When your overwhelmed with what to do with all the problems, one will solve them all

[Thad]

What would it look like when people caring had no opposition. When the laws of the day finaly say we need something different than law to govern us.

Sonoma County wants to solve a problem no one else has figured out to solve and saying to us lets do it, how do we fix it so no one is homeless.

Faces: https://www.sonomacountygazette.com/...icle-4689.html

https://www.pressdemocrat.com/news/5...s-okay-village

https://sonomacounty.ca.gov/CDC/News...meless-People/

Why not have a festival out of solving problems.

How it could be

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1...it?ts=5692b5b7

It could be better by editing so it could stand as a presentation to a sitting council

[nicofrog]

OK; nice sentiment,AND you are right It COULD be better by editing so here goes..

When You're overwhelmed with what to do with problems,one might solve them all

What would it look like if people caring had no opposition. When the laws of the day finaly say we need something different than law to govern us.

Sonoma County wants to solve a problem no one else has figured out to solve, saying to us" lets do it," how do we fix it and make it so no one is homeless.

Faces: https://www.sonomacountygazette.com/...icle-4689.html

https://www.pressdemocrat.com/news/5...s-okay-village

https://sonomacounty.ca.gov/CDC/News...meless-People/

Why not have a festival of solving problems.

How it could be??

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1...it?ts=5692b5b7

It might be better by editing , so it could stand as a presentation to a sitting council of ducks
(Brief quick edit by unqualified editor)

[Thad]

It took me a minute to get past the ducks, but you did edit and so thank you

OK; nice sentiment,AND you are right It COULD be better by editing so here goes..

[Moon]

..., how do we fix it so no one is homeless...

Please phone your county Supervisor's office and ask her/him to get the Board to open all the unused buildings the county owns, and has no plans to sell or use, for housing--the largest for Camp Michela to get indoors for the rest of the winter, all the others to be converted to tiny apartments.

[Tinkerbell]

Moon - I think this is a very good idea and timely. A group of us (called EACH - Elder Advocates for Community Health) went to Supervisor Carillo several months ago and asked his help for the homeless. He seemed interested, but I don't think he has done very much. We asked him for a list of all the county buildings and real property. He said he would get it for us, but his office never could find such a list. Of course the county does have a list somewhere.
I suggest that your idea be expanded to include buildings that the county wants to sell - such as the old water works building on College Ave in Santa Rosa, and the old Sutter Hospital on Chanate. It is more important to house people than to make money.

Please phone your county Supervisor's office and ask her/him to get the Board to open all the unused buildings the county owns, and has no plans to sell or use, for housing--the largest for Camp Michela to get indoors for the rest of the winter, all the others to be converted to tiny apartments.

[Shandi]

"It is more important to house people than to make money."

This is a matter of opinion, depending on who will benefit. Unfortunately, the increasing rents don't support this perspective.

If affordable housing developers bought these properties that could help, but there's a reason that's not happening. Anyone have a clue about this?

[podfish]

"It is more important to house people than to make money."

This is a matter of opinion, depending on who will benefit. Unfortunately, the increasing rents don't support this perspective.

just to tie it into my ongoing piecemeal rant:

of course it's more important, and while technically it's a matter of opinion - really? you want to take the opposite position: it's more important to make money than house people?

people need housing. People need health care. One of the things that bugged me the most about people against Obama's initiatives actually took the position that it's essential that some people don't get health care - that the system can't afford to provide it. By failing to take that to its logical conclusion, they tacitly claim that a system that costs less because more people die is a reasonable choice.
The point here - if applied to an individual, maybe true. Although I'd hate to stand at the pearly gates and say it - no, my personal goal isn't to house everyone rather than make any money myself. As a society, though, it should be a more important goal than it appears to be.

[Moon]

Moon - ... A group of us (called EACH - Elder Advocates for Community Health) went to Supervisor Carillo several months ago and asked his help for the homeless...

I agree; however, Jim Leddy, who has been very supportive, assures us the Board would not even consider such a thing. The problem is, though, that if the county had been willing to open the water agency building for use until it went on the market, Michela, for whom the camp is named, would not have been murdered at age 23.

[tommy]

The statement "It is more important to house people than to make money" is true in the absolute. It's an ideal perspective, that breaks down in the complexity and messiness of every day reality. Like the ideal "you should always tell the truth", our human egos do not always hold that absolute, when we're trying to get what we want, and shading the truth a little bit may help.

Housing is an element of the supply and demand constraints of our capital based economy. The amount of rent charged reflects the cost of the down payment, mortgage, repairs, management, profit, etc... relative to other uses of that money - the return one could get from investing in the stock market, selling weed, or whatever. If the rent is too high, no one will want to rent it. If it's too low, you'll have tons of people who want it, and have to withdraw the listing from Craigslist as you'll be overwhelmed with emails.

