Posted on 12/07/2005 5:57:03 AM PST by SmithL
A bureaucratic stalemate is turning San Francisco's underpasses near the Bay Bridge into a free-fly zone for the homeless -- with the city's cops being ordered to stay out or face possible discipline charges.
In recent months, squatters have been setting up camps amid the piles of beams and pillars stored under roadways for the retrofit of the bridge and its freeway approaches.
In the meantime, police say, there has been a proliferation of auto break-ins and petty crimes around the freeway -- plus a growing chorus of complaints from neighbors and merchants who have had to put up with drunkenness, panhandling, street defecation and other lewd acts.
"We have a bunch of irate merchants and residents who are just fed up,'' said police Capt. Denis O'Leary, who found himself fielding the complaints soon after taking over command of Southern Station some 15 months ago.
There was a time when the cops would have felt free to clear away homeless encampments under the freeway. Anyone refusing to go would have been cited for illegal lodging, blocking the sidewalk or generally creating a nuisance.
But in late 2003, advocates for the homeless went to the city's Office of Citizen Complaints and accused the cops of illegally trying to boot a group of homeless campers off a state-owned parking lot near the Transbay Terminal.
The police watchdog agency rejected the complaint, saying the homeless didn't have permission from the lot's manager to be there; and, therefore, they were trespassing.
Nonetheless, the cops got the message to back off -- and leave the areas under the freeway and its ramps to the California Highway Patrol until they got an agreement from the state to enforce the law on Caltrans property.
(Excerpt) Read more at sfgate.com ...
In Chicago the cops keep the bums moving. "Get up...Get movin"
It works real well. Bums like to sit.... so they go somewhere else.
Yet you keep voting in loony socialist politicians. I guess socialism is a great feel good thing until it affects you personally - then it is not so funny.
It's real great the San Francisco is quickly becoming a dump that normal people don't want to visit. Pretty sad to see the bums taking over because the cops are favoring them over the residents and business owners.
When the Communists took over the Russians, they shot all the homeless. End of problem. Guess we can't do that.
San Fran is taking the same approach as the French with their little Muslim slum problem. Look where it got them.
So the contractors are forced to deal with the bums? That sucks.
While I was working on the big dig in Boston, we had a jobsite right across from the Pine Street Inn, a big homeless shelter. They don't allow drunk people in, so they decided to take over our job trailer while we were temporarily delayed. In 2 weeks, the trailer was so gross, we had it removed and destroyed.
I hope the contractor files a big claim against the city for every second and penny lost dealing with the bums.
in fact, one of stalins favorite lines was, get rid of the man, no man, no more problems. to tell you the truth, we will either learn to use a bit more common sense with things like crime and homelessness, or we will perish.
I recall the bums (homeless) of SF way back in 1950. The streets were their home. Course most had their jug of red wind for comfort.
In Merry Olde England, they used to be given twenty lashes and orders to move along
So what's to stop some terrorist from disguising himself as a bum (probably wouldn't be very hard to do), heading over to the area where police aren't allowed to go, and setting up a bomb underneath one of those freeway ramps?
I used to work in the Brentwood district of West Los Angeles (O.J. Simpson murder country)...every summer the flocks of bums and panhandlers would really expand.
My reasoning was that it was the "flyway" between downtown Los Angeles and homeless-friendly Santa Monica.
They'd migrate their way west to the cooler climes of the beach.
These people deserve the right to crap, pee, and talk to themselves anywhere they want! </ sar>
The San Francisco Board of Supervisors needs a healthy bum presence in town - how else are they going to "prove" that capitalism is evil and justify their ongoing shakedown of downtown businesses? If some city residents end up being crime victims...well, that's just the price we all have to pay to ensure an orderly (and for the Supervisors and their "homeless advocate cronies, profitable) transition to a post-modernist, socialist society. ;)
I can see this one coming - the fruity liberal groups want the cops to leave them alone and let them gather in this area and then when conditions get REALLY bad there they will blame it on the government saying that they turned their back on the people because the government is racist. Kind of reminds me of the police-hating thug culture in New Orleans that was suddenly upset that there weren't more cops around.
Hey! The Dims are just trying to create their own
'Enterprise Free Zones'.
LOL!
They are in *full* 'Self Fullfilling Prophesy Mode'.
One way, non refundable, bus tickets to San Fransisco,
and a grocery bag each, filled with PB sandwiches,
Bologna sandwiches, and a plasitic gallon milk jug
to refill at the bus stop layovers....problem solved.
Best capital expediture a city could make.
This has happened before, a number of times, in various parts of the city. Same m.o., same bums, same politicians, same lawyers/homeless advocates. Same ole, same ole. (City Hall, U.N.Plaza, Powell/Market, Union Square, 280 underpasses, etc.)
The neighbors and merchants will finally pressure the Board of Stuporvisors and the Mayor (Laughing Stock of the USA) Newsom to let the cops do their jobs.....but NOT before more wailing, posturing and non-profits lawyering -- all for bellying up to the election bar. This is a good time to do it when the focus is on Christmas and the season of hope/help/whatever. It's pure politicking.
The city property is SO expensive, both private and commercial, that the bums WILL lose.
Most of the bums are non-minority. They can't go to the homeless shelters because they are controlled (in reality) by minority thugs who take over and don't allow the non-minorities much of a chance to move in. (I do volunteer work for the charity that runs almost all of the shelters.)
No one really cares for the bums, since they are just drunks and drug addicts who could work, and non-minority bums to boot.
The charity groups do (most Catholic charities, though there is still the one Salvation Army shelter.) but the rest of the loudmouths? Nah, they really don't care. They may really have the best attitude because nothing ever changes with the bums. They live, party, get sick and die with regularity, to be replaced instantaneously by more bums....to be endlessly used by the politicians and "advocates."
The drunks and addicts have been here forever, the way it is with most large urban areas, the same nasty areas of town, same hopelessness, same problems, same everything except their race. There are more minorities, but now THEY get first/best shot at detox, rehab and shelters. For the non-minorities, nothing has changed, ever.
There are no women or children on the streets. Well, there are for a few hours, then they are whisked away to the appropriate shelters, rehab, detox and foster homes.
The crazies on the street, who won't/don't take their meds are also mostly non-minorities. The minority and women crazies get first crack at the shelters, hospitals and hospices...if they want. Not all want that, regardles of race, gender and age. Some insist on staying on the streets. Forcible coercion is rarely use.
Bottom line: the crack-down WILL happen eventually, probably after the new year, when all the hubbub of the Christmas season is past and all are nursing hang-overs.
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