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800 Maynard Ave S, Suite 200, Seattle, WA 98134
800 Maynard Ave S, Suite 200, Seattle, WA 98134
Tavel. Clearly a dick.
Tavel appears to insist on greater accountability; cost-effective solutions; and a refusal to let political orthodoxy interfere with research and policy-making. This makes him sensible, not a right-wing fanatic. This makes him a credible candidate, not a homeless-hating monster. Of course, this will earn him the name-calling hostility of many writers and readers of The Stranger, but Tavel merits respect. Speak your mind, Phil. People are listening.
That McKinsey study, which CM Herbold and The Stranger seem to accept as gospel, has a few serious problems:
It was funded by the Seattle Chamber of Commerce, whose members could gain huge $$$ in government contracts to build more affordable housing. This gives the reportâs authors a large inherent conflict of interest which is not noted, let alone compensated for, in their analysis.
It notes a correlation between rising rents and a rising homeless population, and then simply assumes causation. Other possible causes are either hand-waved away, or ignored completely, including:
The Cityâs own survey of homeless persons in 2016 had less than 1 in 6 saying a rental increase had caused homelessness, while far more gave drug use or job loss. That same survey showed a miniority of Seattleâs homeless giving âSeattleâ in response to the question, âWhere did you most recently become homeless?â Despite this, McKinseyâs authors nowhere consider the possibility of a chronically-homeless population simply moving here.
Being homeless isn't a simple problem; there are many ways it happens and the best thing we could do is provide a real support system for the people.
Mental health care we need to get serious about this and we need some better shrinks because the last one a friend saw was more interested in her RLS (restless leg syndrome) than her head.
Let's provide a real support system for when people become unemployed or underemployed; sure Unemployment Insurance is a step in the right direction but it's not enough. If you become unemployed for any reason we should catch you and spin you a direction where you can get a new job and continue to take care of said family. This could be education; this could be a basic income...
Public Transportation for homeless people should be free
We also need to catch the underemployed and help them so they can support their family.
This is the hardest part for our society to change but we need to stop valuing the wrong things like the latest iphone or sneakers. Create products that can be repaired instead of thrown away it can be repaired like my fathers cars.
If you think this last part isn't true drive through a great neighborhood on trash day and you can find electronics and all sorts of things out on the curb waiting for the trash man to throw it away. You get there at the right time and you can win if you can repair it.
Otherwise we will end up like Babylon
P.S. Plastic bags have got to go; use glass bottles instead.
Tavel has pandered to the right-wing lock-'em-up "Safe Seattle" crowd throughout this entire campaign. He's doing it with dog whistles, but he's doing it. Fortunately, compared to Lisa Herbold, who is maybe the single most knowledgeable Council member we have, he's in way over his head, and most of the voters won't be fooled. Ask Lisa about any issue, and she'll give you the facts and figures right off the top of her head. Ask Tavel, and all you'll get is platitudes.
"The analogy that I use,â Tavel said, âis itâs like parents [who] have the 40-year-old pot head on the couch playing video games and leaving their stuff all over⌠"
Spot on! This guy gets it. Let people behave how they want with no fear of consequences in the name of "compassion, " and guess what? You prolong that behavior. And you're not doing your 40 ymyear ols vid playing pothead any favors, either.
@7: Agreed, but Tavelâs analogy is actually quite tame. If heâd had the adult child stealing from the parents to buy drugs, it would have been more apt.
What Seattle has done really does count as enabling, but on a grand scale. Weâve effectively enticed people to move here, done everything we could to ensure they had a ready and steady supply of crippling drugs, and then left them to rot in their own filth. Along the way, weâve built a truly parasitic, wasteful, and entitled homeless-industrial complex, which has made things worse for everyone. There is literally nothing good to have emerged from any of this, and yet anyone who dares offer an honest, earnest, and obvious criticism gets vilified as a raging right-winger who hates the homeless.
If our next City Council actually does a proper job of investigating the details of this mess, they may well find things are even worse than we already know. All we can do is vote out all of our current incumbents, and start fresh.
Funny how corporations are evil until they produce a study that supports your prejudices. That McKinsey study should itself be studied. I suspect a whole lot of cherry-picking to support a recommendation to spend $400 Million yearly, ad infinitum.
Maybe Lisa should take the bull ring out of her nose. It draws attention to part of her that doesnât need it, ie. her face.