Plus add to the mix, Sonoma Co is a very desirable place, a beautiful & pretty well preserved coastal area of stunning beauty, with a healthy economy... leading to a bunch of people who want to live here. Then withdraw alot of housing from locals, so you can get 2 or 3 times the rental amount by renting Airbnb... & you've got more demand than supply.

Affordable housing is, kinda like our dreams of St Peter welcoming us into heaven, more fantasy than reality. In the last year, maybe 75 affordable rentals and for sale units were built in the County, while 6500 jobs were added. Affordable housing is generally built by developers who get incentives from the government... otherwise they could make more money building market rate housing, or investing their time and money somewhere else. Rent control? All that does is withdraw housing from the supply, as once people get a rent controlled unit, they stay there forever, reducing supply and thus raising the rents for others.

The result? People move out of the County for more affordable places. They double and triple up. Our economy is based on money. It evolved gradually from a bartering system. If you want good housing, you've got to work for it, or be lucky & win the lottery. This may not be an ideal system, but it is the reality.

"It is more important to house people than to make money."

This is a matter of opinion, depending on who will benefit. Unfortunately, the increasing rents don't support this perspective.

If affordable housing developers bought these properties that could help, but there's a reason that's not happening. Anyone have a clue about this?

[Joseph]

Reality sets in again. What seems reasonable and fair meets fact and unfair. Your effort to educate will likely not inspire others to look for deeper solutions. The obvious one is to offer space in one's own home. No government involvement, etc.

Even if one area find a limited solution to the immediate problem, it is not a solution to the many homeless around the country or the world. These are deep seated problems that we only see the ugly face showing.
Another solution is to collectively finance the purchase of the properties from the county and hire the homeless to renovate them, while teaching skills but for how many and for how long ?

It is admirable that someone wants to solve the problem but as you have, I would suggest we all learn to not try to solve symptoms but causes. It takes a lot more thought and commitment, something lacking in the local and national culture.

[Dorothy Friberg]

With most of the taxpayers trying to figure out how NOT to pay taxes (me too) and a good percentage of us thinking the government OWES us food, housing and medical care; how, pray tell,will these services be funded??? (and yes, I believe in Food Not Bombs). Dorothy Friberg

...people need housing. People need health care...

[tommy]

There is no complete solution to Housing problems. There are many reasons that make solutions elusive, such as providing housing for the homeless will attract more homeless, and exacerbate the problem. Realistically, homelessness is the result of other currents in our culture. There used to be more resources for the mentally ill, better middle class jobs, and cheaper housing. For me, it's the economy that is underneath these currents. The economy has changed: less regulation, less funding for social welfare programs, fewer jobs, more investors making money off housing... all of which has led to more homeless.

Housing is now a challenge we face, along with environmental degradation, global warming, terrorism, overpopulation, etc. May we hold these issues, and those affected by them, in our hearts, with love and kindness.

...Even if one area find a limited solution to the immediate problem, it is not a solution to the many homeless around the country or the world....

[Sara S]

I remember after Reagan cut off funding for mental services there were more and more people on the streets who had been in some facility; not many, I'm sure, had any housing available to them.

[Thad]

One womans solution to homelessness

https://news.yahoo.com/meet-woman-th...173900904.html

[podfish]

With most of the taxpayers trying to figure out how NOT to pay taxes (me too) and a good percentage of us thinking the government OWES us food, housing and medical care; how, pray tell,will these services be funded??? (and yes, I believe in Food Not Bombs). Dorothy Friberg

that phrasing is really annoying - it's dog-whistle politics: claiming people feel that XXX 'owes' them YYY. Boy, those people have some sense of entitlement, eh?
you're right if you're describing a problem. People are indeed trying to figure a way to not pay taxes. Not all people - but plenty. Some of us feel that our fair share is fair to pay, and don't get all righteous about whether it's being managed all that well. If I cared enough, I should get involved and do something to change it. But I don't, so I don't hold public organizations to some unrealistic idealized standard.

Sorry if I'm misunderstanding your position - but you're using the language of the vindictive, moralizing, uncharitable political right. I honestly don't care if people think they're owed something. Ethically, it matters to me that I think they're owed something. Because they're human. And I'm disgusted that people who are interested in power don't think that while they're in power, it should be a primary goal that all people are fed, housed and kept healthy despite themselves and their bad behavior. Unfortunately I'm not interested in power, I don't have the talent or inclination to run a political organization, but I try to support those who share these goals at least a little.
And the most offensive thing of all is that this is supposed to be a Christian nation. I'm not religious at all myself, but I have a good enough education to know that there's nothing in the Christian doctrine about caring for only the worthy, or preserving wealth for the deserving. If anything, it's the opposite. There's words about god not letting the birds starve despite the fact they don't work - no words at all encouraging a balanced approach in giving charity or caring for those in need.

So it's a practical problem that 'these services' aren't being paid for. I'm an engineer, there are lots of solutions if your change the way you look at the problem. So hell yes, tax people harder. Find out who enjoys work for its own sake, and help them do it but don't let them keep the cash. Really, you don't think Zuckerberg would run Facebook anyway? It's warped economics that lets so much cash flow to so few people. A historical accident, not a designed system. Make supermarkets put out bins of raw rice for free, and charge more for beer. I'd spend about the same and people who can't afford beer then could eat. There are lots of things that could be done if we didn't have so much inertia in society and such unfortunate patterns of thinking.
It's true that too much goes to the military, way too much, that would go a long way to providing necessities. It's a bunch of money so it's a great place to start. But it can also be a cop out - just like the conservative point of view that welfare wouldn't be needed if people would just work harder, this can be the equivalent that we won't have to give up anything else if the military didn't suck up so much. I'm proposing (and hoping that this is the way civilization is evolving) a different way to envision what's "my" money and who's actually earned what. As well as a new ethical standard. We find the Romans barbaric; I hope that we too will be seen that way, tolerating people sleeping under bridges and in doorways, but also in forcing 'average' people to struggle to find a simple place to live.

[podfish]

hopefully this ties up the OT tangent.. I don't know whether it's a thread of its own:

Even a publication as mainstream as Forbes is recognizing this..

But how are we all going to live if we don’t have jobs? At the same time as technology has replaced more and more occupations and it becomes clear that it will replace many others in the coming years, the introduction of a universal income has been proposed as a solution to providing the majority of people in society with enough money to live on, allowing them to retrain for other activities.

[Moon]

Could you remind us what OT stands for? [Off Topic]
A basic income--livable income, currently, say, $33k/y, not $11k--is a great idea, and when it's had a year or so to show its success in Switzerland, I hope we can institute it here. One of the first things it would do is to virtually eliminate child and teen prostitution. And, no, it won't just be eaten up by inflation, even under this irrational, eternal-growth, capitalist system; there are web sites where you can look at diagrams of the flow of wealth in an economy with a guaranteed income. Universal housing is possible; Cuba's had it for a long time, and now even Utah has it. (Now if we can just get Utahans to stay in their homes and not invade California when we have an important political issue coming up.)

hopefully this ties up the OT tangent...

[podfish]

Could you remind us what OT stands for? [Off Topic]
A basic income--livable income, currently, say, $33k/y, not $11k--is a great idea, and when it's had a year or so to show its success in Switzerland, I hope we can institute it here. One of the first things it would do is to virtually eliminate child and teen prostitution. And, no, it won't just be eaten up by inflation, even under this irrational, eternal-growth, capitalist system; there are web sites where you can look at diagrams of the flow of wealth in an economy with a guaranteed income. Universal housing is possible; Cuba's had it for a long time, and now even Utah has it. (Now if we can just get Utahans to stay in their homes and not invade California when we have an important political issue coming up.)

I do really love the idea, though it's not easy to see how it'll get from here to there, but to me one key is to separate 'needs' from the cash economy. They tried to keep insurance companies involved in public health, just to avoid too much disruption, but look what that's done to Obamacare. Life would be simpler if earnings were for discretionary things. That way you don't have the stereotypical (and I suspect not all that serious a) problem of people spending welfare on cigarettes. So, you might still have exploitative vices, since people do want their cigarettes and would sell what they could. Hmm.. maybe besides the in-kind free stuff, a little per-person cash for discretionary naughtiness would help it succeed.

[Thad]

You don't have to teach a plant to grow, mostly make sure there's water don't block it from the sun, it grows and yields its bounty. As for humans we grow the same way, Unfortunately there are those in power who have only a small focus on what they require from this process

Undiscovered currency.

Creating value out of Chaos

the baseline of the new formula

Imagination

Imagi Nation

Citizens of The Dream

Within imagination the battles are won or lost

How large are are you or how small does your imagination tell you you are

in terms of that

What could be

I do really love the idea, though it's not easy to see how it'll get from here to there, but to me one key is to separate 'needs' from the cash economy...

[Jude Iam]

so, umm, tommy,

along with "holding the issues and those affected by them in our hearts",
if one had, say, two or three dozen rental houses in sonoma county then those places could be rented at an affordable rate - or even better, a rate of true "love and kindness" - a bargain rate.

just how many of your dozens of rentals are at that rate? wondering, jude

...May we hold these issues, and those affected by them, in our hearts, with love and kindness.

[Dorothy Friberg]

I agree with the rice solution, but let it be brown rice.