'Castaways' in motor homes feel stranded on society's fringe

LA times ^ | 3/3/2018 | Luis Sinco

[sodpoodle]

The 2017 Greater Los Angeles Homeless Count tallied 4,545 campers and RVs in L.A. County that possibly serve as makeshift dwellings. In short, one of America's least affordable housing market forces people to find creative alternatives for shelter.

I happened upon the situation about a year ago, trying to find a shortcut on my commute home. I exited the jammed 110 Freeway in South L.A., turning onto Broadway to a landscape dominated by warehouses and light industry. At 133rd Street, I noticed numerous motor homes, most in a state of disrepair, lining both sides of the road.

I found similar encampments in Manchester Square, a once-thriving neighborhood just east of LAX being converted into a transportation hub for the airport. In a surreal scene, scores of homeless people scratched out an existence beneath the endless string of jetliners landing at the airport.

[yldstrk]

Your brother and his children take proper steps to use the services as intended and will climb out of poverty. Many do not.

[yldstrk]

Where is that? Where exactly are the opportunities?

[steelwheels]

That indicates some sense of self-reliance.

Maybe a little, but in my opinion mostly indolence.

[hal ogen]

People make choices. Choices have consequences. It is their lives. No violins here.

[Rebelbase]

I’ve read countless sailing journals from folks touring in the South Pacific. A significant number of them have idyllic experiences until they dock in a US dependency. That’s when things start going missing from their boats.

[Wuli]

A generation caught by a two-fer; technology and automation skewing the “blue collar” and high end job market away from skills everyone with just a high school degree trained for or had experience in, and illegal immigration lowering the average wage of all work on the low end, undercutting some of the self-help self-employed service industries that citizens use to do, for decent wages; industries now dominated by legal and illegal cheaper imported labor.

[Chode]

maybe if they kicked out all the ILLEGALS there'd be money to solve the problem...

wait, never mind, that's crazy talk

[TADSLOS]

LMAO. That’s a hate speech violation in Kalifornia.

[robroys woman]

All over the country. But you have to have a marketable skill, be it computers, mechanics, electrical, finance, etc.

The days of making a living via unskilled labor are over.

[robroys woman]

Yup.

[Chode]

100%

[sportutegrl]

When are they going to start parking their campers on the beach in LA like in the Lethal Weapon movies. Imagine a beat up old camper with a million dollar location.

[jeannineinsd]

Imagine a beat up old camper with a million dollar location

Sounds like James Garner in the Rockford Files in the 1970s.

[jeannineinsd]

Instead of camping in a RV in Los Angeles County, these folks should have camped in a tent by the Santa Ana River in Orange County. Then they would have been provided with a taxpayer funded motel voucher.

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/3636782/posts

[who_would_fardels_bear]

1) Make it illegal to be an able-bodied vagrant
2) Bring back something like the Conservation Corps
3) Provide three hots and a cot and a minimum wage to all those who sign up
4) Keep them occupied with simple work such as clearing litter, clearing brush, making fire roads, prepping land for new freeways, picking crops, etc.