategy...