Is homelessness a visible problem where you are?

seadoug said:
Yes. We are in a more suburban area of Dallas. Homelessness used to be confined to the downtown area but now it is down the street. I feel so bad for these people when our temps hit over 100 degrees, but I've been advised there are shelters and some don't want to go because there are curfews and strict alcohol and drug policies.

Several years ago, I went to my local dry cleaners and there was a woman sitting on the sidewalk right outside. I felt so bad for her, and she wasn't pan-handling so I gave her $20. I went inside the dry cleaners and the manager told me the police had offered on numerous occasions to take her to a shelter but she had refused. :(
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OKC has this problem on a few highway ramps with traffic lights. Panhandlers get aggressive. What gets me is smoking, pricey bicycles and good hair cuts. There are shelters everywhere.
 

Yes they are seen.
Every parking lot has people working the exit they have shifts and often spats about this is their time to panhandle. They have various signs saved in a shrub about 20 feet away from their "work" .... they stay in cars or RV on a street a block from work. seen a few narcan empties litter the street.

Every so often the police run them off as it effects the businesses in area. I worry about my car while at work so park by a window I can watch it.... Sad thing is most of these people who driven up to my city from a bigger city south of us..... that wants to fake they are working on their problem be driving or encouraging them to other places . My city bought a older hotel and before they could move them in found many areas contaminated with residue from cooking meth.
Now they have little money to gut it and rebuild and the taxpayers lost sympathy when the city had not done due diligence before purchase.
 
mike4lorie said:
Quite a few in town... I always try, met a fella that was down in the dumps, pushing his shopping cart around, with all his belongings...with his dog following... I told him to have a seat on the bench, and that I will be right back... went to the grocery store, got a can of food for his dog... and then to Subway, got him a sandwich... and a drink, came back...gave it to him, and probably $50 in my wallet...

Told him here's my number, call me later tonight, and I will talk to the wife, and see if it's ok, if you and your dog move it, and maybe help ya get back on your feet... Lorie was all for it, but wanted to meet him... I said he's going to call tonight, and we;ll meet somewhere... My phone rang for about a week wanting to buy drugs, or sell me drugs, and never saw this fellow and his dog ever again... Think my number was sold for money... I just wanted to help...
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Mike, obviously you and your wife meant well, but you would have been taking an awful chance. It would be extremely dangerous to just open up your home to a total stranger you met on the street, because he was down and out. He could have been mentally ill, or part of a criminal gang. You could have been harmed (or killed!), or lost all your precious possessions, just because you were trying to be kind.

I think the best way to help someone like that would be to give them the address of a local social service agency, where the professional social workers know of places that could take them in. Or probably, many of them would rather just continue living on the street, because of mental illness or other reasons. But short of giving him a couple of bucks or a sandwich, or giving them the referral I just mentioned, I would steer clear.
 
Sunny said:
Mike, obviously you and your wife meant well, but you would have been taking an awful chance. It would be extremely dangerous to just open up your home to a total stranger you met on the street, because he was down and out. He could have been mentally ill, or part of a criminal gang. You could have been harmed (or killed!), or lost all your precious possessions, just because you were trying to be kind.

I think the best way to help someone like that would be to give them the address of a local social service agency, where the professional social workers know of places that could take them in. Or probably, many of them would rather just continue living on the street, because of mental illness or other reasons. But short of giving him a couple of bucks or a sandwich, or giving them the referral I just mentioned, I would steer clear.
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These days, I would be equally afraid if I was homeless and someone approached me with a similar offer.

Too much, too fast.

It takes time to develop trust.
 
We live in the Kansas City area, and we seldom get anywhere near downtown. When we do, it is usually just driving through downtown to get to somewhere down below downtown. In fact, I have never noticed anyone looking for handouts in the downtown area. I am sure we have some, but they must go elsewhere to search for handouts.
 
Outside a big city and still visible here.

They mostly hang in the parks some setting up tents or making teepees in the wooded areas or hanging out underneath pavillions or over hangs of buildings especially the first half of the day. In one open park with sport fields, pinic areas and trees they had to put lighting at/on the pavillions which helps deter many from hanging out there at night.

Some of the shopping centers with vacant store fronts also seem to attract them because many of those strip malls have overhead cover. The problem has gotton so bad that many big shopping centers won't put in bus stop benches or cover.
 
Visible ? Yes Younger, older well dressed poorly dressed, male female there is no one description that fits them all.

KTNV
Southern Nevada Homelessness Continuum of Care Census Report
In 2024, the Point-in-Time (PIT) Count found that 7,906 people in Clark County were experiencing homelessness on a single day. Of ...

Southern Nevada sees 20% rise in homelessness, new report reveals
Mar 7, 2025 — Las Vegas (KSNV) — The 2024 "Point in Time" homeless count has identified over 7,900 individuals experiencing homelessness...
 
Santa Clara County population 2025 estimate 1.87m. Homeless estimate 10,000 thus 187 citizens per one homeless. We have the highest number of homeless in the SFBay Area. Many are not long time residents but rather moved to this region because of :

  • much low pay employment for unskilled, uneducated,
  • lack of government harassment if illegal aliens,
  • highest level of support services for unemployed and homeless,
  • lots of charitable persons eager to help them
  • legal recreational weed at numbers of legal dispensaries
  • plenty of supermarket food supplies everywhere just an easy walk away
  • easy to obtain, available illegal drugs
  • many other homeless to socialize with
  • Pacific Ocean moderated climate easy to sleep outdoors within not too cold in winter nor hot in summer.
  • plenty of tree and vegetated creeks across landscapes where authorities cannot easily find them tenting
  • as one of the wealthiest urban counties in nation, plenty of residential folks to burglarize for the not few criminally oriented.

In fact, our legislature even gives illegal aliens monthly cash benefits without much oversight because there are so many. So YEAH a powerful MAGNET, as pinheads in control wonder why the homeless population keeps growing?🥴

It would not be so bad if the state or feds paid for sharing a fair amount of the overhead but instead local cities and counties bear all the cost and again act as magnets.
 
There are many reasons for homelessness. But I think the most common one is a long series of bad decisions until it’s too late to change. Does everyone deserve a roof over their head. Sure, in theory. But who’s going to pay for it? The government in Austin throws all kinds of money at homelessness, and gues what? Turns out, when you subsidize something, you just get more of it.
 
JBR said:
It's kind of like that around here. British Columbia has a lot of the milder climate in Canada, especially further west than where I live (Vancouver, Sunshine Coast, Vancouver Island, some of the Gulf Islands).
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As a garden appreciator Victorias gardens are worth the bother to get there but the Van Dusen in your town was as good as anything I saw in the Northwest.
 
Yes in the city , most have resorted to living in tiny tents in the parklands that surround the city and this time of the year when it’s stating to get chilly going into winter months they collect bits of dry wood that’s on or fallen off trees and have a campfire.

There appears to be quite a few homeless people in NSW side of the boarder of where we are at present in QLD / NSW ….but we’ve noticed that in the previous years before covid when we came up here for a month each winter
and sadly it was very noticeable how many were being treated for drug addition in the area ..way back in 2018 by the number who were lined up at 9 am at a chemist , to get some sort of treatment ( I noticed some drinking something from a cup )
as the chemist walked down the line handing It out ….

So drugs have taken a big toll on many forcing them to decide between drugs and a roof over the head

That chemist is no longer there ( we had to walk past it to get to a 9.30 am dance we attended )
 
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Bretrick said:
I rarely come into the city center this early, 7.30 am. Circumstances dictated that I did this morning.
In the 400 meters from the Bus Port to this coffee shop I counted 11 vagrants sleeping in shop alcoves.
Australia has twice as many homeless, per capita than the US. (48 per 10,000 v 23)
UKs figures are 56 homeless per 10,000
I have written often about the inequality of Australia, and though we are looked on as a "Rich" Country, only a few are up there in the comfortable level.
The rest? Totally ignored and shunned by society
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Where I'm living now, they have a "Safe Park" for individuals with cars to stay while trying to acquire housing. Problem is, once in there, they have to violate laws to get kicked out.

There's still quite a few who have been there since it was at the Vancouver Mall (2018) and moved over when the site was chosen. They didn't have any desire to get a place to rent and prefer to live in vehicles.

Usually you'll find begging at the off ramps on I-205 vancouver and and occasionally I-5. They fluctuate as some beg 12 hours a day. Then stop as maybe they got enough $$$ for several days.
 
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OregonGuy said:
Here in Portland Oregon businesses moved out when the city began welcoming the homeless and not enforcing trespassing, drug, and shoplifting laws.

Druggies s[aced out sleeping in tents on public and private property.
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Portland is such a cool city. We visited well before Covid and loved it. We could walk just about anywhere at that time. Your national gardens are amazing, especially the Japanese Garden. And we won't talk about Voodoo Donuts!

I'm sorry it has been so hard hit due to such lax policies.
 
Bretrick said:
It is instances like yours that forces us to stop trying to be kind and helpful.
How many times do we need to be kicked in the guts before we say "no more"
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If it wasn't an organized scam there would be fights over the corners with lots of traffic.
The person I was talking about a few above had a PHD and his wife a Dentist.

We do not understand they live a lie, a lifestyle, many have to be unnoticed by the IRS and Child services.
Most of them are B.S. If you drive around a mid-morning / afternoon you might occasionally see a guy with his shopping
cart out there in a mt space with a tent. Most of them move out.

Moto marts lock their outdoor restrooms to keep the druggies out of them taking baths and things.
Hard working Citizens just don't get what total B.S. really is.
 
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papa tiger said:
If it wasn't an organized scam there would be fights over the corners with lots of traffic.
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I guess we need to face the difference between the poverty-stricken and scammers. As I said in my first comment to this thread, we don't have any visible homelessness. We do have plenty of Romanian gypsies, however and on one occasion I actually did see two of them fighting over a corner. There are many four-letter words I have to describe them.
 
Our small town has four drug treatment centers so larger cities in the state bus in people and drop them off here. I don’t know how they think we can take care of them all. On the coldest nights of winter a motel is rented so they’ll have rooms to stay out of the cold but they keep the rescue squad busy handling drug overdoses.
I quit giving panhandlers money the day I saw one leaving the intersection with his homeless sign, go across the road, get in a new pickup and take off up the interstate. Not long after that people were holding panhandling signs at each of the entrances to the mall. All of their signs were exactly the same. Obviously organized. I’m generous but I’m finished being a sucker. I only give through charity organizations now.
 

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