“We closed the mental institutions. Also, drugs were not as prevalent in the 60s and 70s.”
It’s enforcement mostly.
When I was a kid the cops would pick up bums, drive them to the edge of town and beat their ass.
Every city and town would do the same, making the bums reconsider their lifestyle.
When I was a kid the cops would pick up bums, drive them to the edge of town and beat their ass.
There is one suburb of L.A. that is still doing some of that. There was a news story about 6 months ago about it. The town borders L.A. and basically moves the bums across the city line. Their streets are bum free and across the street the tents/shelters cover the sidewalks. The gist of the story was that the suburb (I forget the name) was being heatless and causing problems for L.A. by moving them along.